Gender, narrative and revision: An analysis of Heinrich von Kleist's 'Penthesilea' and Franz Grillparzer's 'Sappho' and 'Medea'.

摘要

Focusing on two dramatists who revised the depiction of female figures from the] Classical world in early years of the 19th century---Heinrich von Kleist (1777--1811) and Franz Grillparzer (1791--1872) -Gender, Narrative and Revision: An Analysis of Heinrich von Kleist's Penthesilea and Franz Grillparzer's Sappho and Medea traces a literary representation of the claims of the social world on these three figures from myth and legend, Penthesilea, Sappho and Medea. This dissertation explores how Kleist and Grillparzer represent the tragic world and, in particular, how they represent identity through the depiction of otherwise culturally unintelligible figures through the frame of gender and genre. Thus, gender as a theoretical gesture will be thematized in this study as well as generic innovations as violations of social norms. Each heroine works at mastery of her reality through the manipulation of language and the organization of thought around deeds. With this focus, Gender, Narrative and Revision is aimed at a reorientation of each narrative around problems of perception, desire and the role of the self in the world.