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Hans Blumenberg, die Wirklichkeit und der Roman (Buchpräsentation)
Hans Blumenberg, reality and the novel (book presentation)
Event by: Leibniz-Zentrum für Literatur- und Kulturforschung, Berlin
Location: Schützenstraße 24, Schützenstraße 24, Berlin - Mitte
About event
With his essay “Concept of Reality and Possibility of the Novel,” Hans Blumenberg made a still provocative contribution not only to the theory of the novel, but also to the theory of realism. He asks how a concept of reality can be obtained when an epoch makes pragmatic use of it, but can only speak of it when it is fragile and replaced by a new, implicit concept of reality. What does this historicization of access to reality mean for philosophy, literature and for our talk about reality today?
On the occasion of the new publication of the essay in the context of the volume “Possibility of the Novel. The editors Niklaus Largier (University of California, Berkeley) and Anja Lemke (University of Cologne) will discuss an essay by Hans Blumenberg" (August 2025) with the Berlin philosophy historian Nicola Zambon (Free University of Berlin). The other authors of the volume – Rüdiger Campe, Karen Feldman, Eva Geulen, Joel Lande and Till Greite – are present.
Participants
Niklaus Largier is a professor in the Department of German at the University of California, Berkeley. Among other things, he was a fellow in residence at the Getty Center for the History of Art and the Humanities and a Guggenheim Fellow. He was director of the Medieval Studies program until 2004 and director of the Religious Studies program at UC Berkeley until 2006. His more recent publications include "Speculative Sensuality: Contemplation and Speculation in the Middle Ages" (Chronos 2018) and "Age of Possibility: Robert Musil, Georg Lukács and the Art of the Essay" (Wehrhahn 2015).
Anja Lemke is director of the Erich Auerbach Institute for Advanced Studies at the University of Cologne, where she was previously co-director of the Käte Hamburger-Kollegs »Morphomata. Genesis, dynamics and mediality of cultural figurations«. Since 2023 she has also been a Regular Visiting Professor at the German Department at Yale University. She is, among other things, editor of the volumes »Leib der Zeit. Approaches and continuations of Erich Auerbach" (Wallstein 2024) and "Theories of the Possible" (August 2021, together with Niklaus Largier) and author of "Memory spaces of the self - Walter Benjamin's Berlin childhood around nineteen hundred" (Königshausen & Neumann 2005).
Nicola Zambon is a research assistant at the Institute for Philosophy at the University of Würzburg. In the summer semester of 2025 he was a visiting professor of practical philosophy at the Facoltà di filosofia at the University of Turin. He received his doctorate from the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich with the dissertation “The Afterglow of the Stars. Constellations of modernity with Hans Blumenberg« (Wilhelm Fink 2017). He is, among other things, the author of »Persuasione ed evidenza. Sul rapporto tra fenomenologia e retorica in Husserl, Heidegger e Blumenberg« (Inschibboleth 2024) as well as editor of several volumes from the estate of Hans Blumenberg at Suhrkamp.
Admission is free, registration is not necessary.
The entrance to the Eberhard-Lämmert-Saal is located on Meierottostr. 8th
On the occasion of the new publication of the essay in the context of the volume “Possibility of the Novel. The editors Niklaus Largier (University of California, Berkeley) and Anja Lemke (University of Cologne) will discuss an essay by Hans Blumenberg" (August 2025) with the Berlin philosophy historian Nicola Zambon (Free University of Berlin). The other authors of the volume – Rüdiger Campe, Karen Feldman, Eva Geulen, Joel Lande and Till Greite – are present.
Participants
Niklaus Largier is a professor in the Department of German at the University of California, Berkeley. Among other things, he was a fellow in residence at the Getty Center for the History of Art and the Humanities and a Guggenheim Fellow. He was director of the Medieval Studies program until 2004 and director of the Religious Studies program at UC Berkeley until 2006. His more recent publications include "Speculative Sensuality: Contemplation and Speculation in the Middle Ages" (Chronos 2018) and "Age of Possibility: Robert Musil, Georg Lukács and the Art of the Essay" (Wehrhahn 2015).
Anja Lemke is director of the Erich Auerbach Institute for Advanced Studies at the University of Cologne, where she was previously co-director of the Käte Hamburger-Kollegs »Morphomata. Genesis, dynamics and mediality of cultural figurations«. Since 2023 she has also been a Regular Visiting Professor at the German Department at Yale University. She is, among other things, editor of the volumes »Leib der Zeit. Approaches and continuations of Erich Auerbach" (Wallstein 2024) and "Theories of the Possible" (August 2021, together with Niklaus Largier) and author of "Memory spaces of the self - Walter Benjamin's Berlin childhood around nineteen hundred" (Königshausen & Neumann 2005).
Nicola Zambon is a research assistant at the Institute for Philosophy at the University of Würzburg. In the summer semester of 2025 he was a visiting professor of practical philosophy at the Facoltà di filosofia at the University of Turin. He received his doctorate from the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich with the dissertation “The Afterglow of the Stars. Constellations of modernity with Hans Blumenberg« (Wilhelm Fink 2017). He is, among other things, the author of »Persuasione ed evidenza. Sul rapporto tra fenomenologia e retorica in Husserl, Heidegger e Blumenberg« (Inschibboleth 2024) as well as editor of several volumes from the estate of Hans Blumenberg at Suhrkamp.
Admission is free, registration is not necessary.
The entrance to the Eberhard-Lämmert-Saal is located on Meierottostr. 8th