'Die Rache der Barbaren sei dir fern!': Myth, Identity, and the Encounter with the Colonial Other in Heinrich von Kleist's Die Hermannsschlacht

Author: Allan, Seán¹

Source: Publications of the English Goethe Society, Volume 78, Numbers 1-2, September 2009 , pp. 47-59(13)

Publisher: Maney Publishing

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Abstract:

When viewed through the ideological prism of the Roman/French imperial forces, the indigenous German population in Kleist's Die Hermannsschlacht is regarded as a primitive Other essentially in awe of the dominant power's apparent 'sophistication'. But as the play shows, it is precisely the failure of the latter to acknowledge the operations of self-interest that lie concealed within these discursive systems of its own making that constitutes a fatal weakness and leads, in time, to their eventual demise. By including the execution of Aristan — the only character besides Hermann to embrace a genuinely radical concept of freedom — Kleist invites the reader/spectator to take a critical view of the central protagonist.

Keywords: KLEIST; DIE HERMANNSSCHLACHT; ARMINIUS; POST-COLONIALISM; GERMAN NATIONALISM; ETHICS

Document Type: Research article

DOI: 10.1179/174962809X399760

Affiliations: 1: University of Warwick, UK

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