Smell-sound synaesthesia as revelatory medium: A brief history with emphasis on German literature (1900–1930)

Abstract

Until the late 18th century, most smell-sound synaesthesiae are metaphors and similes which equate or compare evocative effects of one sense’s impressions with those of another – or highlight synergies of different senses (I.). German Romanticism inaugurates a different kind of smell-sound synaesthesia which presupposes an intrinsic link between different sensory qualities, and the use of such tropes is continued most famously by French Symbolism (II.). German literature between 1900 and 1930 uses such synaesthesiae in three innovative ways: late Symbolist varieties appraise audible human expression ethically; neo-Romantic versions mark irreversible departures from pre-adult ways of life; and parodies ridicule the modern Gesamtkunstwerk (III.). The belief that smell-sound synaesthesiae are manifestations of essential meaning is largely discarded after Modernism (IV.).