Eschewing the First Person: Post-Subjective Autobiography in Hubert Fichte and his Geschichte der Empfindlichkeit / History of Sensitivity

Abstract

Despite the uncanny similarities between the known facts of Hubert Fichte's life and the events depicted in his works, opinion is still divided as to whether Fichte's work constitutes an autobiography or not. This is partly because, rather than adopting the classic first person or using the same name on the cover as in the inside of the book, Fichte gives his protagonists fictitional names: Detlev, Jäcki. The designation of many of his works as 'novels' does not help either. The thesis of this article is that in his literary works, Fichte deliberately drew on the events of his own life, and deliberately invoked the various genres and procedures of life writing in order to construct what I call 'post-subjective autobiography'. In putting forward this thesis, I demonstrate how, from his third novel onwards, Fichte is not writing from the position of a secure subject, but employing a whole range of devices to interrogate the subject of autobiography. And the conclusion is that this post-subjective autobiography is a únique aesthetic and ethical achievement which we would do well to emulate.

Keywords

• post-subjective autobiography
• post-modernism
• poetry after auschwitz
• queer