Egoism in the Age of Romanticism.

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

This dissertation recasts the ethics of Early German Romanticism and its interlocutors as a doctrine of self-denial by arguing that Romantic thought prioritizes negative examples of self-interest. I employ case studies of Romantic and Romantic-adjacent literature that uncover the period's ethical concern for alterity and otherness. In doing so, I oppose the arguments of thinkers such as G. W. F. Hegel and Soren Kierkegaard that interpret Romanticism-particularly in its ironic capacity-as a form of subjectivism, or the doctrine that the self cannot escape the confines of its own thought. To demonstrate Romanticism's opposition to subjectivism, I characterize the period's discourses around irony and disindividuation as problematizations of egoistic tendencies. The resulting work charts not only the development of philosophical and aesthetic paradigms of self-denial but also a particular Romantic sensitivity to failed and abortive attempts at self-denial, which become cautionary tales promoting deeper reflective practices of self-abnegation.The first chapter argues that Ludwig Tieck's 1795 novel William Lovell proleptically critiques the self-determining Romantic irony found in the literary and philosophical theories of Friedrich Schlegel. In my reading, Tieck's novel represents an ironic view that, unlike Schlegel's theories, regards all prioritization of creative subjectivity as a hindrance to true criticism of the self and its expansionist drives. The second chapter claims that Jean Paul Richter's 1800 novel Titan constitutes a similarly critical, though comic, attack on Romantic irony. Advancing beyond Tieck's merely negative view of self-determination, Jean Paul's novel satirizes the self-congratulatory nature of ironic stances while simultaneously maintaining a space for readers to understand and empathize with the inescapability and ubiquity of self-interest. The third chapter interprets Friedrich Holderlin's 1800 drama Der Tod des Empedokles as an observation of the revolutionary demagoguery visible in cults of personality. Though Holderlin's drama is often interpreted to expound a frustrated message of subjective desire and striving, my readings draw attention to skeptical voices surrounding the drama's main action that undercut the titular Empedokles' attempts at charismatic subjectivity. I argue that these voices constitute an ethical excess that outlasts the otherwise aporetic nature of Holderlin's thought. The fourth and final chapter considers the Orientalisms of the poet Karoline von Gunderrode and the philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer as late Romantic attempts to draw ethical inspiration from Hindu conceptions of self-denial. I argue that Gunderrode, in contrast to Schopenhauer, moves away from mainstream German Orientalist interpretations of Hinduism as a nihilistic or pessimistic structure. Gunderrode thereby attains an understanding of self-denial that is qualified by positive reevaluations of the roles that earthly existence and that individuality play in spiritual liberation.