Käte Hamburger (September 21, 1896 in

Hamburg (male), (female) en, Hamburger(s), Hamburgian(s) , timezone1 = Central (CET) , utc_offset1 = +1 , timezone1_DST = Central (CEST) , utc_offset1_DST = +2 , postal ...

– April 8, 1992 in

Stuttgart Stuttgart (; Swabian: ; ) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg. It is located on the Neckar river in a fertile valley known as the ''Stuttgarter Kessel'' (Stuttgart Cauldron) and lies an hour from the ...

) was a

Germanist German studies is the field of humanities that researches, documents and disseminates German language and literature in both its historic and present forms. Academic departments of German studies often include classes on German culture, German hi ...

, literary scholar and philosopher. She was a professor at the

University of Stuttgart The University of Stuttgart (german: Universität Stuttgart) is a leading research university located in Stuttgart, Germany. It was founded in 1829 and is organized into 10 faculties. It is one of the oldest technical universities in Germany wit ...

. Hamburger earned her

doctorate A doctorate (from Latin ''docere'', "to teach"), doctor's degree (from Latin ''doctor'', "teacher"), or doctoral degree is an academic degree awarded by universities and some other educational institutions, derived from the ancient formalism ''l ...

in 1922 in

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the States of Germany, German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the List of cities in Germany by popu ...

. Expelled by the

Nazis Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Na ...

because of her Jewish heritage, she immigrated to Sweden in 1934, where she lived until 1956, earning her living as a language teacher, journalist and writer. She resumed her university career on her return to Germany, writing about

Thomas Mann Paul Thomas Mann ( , ; ; 6 June 1875 – 12 August 1955) was a German novelist, short story writer, social critic, philanthropist, essayist, and the 1929 Nobel Prize in Literature laureate. His highly symbolic and ironic epic novels and novella ...

and

Rainer Maria Rilke René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke (4 December 1875 – 29 December 1926), shortened to Rainer Maria Rilke (), was an Austrian poet and novelist. He has been acclaimed as an idiosyncratic and expressive poet, and is widely recogni ...

, among others. Her examination of the ontological status of literary objects in ''Die Logik der Dichtung'' (1957; translated into English as ''The Logic of Literature,'' 1973) established her renown in the field of

literary theory Literary theory is the systematic study of the nature of literature and of the methods for literary analysis. Culler 1997, p.1 Since the 19th century, literary scholarship includes literary theory and considerations of intellectual history, mo ...

. Along with Eberhard Lämmert and

Franz Karl Stanzel Franz Karl Stanzel (born 4 August 1923) is an Austrian literary theorist who specialised in English literature. Academia Born in Molln, Austria, Stanzel finished his degree with Herbert Koziol in Graz. After his habilitation in 1955, he was pro ...

, Hamburger contributed in the 1950s to a reorientation of Germanistics in Germany in the direction of a rational and analytic methodology.

Literature

* Käte Hamburger: ''Die Logik der Dichtung'', Stuttgart 1994. Fourth edition, . First published 1957. English translation by Marilynn J. Rose, ''The Logic of Literature'', 2nd rev. ed., Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 1973. * Käte Hamburger: ''Wahrheit und ästhetische Wahrheit'', Stuttgart 1979, * Käte Hamburger: ''Das Mitleid'', Stuttgart 1985, * ''Querelles. Jahrbuch für Frauen- und Geschlechterforschung'', vol. 8, Johanna Bossinade and

Angelika Schaser Angelika Schaser (born 1956) is a German historian. Life and career Born in Munich, Schaser studied history, geography and library science in Munich and Berlin. In 1985, she became a research assistant to Ilja Mieck at the Friedrich Meinecke I ...

(Hg.): ''Käte Hamburger. Zur Aktualität einer Klassikerin'', Göttingen 2003,

External links

Literatur von und über Käte Hamburger
in the catalogue of

die Deutsche Bibliothek The German Library in Frankfurt am Main (Deutsche Bibliothek abbreviated: DB) was a predecessor of the German National Library (DNB). From 1947 to 1990 it was the West German counterpart to the Deutsche Bücherei in Leipzig, founded in 1912, with ...

Fem-Biographie: Käte Hamburger
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hamburger, Kate German women writers 1896 births 1992 deaths Schiller Memorial Prize winners Commanders Crosses of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany Recipients of the Order of Merit of Baden-Württemberg