Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
This study examines the German-American cultural transfer during the 18th and 19th centuries and its important part in the formation of an American national and cultural identity. The different chapters treat specific problems and criticize existing translation theories. In the concluding chapters a cohesive view of the entire process emerges.
Synopsis
This volume attempts for the first time a comprehensive view of the momentous process of German-American cultural transfer during the 18th and 19th centuries, which played an important part in the formation of an American national and cultural identity, a process to which the New England Transcendentalists contributed some of the decisive ingredients, but which has largely escaped the attention of German and American scholarship. In each chapter a specific problem is treated systematically from a clearly defined perspective, deficiencies of existing translation theories are exposed, so that in the concluding chapters 13 and 14 (with an unpublished memorandum by Alexander von Humboldt) a cohesive view of the entire process emerges. A comprehensive bibliography will facilitate further scholarly pursuits.