Finogenov Victor Anantolyevich – Junior Researcher of the Department of Literary Studies, Institute of Scientific Information for Social Sciences of the Russian Academy of Sciences; ORCID: 0000-0002-1167-9376
The article examines Hoffmann’s short stories that exploit the plots of well-known works. In Hoffmann’s novella The Robbers, the characters adopted from Friedrich Schiller’s play of the same name recognise their connection to the preceding text. In the novella The Mutual Interdependence of Things, the plot intrigue is built around a girl who, at first glance, is identical to Mignon from Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship, while the central idea of the work refers to the novel Elective Affinities. Choosing the Bride recreates the plot of The Merchant of Venice, and several characters mirror Shakespearean heroes. In Report on the Latest Fortunes of the Dog Berganza, Hoffmann adapts Miguel de Cervantes’ stylistic devices. The juxtaposition of the dog Berganza, immortalised in Hoffmann’s work, and the composer Kreisler reflects the writer’s self-reflection. The use of plots from other writers is one of Hoffmann’s favourite techniques, by which he places his own texts into the context of world literature.
Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffmann; Friedrich Schiller; Johann Wolfgang von Goethe; Miguel de Cervantes; German romanticism; romantic dualism