The Emergence of Neuroscience and the German Novel: Poetics of the Brain (Palgrave Studies in Literature, Science and Medicine)

"The Emergence of Neuroscience and the German Novel: Poetics of the Brain revises the dominant narrative about the distinctive psychological inwardness and introspective depth of the German novel by reinterpreting the novels development from the perspective of the nascent discipline of neuroscience, the emergence of which is coterminous with the rise of the novel form. In particular, it asks how the novels formal propertiesstylistic, narrative, rhetorical, and figurativecorrelate with the formation of a neuroscientific discourse, and how the former may have assisted, disrupted, and/or intensified the medical articulation of neurological concepts. This study poses the question: how does this rapidly evolving field emerge in the context of nineteenth century cultural practices and what were the conditions for its emergence in the German-speaking world specifically? Where did neuroscience begin and how did it broaden in scope? And most crucially, to what degree does it owe its existence to literature?"--Back cover Preface Acknowledgments Contents List of Figures Chapter 1: Introduction Neuroscience Chapter Outline Chapter 2: Dissecting the Subject: Brain Localization in The Nightwatches of Bonaventura Beginnings The Organ of the Soul Craniology Chapter 3: Fiction’s Scientific Double: Hallucinations in Jean Paul’s Siebenkäs Phantasms Case Histories The Figure of the Double Unthought Chapter 4: A Tale from the Right Hemisphere: Amusia and Aphasia in Franz Grillparzer’s The Poor Musician Amusia Absolute Music Realism Cerebral Hemispheres Chapter 5: Symmetry as Narrative Structure: OCD in Gottfried Keller’s A Village Romeo and Juliet Monomania An Obsessive Idea Symmetry Pedophilia Chapter 6: Writing Against Forgetting: Korsakoff’s Syndrome in Theodor Fontane’s On Tangled Paths Memory Recuperation Amnesia Pseudo-reminiscences Condensation Chapter 7: Allegory, Modernity, Learning to See: Cytoarchitectonics in Rainer Maria Rilke’s The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge Scientizing Medicine Autopsy of the Soul Brain Ablation Chapter 8: Reading Gestures: Body Schema Disorder and Schizophrenia in Franz Kafka’s Prose The Body Schema Animals Humans Schizophrenia Afterword Bibliography Primary Literature Literary Sources Neuroscientific Sources Secondary Literature Index