Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Concept of Weltliteratur: History of a Transnational Literary Ideal

Date: May 25, 2023 - Thursday

Time: 16:00-18:00

Place: santralistanbul Campus, E1-103B

The series titled ‘Literary Dialogues’ are organized by BİLGİ Department of English Language and Literature.

Speaker: Benoît Ellerbach

Benoît Ellerbach will talk about the history of the concept of Weltliteratur, which was first used by Goethe in 1827. Through an analysis of the various interpretations of the concept over the last two centuries, this lecture will trace its evolution and its worldwide impact on modern literary studies in times of globalization and cultural diversity

About: Benoît Ellerbach is an assistant professor of German Studies at Boğaziçi University since 2016. He teaches Modern German Literature and Cultural History in the Modern Languages Unit (YADYOK). He is the author of L'Arabie contée aux Allemands. Fictions interculturelles chez Rafik Schami [Arabia Told in Stories to the Germans. Intercultural Fictions by Rafik Schami] (2018).

He is currently leading a BAP project on ‘Emine Sevgi Özdamar’s Linguistic and Narrative Strategies’ and he is working on a book-length project on ‘The Literary Reception of the Arabian Nights in German Literature’. He has numerous publications on Transnational German Literature of the 20th and 21th century, on Exoticism and Orientalism in German Literature.