The Bildungsroman (the novel of personal development or of education) originated in Germany in the latter half of the 18^th century and has since become one of the major narrative genres in European and Anglo-American literature. It charts the protagonist’s actual or metaphorical journey from youth to maturity. Initially the aim of this journey is reconciliation between the desire for individuation (self-fulfilment) and the demands of socialisation (adaptation to a given social reality).

Since the genre deals with subjectivity and the relationship between self and society, many novels concerned with psychological characterisation and questions of identity use Bildungsroman elements. The heyday of

This article in full comprises 3205 words but only the first 150 or so words are available to non-members.

All our articles have been written recently by experts in their field, more than 95% of them university professors. To read about membership, please click here.

Published 13 November 2002

Citation: Rau, Petra. "Bildungsroman". The Literary Encyclopedia. 13 November 2002.
[http://www.litencyc.com/php/stopics.php?rec=true&UID=119, accessed 9 February 2010.]