性別問題在當代德語`療養院小說`

Abstract

性別問題在當代德語 ‘療養院小說’ 延續我起初的研究尋求，在這些屬於新形式的家庭小說，且可以被稱作「養老院小 說」1，近期興起的當代德語小說裡，探討老年癡呆症議題，現在我意圖更深入，並探 索另一個重要議題：這新文類裡的性別問題。 來自德國東部，著名女作者小說海加•克尼格斯多夫所著的Die Entsorgung der Großmutter2，可以被認作是癡呆症小說。雖然，起初，祖母的角色似乎不直接在敘述 中現身，但這女性角色卻詭譎地縈繞著家庭成員們，直到整個家庭四分五裂。同樣像 是，瑞士籍女作者羅斯維塔•侉福利，2014 年出版的小說Neun Monate. Über das Sterben meiner Mutter3，述說的是，第一人稱的敘述者，緩慢且充滿問題地道別92 歲 瑞典老母親。 年長者的問題，以及如何處理性別身分與身心退化，在現代社會中，一般而 言，是非常重要的問題，因為將來世代的人們，比起過去，正逐步邁向越來越年老。 這開啟了，包括下列問題：在這些德語小說中，考慮寫作風格與患有阿茲罕默症男女 性別角色的敘述，是否有著不同的敘述模式？男女作者是否以不同方式，敘述他們有 關老年癡呆疾病的故事？如果是的話，在他們的主題、寫作技巧、語言使用上，是否 能發現甚麼不同？老年癡呆症影響的結果，包含社會孤立、依賴、性格改變等。然 而，至今還沒有許多探討，是有關當代德國「養老院小說」裡的性別問題，以及歸因 於性別所導致的問題。

Following my first pursuit to inquire the problem of dementia in the recent emerging contemporary German language novels that belong to a new form of domestic novel and could be called ‘nursing home novels’ (“Pflegeheimromane”),4 now, I intend to go deeper and explore another important issue: the question of gender in this new genre. Already the novel Die Entsorgung der Großmutter5 (‘The disposal of the grandmother’) by the well-known female author Helga Königsdorf from the Eastern part of Germany can be considered a dementia novel. Although at first, the character of the grandmother does not seem to appear directly in the narrative, the female character intriguingly haunts the family members until the family is divided and dispersed. Also, e.g., Swiss born female author Roswitha Quadflieg’s novel Neun Monate. Über das Sterben meiner Mutter (‘Nine month. About the dying of my mother’),6 published in 2014, tells the story of a slow and problematic farewell to the 92-year old Swedish mother of the first-person narrator. The problems of the elderly, and how to deal with gender identity and mental and bodily decay is a very important problem for the modern society in general since people in the coming generations are getting much older than in former times. This opens up, inter alia, the following questions: Are there different narration patterns concerning the style of writing and the description of male and female characters who seem to have Alzheimer’s disease in these German-language novels? Do female and male authors narrate differently their stories about senile dementia disease? If yes, what difference can be found between their topics, writing techniques and language use? Dementia leads inter alia to a social isolation, dependency, a change in personality, etc., however, until now there has not been much inquiry about the question of gender identity in contemporary German language ‘nursing home novels’ and the problems related to gender ascription.