Christoph Perels (review)

Field: Arts and Humanities (Social Sciences)

MLR, 96. I, 2001 MLR, 96. I, 2001 marginalized. Wilhelm's play-acting can only be a phase. The illumination of the the complex connection between the androgynous and the aesthetic is also a core featureof the analysesof Eichendorff'sworks.MacLeod makesclear that there is a near obsessive interest in liminality in his work that can be explained precisely in terms of androgyny and aesthetics. Eichendorff's treatments of liminal sexuality, liminal settings, liminal light conditions, and liminal cultures at times generate conditions of 'rampant category confusion' (p. 144): the transvestite and androgynousfiguresrepresentedprovide , of course, the most tellingevidence of this.And their fate is sealed in much the same manner as in Goethe since, as is stressed throughout: 'The androgyne, with its dyadic oscillation between masculinity and femininity, properly belongs to pre-oedipal sphere of the imaginary and indeed cannot survivein thetriangulatedworldof Bildung and socialization'(p. 148).Hence thereisin Eichendorff'sfiction'narrativemotion fromcategoryblurringto category reconstruction' (p. I60), perceived as a conscious response to the 'sexual/textual chaos describedby earlyRomantic writerssuch as FriedrichSchlegel' (p. I59). Whereas many Romantic and Classical writerswere primarilyconcerned with androgyneswho are ultimatelyrevealedas female, and whose weaknessestherefore reflected poorly upon women (in a rather mysogynistic subtext), there is a strong line of more or less anxious treatmentsof male androgynyproduced in the wake of Winckelmann's homoerotic writing. MacLeod notices that 'for Stifter [...] the solutionto the disquietingspectacleof homoerotic fluidityseems to lie in repressing male androgyny, the figure of the "beautifulboy", in favor of the stability of deeroticized ,heterosexualmarriage'(p. 218).This uneasysolutionreflectsthevagaries of the history of sexuality as characterizedby Foucault.Keller is also shown to be highly uneasy in dealing with unstable effeminacy in his male characters (and indeed with gender-bending tendencies amongst his female characters).Whilst a neat narrative solution may at times be provided by a conclusive marriage, the author repeatedly returns to the theme of indeterminate sexuality. MacLeod identifiesa revealing tendency in the late Keller to return 'repetitivelyto the scene of androgyny,while declaringthe desireto eradicate androgynouseffects'(p. 226). The constant need to addressthe prospect of androgyny,even if only to rejectit, is revealed by MacLeod as a fascinatingaspect of a wide range of eighteenth-century and nineteenth-century literature:indeed the Codato the texts suggests that the fascination was not to disappear in the twentieth (do I sense another book in the offing?).Androgyny is shown to be interestingperse and to be a vital site for the discussionof sexualityand socialization,aesthetics,and narrativestrategy. NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF IRELAND, MAYNOOTH JEFF MORRISON Goethein seinerEpoche.Zwolf Versuche.By CHRISTOPH PERELS.Tuibingen: Niemeyer. 1998. 250 pp. DM 78. In these twelve essays Christoph Perels, Director of the FreieDeutsche Hochstiftin Frankfurt a.M., examines various aspects of Goethe's life and work and the intellectualenvironmentin which he grew up. The book opens with a wide-ranging account of the task of culture in the context of eighteenth century enlightened absolutism that marked German political life of the day. Although regional differencesgreatlymatteredin the Holy Roman Empire,therewere many common features:the princes built on a large scale;public festivitiesthat showed the rulerin allhisglorywere frequentand noteworthy;educationalinstitutions,such ascolleges, universities, or academies, were established on grounds of public policy; many princes saw to it that Bildungwas spread among the population. But really new marginalized. Wilhelm's play-acting can only be a phase. The illumination of the the complex connection between the androgynous and the aesthetic is also a core featureof the analysesof Eichendorff'sworks.MacLeod makesclear that there is a near obsessive interest in liminality in his work that can be explained precisely in terms of androgyny and aesthetics. Eichendorff's treatments of liminal sexuality, liminal settings, liminal light conditions, and liminal cultures at times generate conditions of 'rampant category confusion' (p. 144): the transvestite and androgynousfiguresrepresentedprovide , of course, the most tellingevidence of this.And their fate is sealed in much the same manner as in Goethe since, as is stressed throughout: 'The androgyne, with its dyadic oscillation between masculinity and femininity, properly belongs to pre-oedipal sphere of the imaginary and indeed cannot survivein thetriangulatedworldof Bildung and socialization'(p. 148).Hence thereisin Eichendorff'sfiction'narrativemotion fromcategoryblurringto category reconstruction' (p. I60), perceived as a conscious response to the 'sexual/textual...