The Heine-Tear: the tension between spiritualism and sensualism in three short stories

Abstract

To approach Heine’s literature is to enter the world of one of the most controversial authors, and also one of the most conscious intellectuals about the historical crisis of his time. His work suffers the tension between Romanticism and Modern Era, this is why he tried to give a new esthetic answer that contemplated a critical view of everything that was presented as new, as well as of his past cultural heritage. This article tries to analyze Heine´s three short stories -De las memorias del señor de Schnabelewopski, published in 1833, Noches Florentinas of 1835, and El rabino de Bacherach published in 1840- which problematize the tension between spiritualism and sensualism, in order to demonstrate that de broken unity presented as a contradiction of elements, characters and spaces, constitute the structural procedure of Heine’s literature. Finally, the dichotomy between spiritualism and sensualism stablished by Jewish-christian religion, that continued during Romanticism through its idealized and ahistorical representations, encouraged Heine to use those procedures in order to criticize them, as well as the whole statu quo of his time.