Berlin in English: The German capital in recent Anglophone fiction

Abstract

This article examines the representation of Berlin in a cluster of recent English-language novels by writers including Amit Chaudhuri, Adrian Duncan, Helon Habila, Hari Kunzru, Lauren Oyler, Chris Power, Bea Setton and Matthew Sperling. Showing how the use of English in Berlin has been at the centre of contemporary German debates about migration and cultural identity and explaining how the image of Berlin in English literature has often been balanced between pulp and literary fiction, it asks if this body of contemporary Anglophone writing amounts to something more than literary tourism. Examining its representation of Berlin as both a mnemonic and touristic space, the acuity of its depiction of the city three decades after reunification, and the ways in which it represents different forms of migration to the city, the article contends that these novels do have valuable things to say, particularly concerning the ways in which an urban literary imaginary is being reconfigured for a digital age.