Intertextual Exoticism

Richard Sperber reads a body of non-canonical German exoticist literature published after imperial Germany's loss of colonial Oceania in 1914, applying theories of "intertextuality" (Kristeva) and recent scholarship on literary exoticism to explore Germany's postwar crises of psychology, masculinity, and national identity mapped onto Oceanic spaces. Through analyzing the nuances between narratives that make up these exotic texts, and also by comparing German exotic literatures about Oceania with other canonized adventure texts set in European colonies, such as Conrad's Heart of Darkness, Sperber defines a genre of transnational and intertextual postwar literature that brings new perspectives on the conditions of colonial loss.