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  • The Case of Helene Hegemann: Queerness, Failure, and the German Girl
  • Emily Jeremiah

Helene Hegemann’s 2010 novel Axolotl Roadkill, whose author was seventeen at the time of publication, provoked an instructive controversy. The debates the novel triggered tell us a great deal about contemporary German literary and cultural ideals, especially as far as girls and young women are concerned. Hege-mann’s work in fact “queers” such ideals, evoking though its sixteen-year-old heroine Mifti a traumatized yet defiantly perverse subject. The novel’s content, however, has been overshadowed by media discussions of its author, a contested and provocative figure who herself challenges established models of femininity. In this article, I consequently begin by discussing the reception of Hegemann, concentrating on the questions of age, gender, and Germanness. I go on to examine Axolotl Roadkill, asking how the novel itself conceives of subjectivity, generationality, and nationality. In addition, I discuss the novel as a queer text. I suggest that Mifti – and the novel itself – illustrate what Judith Halberstam terms “the queer art of failure.” Mifti and Hegemann are triumphant failures as German girls. They thus ask us to consider critically what passes for normality and success in our times.

Hegemann’s youth unsurprisingly attracted comment in media coverage of the author, but other factors contributed to the furore surrounding the publication of her novel. The autobiographical status of her work was the subject of speculation, with the prominence of the author’s father, the dramatist Carl Hegemann, serving only to add piquancy (see März). But Hegemann attracted even greater attention when it was revealed that her novel quotes passages from a blog by a writer known as Airen (now published as a book, see Airen), a revelation that led to a flurry of articles in the press about plagiarism and the internet, authorship and intertextuality, and to either condemnation or defence. Hegemann’slackof repentance in the face of the revelation drew criticism. Some commentators, however, have situated the writer in a tradition of “borrowing” that goes back to Thomas Mann and Shakespeare (Graf).1 There is an interesting contradiction here: on the one hand, Hegemann’s work has widely been viewed as autobiographical; on the other, it has been seen as an example of derivativeness or even theft. This contradictoriness points to the unresolved status of literature in [End Page 400] postmodernism, as both intertextual and “original.” It also reveals cultural ambivalence in the face of the young female writer in particular.

Critics have reacted to the writer’s age by seeking to extrapolate from it broader messages about childhood and adulthood. Susanne Schmetkamp, for example, reads the precocious figure of Hegemann as illustrating the speed at which children grow up in contemporary society. At the same time, Hegemann appeals to an adult readership supposedly resistant to responsibility; the writer and her novel offer “Futter für die infantile Gesellschaft” (Schmetkamp). Hegemann’s youth potentially makes her attractive to older people; Jana Simon asserts, “Helene ist ein Mädchen, dem Erwachsene gerne gefallen wollen. In ihrer Nähe fühlen sie sich hip” (see also Kalle). She satisfies what one commentator calls “die Sehnsucht eines erwachsenen Establishments nach einer authentischen, originellen Jugend” (Schmidt). But Hegemann’s age also inspires projection and appropriation (see Kalle). Hegemann’s status as a young person or girl is indeed complex. One journalist describes Hegemann’s eighteenth-birthday party, to which the press was apparently invited, as “[e]in Kindergeburtstag als Performance für Erwachsene?” (Thumfart). Thus, Hegemann’s youth appears to this commentator provocative and even suspect in its “performed” quality. Hegemann herself concedes the performative element of her public persona: “Natürlich kokettiere ich mit meinem Jugendbonus. Und kokettiere sogar damit, dass ich mit ihm kokettiere” (qtd. in Simon). This reflection highlights Hegemann’s agency, and her knowingness, countering views of the author as symbol or surface.

Johannes Thumfart offers an example of such a view. He describes Hege-mann as artfully offering a “Projektionsfläche für sexistische Machtfantasien.” He thereby suggests that Hegemann is colluding with and even encouraging sexism. It is notable that in online discussions in particular, Hegemann’s appearance attracts repeated, and often negative, attention...

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