Fontane's Stine as a Work of poetic Realism

Like his other novels, Fontane wrote Stine in the style of Poetic Realism. The plot is chiefly invented, but the events were meant to appear real and were therefore set in Berlin during the Industrial Age. Occasionally, however, Fontane distorted reality or portrayed it inaccurately for the sake of the respective intended meaning, thus creating a network of meaningful signs and references. After some preliminary remarks on excerpts from the novel where Fontane deliberately alters reality, the article takes a systematic look on his poetization of prose. It identifies and explains motifs and facts and their reflection in other narrative contexts, the evocative power of names, the prolepses and the linguistic ambiguities, the use of traditional images and analyzes how the repetition of motifs triggers shifts in meaning.