German Studies

Monsters in the Middle Ages assumed significant epistemological functions, providing an image of the complete 'other' in the human quest for the self. Since late antiquity teratology played a big role in literature, art, philosophy, and religion, but meaning and relevance of monsters changed from author to author (the same applies to their visual representation). This article provides an overview of how the image of the monster changed throughout times and how individual writers evaluated them.

First scholarly article on the novels by Renate Ahrens, whose texts (since 2003) prove to be extraordinary literary masterpieces in which she deals with many different situations in which modern people struggle to come to terms with the Foreign in the form of family members, relatives, friends, and lovers.