Der Hungerpastor

Download or read book Wilhelm Raabe's Der Hungerpastor and Charles Dickens' David Copperfield written by Peter O. Arnds and published by Peter Lang Incorporated, International Academic Publishers. This book was released on 1997 with total page 218 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Der Hungerpastor (1864-65) is Wilhelm Raabe's most popular novel. This monograph shows how Raabe borrowed much of the plot and characters from Charles Dickens's best-selling David Copperfield (1849-50). By providing the reasons why Raabe borrowed from Dickens, this study goes far beyond the existing research on the parallels between these two Bildungsromane. A comparison of the heroes, their Jewish antagonists and a number of female characters demonstrates the extent of Raabe's indebtedness to Dickens. The intertextuality ranges from direct verbal echoes to a mere use of Dickens's ideas upon which Raabe builds a novel distinctly his own.