From Implied Author to Literary Character: The Productive Reception of Walther von der Vogelweide in Modern German Narrative Prose

The article focuses on the productive reception of the implied author (Booth, 1961) of Walther von der Vogelweide in modern and contemporary German narrative prose. In particular, it concentrates on the fictionalization of Walther into a literary character, and on the ideologies projected onto his fictional versions. The study has two main aims. First, it advances a methodological approach that combines Corpus-Assisted Discourse Studies (CADS) with text linguistics in order to detect the ideologies projected onto the fictional Walther(s). The adoption of this perspective is based on the premise that an author’s linguistic choices can reveal his or her beliefs, worldviews, and purposes, as highlighted by Discourse Analysis. To demonstrate the effectiveness of this approach, Robert Löhr’s novel Krieg der Sänger (2012), in which Walther plays a central role, is examined as a pilot study. The analysis uncovers a multifaceted fictional persona onto which, most importantly, contemporary values are projected, as Walther is portrayed both as a supporter of religious tolerance and an opponent of sexual violence. Second, the article presents an ad hoc literary corpus of German narrative prose texts written between 1800 – when Walther’s work became known to a wide audience – and the present day and in which Walther appears as a fictional character. Both the corpus design criteria and the distribution of texts will be addressed. By combining these perspectives, the study provides a systematic approach to examine how Walther von der Vogelweide is represented in modern and contemporary fiction, shedding light on the interplay between historical narratives, literary imagination, and cultural discourse.