Clemens Wurzinger

How Literature Touches Us. Of immersion and transformation in Tibullus

This dissertation examines how Tibullus' elegies can transform readers' relationships with the world. The central hypothesis posits that literary texts can alter readers' perception and self-understanding through specific textual structures and performative elements. The work integrates resonance theory of Hartmut Rosa with theories of reader-response criticism and performativity. Rosa's theory views individuals' relationships with the world as characterized by moments of openness and connection or alienation. According to Rosa, literature can facilitate resonant connections by offering readers new perspectives. These theoretical approaches are complemented by reader-response criticism from the Konstanz School (Jauss, Iser), which describes reading as an active, meaning-making process, performativity theory (Austin, Fischer-Lichte), which examines the effects of linguistic and literary performance, emotion studies (Winko, Hillebrandt), and immersion theories (Ryan, Wolf).The dissertation analyses Tibullus' first book using close reading methodology. Each elegy is examined through multiple lenses: textual criticism, translation, analysis of stylistic and rhetorical devices, and emotional and aesthetic impact on readers. The analysis focuses on how the elegies engage readers emotionally and intellectually, and which textual structures function as transformative offerings. Tibullus creates complex dynamics through specific leitmotifs, intertextual references, ritual scenes, and stylistic devices such as irony, repetition, and semantic tensions. This dynamic can trigger transformative processes during reading that influence how readers perceive themselves and the world.Another key aspect is the texts' embedding in the socio-historical context of the Augustan era. The elegies reflect on themes such as war, peace, love, and transience, offering subtle, often critical perspectives on the social upheavals of this epoch. The transition from Roman Republic to Augustus' principate is portrayed in Tibullus' work as a period of profound transformations affecting both the political landscape and individual lifeworlds. This historical perspective enables understanding the elegies not merely as literary works but as contemporary reflections on an era of change.The dissertation contributes to Tibullus scholarship by analysing the elegies as media of world-relationship and demonstrating their capacity to evoke emotional effects in readers. The findings illustrate that Tibullus' poetry, through its performative and emotion-evoking structures, offers transformative potential beyond mere reception, capable of initiating profound changes in readers' understanding of self and world.

 

You can find personal information at this link.