Across the Fence: Quellenforschung

I never even knew the Germanism Quellenforschung (pronounce: ‘kvellen-for-shoong, i.e. source research), meaning basic research, exists in the English language. To be honest, basic research sounds almost like a wrong translation because Quellenforschung is anything BUT basic. It is fundamental and profound. It is a term from literary studies and is all about “the study of the sources of, or influences upon, a literary work” (quote from Wiktionary).

What does THAT mean, now?! Well, imagine you are reading a novel. The author, no matter what the topic is about, will have used some personal experiences. If the novel is based on a historical event or on a historical context, they will have used what knowledge they had of either. But we, as the readers, don’t know off-hand what their experience and/or knowledge is/was. If a particular attitude is displayed, we want to know more.

That’s where the Quellenforschung comes in. Often, in their acknowledgements, authors tell their readers what sources they used when they were researching a topic more thoroughly. I have even a bibliography – a list of all books I read on the topic of the German occupation of the British Channel Islands during WW II – in the back of my historical mystery, Islands in the Storm. It makes it easier for anybody deeper into the topic to find what facts they are looking for. What they might have to research, though, is where I took my knowledge about oil crayons from and how I acquired it. That’s where they might have to look into my biography and find that, as a journalist, I used to work, among others, with the industry of art supplies. What they will also find is that I am a native German and that I have grown up in a time when Germany worked hard on processing its WW II history. And that at the time I researched and wrote the book (1998/1999) there was not a single book on the German market dealing with the topic of this occupation, as the British archives had only been opened so very recently. They will find that the language is a mix of British and American English and figure that my school English was British English and that I acquired American English only later.

Basically, Quellenforschung is going backward to from where the author took it forward. Think of all the movies that are based on novels. Let’s take one of my favorite ones, Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. There are numerous movies based very closely on the text, and all production teams have most probably done their homework. Yet, we see that there are differences in the costumes (some are NOT regency era anymore), in the attitude the actors show (some are way too modern considering the time that the novel is set in), and in the portrait of etiquette.

Novels have purposes and messages that can be found in between the lines or quite overtly. The authors usually have their reasons for choosing their message. To find this out, Quellenforschung will have to look at biographies and at contemporary circumstances in society. At what mainstream culture is/was around the author and their work and at what period the story is set in. It will then have to check what kind of influence the work may have had on its readers in looking at its reception.

Quellenforschung is an intriguing field that – by now you might have guessed it – is sometimes meaningful for understanding an author and their work better. Mostly, it is done in the so-called ivory tower – in studies away from mainstream society. It’s deep and somewhat otherworldly in its purpose. A lot of people who simply read for entertainment, won’t even deem it necessary. It’s for those who want a bit more substance that it really creates a thrill.