Publisher's Synopsis
Members of temperance and abstinence clubs that had been active in German-speaking countries since the first half of the 19th century declared drinking to be the cause of practically all ills. From then on, social inequality, moral decay and physical and mental illnesses were explained by alcohol consumption. Literature was not unaffected by this anti-alcohol rhetoric. Influences from the non-literary discourse on alcohol can be seen in many biographies of drinking figures. Oliver Käsermann examines such biographies in 13 novels - by J. Gotthelf, A. von Droste-Hülshoff, Th. Storm, P. Heyse, A. Schnitzler and others - and reconstructs an overarching narrative pattern from them, which he calls "Biographical Narrative of Drinkers " names. With this narrative as an interface, a method for examining the relationship between literary and non-literary discourses can be demonstrated and tested as an example.
