My dissertation analyzes travel as a mirror of the explosive social changes during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries as depicted in German Volksbücher. I trace how these changes are depicted across the period 1450-1600 in Thüring von Ringoltingen’s adaptation of Melusine (1457), Ein kurtzweilig Lesen von Dil Ulenspiegel (1515), Fortunatus (1509), and Historia von D. Johann Fausten (1587). I examine these texts using various theoretical approaches from gender studies to race and ethnic studies as well as the latest work on the interplay between the age of exploration and the „long“ Reformation in Western Christianity. By analyzing these works through the theme of fictionalized travel, my research repositions the Volksbuch as an outward facing genre that engages with global discoveries, new market economies, and profound reformations in the church and society, which compelled these authors to (re)define German identity. Through exploring and analyzing the ecosystems of fictionalized travel, I reposition these works and the genre of Volksbuch in the literary canon.

https://germanic.illinois.edu/directory/profile/aschwen2