Brandans Buch der Welt – eine konkretisierte Metapher

Abstract

This analysis of Sankt Brandans Reise focuses on the literary potential of a religious metaphor, on Augustine’s metaphor of the world as a book. This metaphor becomes concrete in several episodes. Despite the substantial difference in scale between the world and a book, they are identified in the narrative, as well as in a paradisiac artefact that presents a deceptively realistic representation of almost the whole world. At the same time, however, this stands in contrast with an awareness that it is not possible for Brendan’s travel journal to contain a record of the whole world.

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