Merkwürdige Alte

Age as theme, style, and metaphor: The contributions to this volume investigate the historical change and function of certain figures of advanced age, such as the 'old hag', 'old maid', 'puer senex', and 'the amorous old man/woman'. Topics explored include literature and the visual arts, the presentation of dementia, humane care, sexuality of the elderly and intergenerational relationships in German and Japanese Alzheimer's narratives and nursing home novels, patterns of memory and visions of the future in the later works of Theodor Fontane and Christa Wolf, and old age as a metaphor for epochal change in fin de siècle literature.