Paul Schallück and the Post-War German Don Quixote

The basic premise of this work is that an in-depth study of one very representative author and three almost ubiquitous literary themes can very profitably complement those books on Post-War German Literature which are - given the vast breadth of the topic - by necessity almost entirely encyclopaedic in format. The intent of the study then, is four-fold: to introduce the writer Paul Schallück and his major works, to isolate several of his major themes and attempt locating these diachronically, and then synchronically, shedding light in the process on several important topics in Post-War German writing: providing, as it were, a kind of «case-study» introduction to German Literature since 1945. Hence the three themes that comprise Chapters 3, 4 and 5 were chosen for discussion on the basis of their importance for the novels of Paul Schallück, on the basis of their importance to previous literary movements and finally, on the basis of their frequent occurrence in and significance to other «contemporary» works by Grass, Böll, et al.