Sprachkunst Jahrgang XL/2009/2. Halbband, pp. 261-278, 2011/05/17
Beiträge zur Literaturwissenschaft
The latest collections of short stories by Hermann and Kehlmann were instantly received as comparable: treating the boundary situations of death and leavetaking, centring on variable protagonists, they approach the form of the novel structurally and through the narrative situation employed. Increasingly Judith Hermann deals with figures of a minimal self and opts for a suggestive external view of the banality of every day life. Drawing on metafiction and intertextuality and a greater thematic variety, reflecting digital simulation and the deconstruction of identity Kehlmann achieves innovative narrative structures in coping with boundary situations in the human condition.