Forest in Medieval German Literature

Albrecht Classen is University Distinguished Professor of German studies at the University of Arizona.

Classen explores a hitherto understudied motif in medieval and early modern German literature: the forest. He provides an intensive study of noteworthy texts by seven authors and of the anonymously authored Nibelungenlied and offers anextensive survey that covers some 300 years. Classen points out the forest is used to portray adventure, heroic or dastardly deeds, passages both physical and metaphysical, transformation, and often mystery. Classen's . . . ecocritical approach seeks to balance the imaginative nature of literary works with the realities of the environments in which the protagonists act. As a place outside of yet accessible to those in traditional society (as presented in the literary canon), the forest represents Utopian refuge or mortal danger (and in some cases both at the same time), always reflecting on the status of the 'other' locale. There, nature and culture interact in sometimes surprising configurations. This richly annotated investigation reveals that other texts and authors might fruitfully be subjected to scrutiny similar to that Classen devotes to Hartmann von Aue, Wolfram von Eschenbach, Gottfried von Strassburg, et al. With its impressive bibliography and index, this is a valuable resource for those interested in German literature and history. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty.

• AcknowledgementsIntroduction and Theoretical Reflections: The Forest as an Epistemological Challenge in the Middle AgesChapter One: Hartmann von Aue’s Concept of the Forest: The Arthurian Adventure in the Forest and the ConsequencesChapter Two:The Forest as Staging Ground for the Heroic Protagonist:Glory and Demise in the NibelungenliedChapter Three:The Forest in Wolfram von Eschenbach’s Works:The Passage from the Arthurian Court to the Grail Kingdom Through the ForestChapter Four:The Forest in Gottfried von Straßburg’s Tristan and in Alternative Tristan VersionsChapter Five:The Forest in Der Melerantz von Frankreich by The PleierChapter Six:The Forest as the Transitional and Transformative Space in Konrad von Würzburg’s Partonopier und MeliurChapter Seven:The Ambivalence of the Forest: Exile or Safe Haven? The Destiny of the Female Protagonist Refracted in the Forest:Elisabeth von Nassau-Saarbrücken’s Königin SibilleChapter Eight:Forest in