Papers by Albrecht Classen
Cultural Arts Research and Development |
One of the greatest poets of epigrams, Angelus Silesius, was not only highly famous for his short... more One of the greatest poets of epigrams, Angelus Silesius, was not only highly famous for his short stanzas written in the latter half of the seventeenth century. He also exerted, both during his lifetime and then during his posterity, and thus until today, a deep influence on poetry, philosophy, and theology. But his epigrams are extremely difficult to understand and represent, despite their formal simplicity, a major intellectual challenge. This is both a hurdle and simultaneously an opportunity because human epistemology grows when there are barriers, especially linguistic, conceptual, and intellectual ones, under the right circumstances. This paper will reintroduce Silesius as a Baroque poet who deserves our full attention today because he provided us in a most unique fashion with literary images to capture some of the most subtle, spiritual, and sensory experiences in human life formulated during the Baroque period. Relying on dialectics, rhetorical strategies, and metaphorical language, Silesius proves to be one of the most meaningful poets from the past who speaks to us today and probably also tomorrow, offering perspectives toward the personal experience of the transcendental.
Journal of Arts and Humanities, 2025
Definition It is one of the favorite strategies by many people to reflect generally and superfici... more Definition It is one of the favorite strategies by many people to reflect generally and superficially on the past for comparative purposes and then to cast it in mostly negative terms. Thereby they can aggrandize and idealize their own culture as if all that technological progress in the modern world really represented progress for humanity in ethical, moral, or spiritual, and then also material terms. The Middle Ages and also the following centuries were, so the story goes, mostly dark, cold, barbaric, and ignorant, entirely subservient to the Catholic Church, and only with the rise of the Renaissance, later the age of the Enlightenment, did notable progress develop. Numerous medievalists have rallied against this myth, but myths tend to be stronger than historical facts, at least in popular opinions. In particular, the concept of physical hygiene proves to be most insightful in this regard especially because we have much more evidence available confirming a relatively higher level of hygiene in the pre-modern world than most commentators today want to believe. After a critical review of the common process of myth making today and the notion of dirt, this article will examine the statements by the rather obscure and yet important poet Der König vom Odenwald who had much to say about this and other related topics in cultural-historical terms. His comments and those by numerous contemporaries easily confirm that we must put to rest this foolish myth of the dirty Middle Ages and the early modern period. Most scholars are fully aware of this need, but we often lack the concrete evidence to make this claim.
Journal of Scholarly Communication , 2025
Although most seasoned scholars know how to do their basic work and produce well-researched paper... more Although most seasoned scholars know how to do their basic work and produce well-researched papers or books, each new generation faces the issue once again, figuring out what true research is, how to find the relevant research literature, and then how to produce a solidly investigated and developed publication. At the same time, technology is moving forward rapidly, and all our library systems are undergoing constant
changes. In fact, there are ever more available databases or bibliographies that are often ignored or remain unknown particularly to more traditionally oriented scholars. So, it is high time right now to reassess the
situation in library science from a pragmatic point of view and to outline in as much detail as possible or necessary what approaches and methods are advisable, how to carry out basic research, and how to move
a paper from its draft stage to the level of being publishable. The discussion below is based on decades of my own research, with 134 scholarly books currently published (single-authored monographs, edited
volumes, textbooks, and translations), and more than 800 scholarly articles, both in traditional print journals and increasingly in online journals, both in well-established and highly esteemed research fora and in new and emerging venues. This basically unmatched record encourages me to offer the subsequent outline of the fundamental strategies relevant in carrying out research in the Humanities, especially with a focus on literary and cultural history.
Cultural Arts Research and Development , 2025
Since the early twentieth century, intellectuals, artists, writers, and philosophers across the b... more Since the early twentieth century, intellectuals, artists, writers, and philosophers across the board have realized that humanity is increasingly losing its grip on its own existence in many different terms. Neither rationality nor reality seems to make all that much sense any longer. Catastrophic experiences in various wars, in the Holodomor, Holocaust, and a long series of other genocidal campaigns across the world, and now the virtually certain prospect that we humans are causing global warming and hence threaten to destroy the foundation of our existence here on earth increasingly indicate that the traditional rational framework is fraying at its seams and threatens to undermine the core of our existence. Since the early twentieth century, we have observed the growth of absurdity as a new mode of expression. Whereas scholarship has so far focused mostly on such famous writers as Franz Kafka, Albert Camus, or Jean-Paul Sartre, this article introduces a different approach to absurdity through the lens of satire and the grotesque, intriguingly represented by the German author of short stories, Kurt Kusenberg. As much as he made his audience smile, if not even laugh about the absurd conditions in ordinary human situations, basically their own, he deftly, though subtly, indicated that for him as well absurdity had become the norm of human life. Yet there is no way to combat it, as the author suggests; instead, mocking absurdity offers healthy, productive alternatives beyond traditional efforts to operate with a rational epistemology and to laugh about absurdity itself.
