THE ROMANTIC HERO IN WITHDRAWAL: IRONIC SOLUTIONS OF LAZA LAZAREVIĆ’S ”WERTHER” AND THOMAS MANN’S ”TRISTAN”

Abstract

Through the comparative approach, the paper analyses some aspects of Laza Lazarević’s Werther (1881) and Thomas Mann’s Tristan (1903). We argue that the artistic stylisation of the two stories’ ironic solutions represent a moment of significant typological resemblance. The scenes in focus are modelled by means of modernist literary mechanisms of deromanticisation and deheroisation of the Romantic Hero, thereby establishing a peculiar intertextual relation in reference to Tristan and Werther canonical narratives. The ironic solutions are manifested through a particular “fight” of two opposite parties and represent a subversive and anticlimactic defeat of the Hero.