The Wendish Research Exchange - Scholze-Šołta, Dietrich: The Reception of Sorbian Novels from 1945 to the Present

Lětopis Abstract 2008 1: Scholze-Šołta, Dietrich: The Reception of Sorbian Novels from 1945 to the Present

The author traces the development of the reception of Sorbian novels, which did not become established as a literary genre until the second half of the Twentieth Century. As an introduction the author describes the increased interest in reception studies in the literary studies of the GDR and the Federal Republic since the 1960s, which created the basis in cultural policy for a reappraisal of the relationship between writers and their readership. He takes six significant works from different decades as examples (almost all published in Sorbian and German versions) and then discusses the changes which occurred in the reception of Sorbian literature both within and outside Lusatia, from Kurt Krenz’s novel Jan (1955) to Jurij Brězan’s satirical novel Die Leute von Salow (The People of Salow, 1997). The study finishes with a short survey of the present state of Sorbian publishing.