LEGEND OF THE WANDERING JEW AND ITS INTERPRETATION IN THE GERMAN-LANGUAGE LITERATURE OF THE XVIII - XIX CENTURIES

Abstract

Te article is devoted to one of the so-called “eternal fctional characters” (literary archetypes) of World Literature Ahasuerus. Te author makes an attempt to determine the place of this literary character in a number of other «eternal» personages, Prometheus, Faust, Cain, Don Juan and so on. Te article identifes the feature of the Ahasuerus character that results in fundamentally different nature of its interpretation in various literary works, namely, the lack of binding to the story, and therefore unlimited possibilities for plot constructing. Te article provides an overview of various folk and annalistic sources of the Ahasuerus story and concludes that the Wandering Jew makes an appearance in literary works afer the publication in 1602 of the pamphlet of four leaves about Ahasuerus. Te author of the article comes to conclusion that the appearance of the frst literary interpretations of this legend in Germany at the end of the XVIII century is quite natural. It is connected with the Sturm und Drang (Storm and Stress) movement and disappointment with the ideas of the Enlightenment. Based on the works of I.V. Goethe, K.F.D. Schubart, N. Lenau and R. Hamerling the article shows that the interpretation of the legend about Ahasuerus depends on the literary movement, which can be attributed to the work of these writers: Enlightenment classicism, pre-Romanticism and Romanticism.