Leggere e rivivere in "Der Grüne Heinrich" di Gottfried Keller

The paper is the Italian translation of the speech held in German language by Professor Karl Pestalozzi (University of Basel) at a seminar on literature in April 2004 (Catholic University of Milan, Faculty for Foreign Languages). The analysis focuses on what the author considers the richest, most original and spontaneous version of Keller’s novel Der grüne Heinrich. Of this version the author highlights the description of two main perspectives, the outer and the inner one. In particular, he focuses on the contrast between the narrative, i.e. ‘auctorial’ self, who tells and judges events afterwards, and the self, who lives them from inside his experience. Aim of the work is the analysis of some passages of Keller’s novel, which underline Heinrich’s profound literary knowledge. Heinrich’s reading of the German classic and romantic literature becomes the vehicle, through which he can understand and judge who he is and what he experiences: focusing on this central question of the novel, Heinrich’s experience of Lesen und Erleben, the reader is invited to reflect on his own knowledge and experience of literary works.