"Militarisierte“ Buchhandel? Die deutsche Übersetzungsliteratur im Ersten Weltkrieg

Abstract

The paper investigates the position of literary translations in the German publishing market during the First World War. The existing research in the area disregards statistical data on the participation of books translated into German in the general publishing output in the years 1914-1918 and it proposes the military character of the book market instead. The analysis of the data in this respect, based on the specialist magazine Börsenblatt für den Deutschen Buchhandel, seeks to rectify this erroneous impression. As the analysis shows, not only „big“ national literatures (English, French or Russian), but also „smaller“ ones, including those of countries in which WWI was actually fought (Flemish or Polish literature, among others) were of great interest to German publishers. Translations of Flemish literature, for example, need to be considered not only as a by-product of the German Flamenpolitik, but also as a continuation of publishing projects that had started before WWI broke out. Similarly, in terms of its reception in the German language circle, Polish literature had been elevated to the position of “universal literature” enjoying a significant position in the system of world literature.