Abstract:
This study investigates the internal textual structure (cohesion) of Hugo Loetscher’s
novel, Der Immune (1975/1985).
The secondary literature (in particular Nigg (1992: 12), So nicka (2009: 109) and
various reviews) makes it clear that what makes the text form a whole is a matter of
dispute. It may be assumed that this is partly due to the work’s non-linear, stylistically
heterogeneous composition. The matter of the text’s cohesion thus becomes crucial
to the understanding of the novel. Rastier (1987: 205) defines cohesion as the “unité
d’une séquence, définie par ses relations sémantiques internes”. Rosmarie Zeller
(1989: 1041) claims that it is the immunity metaphor which makes the work form a
whole in this sense.
Zeller’s claim has to be reformulated due to lack of evidence. In this study, it is
replaced by the hypothesis that the immunity metaphor itself is the product of
interaction between various other ‘metaphors’ or semantic fields. For although
immunity is seldom addressed explicitly in the text, when this does occur, it is often
contextualised by means of other (literal and figurative) themes, which occur more
frequently in the text. This makes the term ‘metaphor’, with its traditional meaning of
‘figurative speaking’, problematic. For this reason, ‘metaphor’ is discarded in favour
of a group of semantic isotopies (based on Rastier 1987), which combine to form a
multidimensional network. The study is structured as follows:
1. An introduction and short methodological statement is followed by a literature
review, in which the controversy surrounding the novel’s cohesion is
discussed.
2. A cursory narratological discussion of the novel’s formal characteristics serves
to introduce the main part of the study. The narratological form the text takes
is only of interest to the extent that it contributes to the problem of the text’s
cohesion. As such, this part of the study focusses on demonstrating the
work’s polyphony and its subsequent difficulty for reception as a cohesive
text.
3. In the main part of the study, the themes ‘Theatre’, ‘Intellect’, ‘Society’ and
‘Language’ are analysed by means of the isotopy concept, as it is established
that these often co-occur with ‘Immunity’. Each of these themes is
investigated in terms of its interaction with the others, in order to contribute to
the creation of ‘Immunity’ as the text’s implicit main theme.
4. In conclusion, the results from the main part of the study are discussed and it
is considered to what extent ‘Immunity’ as a theme is capable of shaping the
novel Der Immune into a cohesive whole.