Alman Dili ve Edebiyatı Dergisi Studien zur deutschen Sprache und Literatur
Since the thirteenth century at the latest, the role of money had become increasingly important i... more Since the thirteenth century at the latest, the role of money had become increasingly important in the wake of growing national and international trade, which also found vivid expression in many literary texts. These texts often serve well as mirrors of social and economic transformations, such as the Schwank (jest narrative), in which the various poets made fun of many different people and laughed about ordinary situations both in the village and in the city, in a monastery or in a castle. Hence, the explicit thematization of money in these Schwänke (plural) does not really surprise us, but scholars have not paid enough attention to this phenomenon. Turning to the voluminous Wendunmuth by Hans Wilhelm Kirchhof (1563), we have an excellent opportunity to identify the ubiquitous presence of money in all human relations and the trouble which it has always created. In his short prose texts, we encounter some of the most explicit comments about the huge impact of money on early modern German society. Keywords money in late medieval literature • jest narratives • Hans Wilhelm Kirchhof • economic criticism • Jews Citation: Classen, A. (2025). The discourse on money in early modern literature. The case of Hans Wilhelm Kirchhof's Wendunmuth (1563).
Dulcea of Worms
Springer eBooks, 2024
Kottannerin, Helene, Memoirs
Springer eBooks, 2024
Elisabeth von Nassau-Saarbrücken
Springer eBooks, 2024
Frau Ava
Springer eBooks, 2024
The Survival of Medieval Manuscript Culture in the Early Modern Age: The Other Side of a Universal Paradigm Shift
Publishing research quarterly, Feb 23, 2024
Philip Ajouri, Julia Bangert, Gerhard Lauer and Nikolaus Weichselbaumer, eds. 2023. Gutenberg-Jahrbuch 2023. Vol. 98. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. 253 pp. €98.00. Hardback. ISBN 978-3-44-712016-6
Publishing Research Quarterly, Nov 1, 2023
Athens Journal of Humanities & Arts, Oct 1, 2023
New Chaucer Studies: Pedagogy and Profession
The editorial staff of New Chaucer Studies: Pedagogy and Profession works hard to ensure that con... more The editorial staff of New Chaucer Studies: Pedagogy and Profession works hard to ensure that contributions are accurate and follow professional ethical guidelines. However, the views and opinions expressed in each contribution belong exclusively to the author(s). The publisher and the editors do not endorse or accept responsibility for them. See for more information.
Von Widukind zur ‚Sassine‘: Prozesse der Konstruktion und Transformation regionaler Identität im norddeutschen Raum
German History
Die Vermittlung des Mittelalters im 21. Jahrhundert
DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals), Dec 1, 2022
15.11.22, Herbers and Lehner, eds., Unterwegs im Namen der Religion / On the Road in the Name of Religion
The Medieval Review, 2015
97.07.04, Kolmer, ed., Der Tod des Mächtigen
96.11.03, Mueller, ed., Auffuehrung und Schrift
The Medieval Review, 1996
97.03.04, Bumke, Die vier Fassungen der Nibelungenklage
The Medieval Review, 1997
Ungewöhnliche Perspektiven auf Juden in der deutschen und italienischen Literatur des Spätmittelalters
Aschkenas, 2021
We always face a certain danger when we investigate cultural-historical situations or conditions.... more We always face a certain danger when we investigate cultural-historical situations or conditions. Our chronicles and other documents tend to emphasize dramatic, if not tragic cases that color our understanding in rather dark light. This also applies to the relationship between Jews and Christians during the late Middle Ages, which has been discussed already from many different perspectives. Less consulted have been late German medieval verse narratives (verse-couplets, or mæren), where we encounter a number of times quite remarkable frameworks which situate the Jews in a much more mundane, ordinary context. As much as the poets endeavored, of course, to present the possibility of converting Jews to Christianity, as much they thereby also reveal a variety of different relationships characterized by a surprising degree of normalcy, free from the usual anti-Judaic hostility. We gain additional support for our approach by way of including two prose novellas by Boccaccio in his Decameron...
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Papers by Albrecht Classen
changes. In fact, there are ever more available databases or bibliographies that are often ignored or remain unknown particularly to more traditionally oriented scholars. So, it is high time right now to reassess the
situation in library science from a pragmatic point of view and to outline in as much detail as possible or necessary what approaches and methods are advisable, how to carry out basic research, and how to move
a paper from its draft stage to the level of being publishable. The discussion below is based on decades of my own research, with 134 scholarly books currently published (single-authored monographs, edited
volumes, textbooks, and translations), and more than 800 scholarly articles, both in traditional print journals and increasingly in online journals, both in well-established and highly esteemed research fora and in new and emerging venues. This basically unmatched record encourages me to offer the subsequent outline of the fundamental strategies relevant in carrying out research in the Humanities, especially with a focus on literary and cultural history.