Literature as an Alternative Project? The two Estrangements in the Novel Die rechtschaffenen Mörder by Ingo Schulze

Abstract

The article examines Ingo Schulze’s novel Die rechtschaffenen Mörder (2020) in the light of the considerations on estrangement expressed by the author in his speech for the Brecht Prize in 2013. This paper highlights how the novel is about two types of ‘estrangements’: the first, along Brecht’s lines, is at the service of committed literature, capable of representing an “alternative project” for society; the second, on the other hand, is functional to the author’s self-reflective moment and characteristic of the postmodern novel. The analysis of the novel argues that ‘estrangement’, from being a tool of political and social commitment aimed at demystifying power relations, ultimately becomes a merely formal device that preserves the status quo in the market of artistic forms produced by the “mass-democratic postmodernity” (Kondylis) in which Schulze operates, thus counteracting Brecht’s and perhaps even Schulze’s own initial aim.