Precarious Times

In Precarious Times, Anne Fuchs explores how works of German literature, film, and photography reflect on the profound temporal anxieties precipitated by contemporary experiences of atomization, displacement, and fragmentation that bring about a loss of history and of time itself and that is peculiar to our current moment. The digital age places premiums on just-in-time deliveries, continual innovation, instantaneous connectivity, and around-the-clock availability. While some celebrate this 24/7 culture, others see it as profoundly destructive to the natural rhythm of day and night-and to human happiness. Have we entered an era of a perpetual present that depletes the future and erodes our grasp of the past? Beginning its examination around 1900, when rapid modernization was accompanied by comparably intense reflection on changing temporal experience, Precarious Times provides historical depth and perspective to current debates on the "digital now." Expanding the modern discourse on time and speed, Fuchs deploys such concepts as attention, slowness and lateness to emphasize the uneven quality of time around the world.

Anne Fuchs

List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
List of Abbreviations
Introduction
1. Theoretical Perspectives: Temporal Anxieties in the Digital Age
Timeless Time
Acceleration
Resonance
Atomization
Immediacy
The Extended Present
Time-Space Compression
Network Time
Precarious Times
2. Historical Perspectives: Modernism and Speed Politics
Temporality and the Modern Imagination
Two Visions of Late Culture: Friedrich Nietzsche and Thomas Mann
Attention, Distraction, and the Modern Conditions of Perception: Georg Simmel and Franz Kafka
Modern Man and the Trouble with Time: Franz Kafka's Der Proceß
Speed Politics in Robert Walser's Short Prose
From Lateness to Latency: Sigmund Freud
Conclusion
3. Contemporary Perspectives: Precarious Time(s) in Photography and Film
Slow Art
The Disruption of Linear Time: Michael Wesely's Time Photography
The Disruption of Historical Time: Ulrich Wüst's Photobook Später Sommer/Letzter Herbst
In the Acoustic Space of the GDR: Christian Petzold's Barbara
The Longing for Transcendence: Ulrich Seidl's Paradies: Glaube
Disruptive Performances: Maren Ade's Toni Erdmann
Conclusion
4. Narrating Precariousness
Dis/connectedness in Contemporary German Literature
Acceleration and Point Time: Clemens Meyer's Als wir träumten
Empty Time and the Extended Present: Julia Schoch's Mit der Geschwindigkeit des Sommers and Karen Duve's Taxi
The Cult of Immediacy and the Search for Resonance: Wilhelm Genazino's Das Glück in glücksfernen Zeiten
The Search for Transcendence: Arnold Stadler's Sehnsucht: Versuch über das erste Mal and Salvatore
Precarious Times, Precarious Lives: Jenny Erpenbeck's Gehen, ging, gegangen
Conclusion
Epilogue: Presentist Dystopias or the Case for Environmental Humanities
Bibliography
Index