2 - Reading for Pleasure vs. Reading for Pain: Julchen Grünthal: Eine Pensionsgeschichte (1784)

Summary

Der Mensch ist oft nicht so weit von den Thieren verschieden, als Menschen von Menschen: denn waren nicht die Oneidas, bey welchen ich Schutz und Hülfe gefunden hatte, Engel gegen das Volk der Pariser?

—Sophie von La Roche

[Human beings are often not as different from animals as they are from each other: for were not the Oneidas, with whom I had found protection and help, angels in comparison with the people of Paris?]

Die Natur wollte nun einmal, daß in der Reihe der Wesen auch ein solches Geschöpf existiren sollte, wie ich bin. Eben so weit davon entfernt, mich als Muster darstellen zu wollen, als ich entfernt bin, meine eigene Anklägerin zu werden, will ich mich also nur in meiner Eigenthümlichkeit schildern.

—Friederike Unger

[Nature wanted such a creature as I am to exist along with others. I am as far from portraying myself as a paragon as I am from becoming my own accuser; I want merely to describe myself with my idiosyncrasies.]

WHEREAS IN THE PREVIOUS CHAPTER I argued for the canon-worthiness of Sternheim and acknowledged the impact of English culture on both the German author Sophie von La Roche and her character Sternheim, in this chapter I argue for the inclusion of the German author Friederike Unger and her fictional characters who react to French cultural manifestations. Just as La Roche imports and innovates when processing literary influences, so, too, does Unger. Like her fictional character of the beautiful soul cited above, Unger's novel acknowledges influence and individuality at the same time. Both La Roche and Unger focus their explorations of cultural interchange on female development, and both novels generate a narrative of emotions that accompany that development. The subjective judgment of Unger, however, is diametrically opposed to that of La Roche. In contrast to La Roche's Anglophilia, Unger repeatedly rejects the supposed superiority of French culture, as seen in this quote, in which Unger's narrator ridicules his neighbors:

Diese waren in Berlin in einer französischen Pensionschule verbildet worden, schämten sich nun ihrer deutschpommerschen Namen, und nannten sich ma soeur Julie, und ma soeur Adeaide [sic], den derbdeutschen Vater, der kaum ahnete, daß es noch andre Franzosen in der Welt gäbe als die er als Kornet bei Rosbach hatte schlagen helfen, mon cher père …