School of Cultures, Languages and Area Studies

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Image of Bram Mertens

Bram Mertens

Lecturer in German, Faculty of Arts

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Biography

I studied English and German at the University of Leuven in Belgium before studying for an MPhil in English at Keele University. I gained my PhD in German and English from the University of Nottingham in 2001, and have been working at the University ever since, first as a postdoctoral research fellow and later as a Lecturer in German and Dutch.

Expertise Summary

Areas of interest include Flemish literature since 1945 as well as the history, politics, culture and society of Belgium in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Teaching Summary

I have taught at all levels in Dutch and German Studies. Past modules have included Jewish Intellectuals in Germany 1830-1940, History of the Low Countries, Culture and Society of the Low Countries,… read more

Recent Publications

I have taught at all levels in Dutch and German Studies. Past modules have included Jewish Intellectuals in Germany 1830-1940, History of the Low Countries, Culture and Society of the Low Countries, The Second World War in Modern Dutch Fiction and Post-War Belgian Cinema. I also convene the Department's first-year core module, Introduction to German Studies, as well as the final-year dissertation modules.

Past Research

My doctoral thesis Das Denken der Lehre: Walter Benjamin, Franz Joseph Molitor and the Jewish Tradition (2001) examined the influence of the Jewish tradition on the work of Walter Benjamin, mediated through the writings of the nineteenth-century catholic kabbalist Franz Joseph Molitor, notably his four-volume magnum opus Philosophie der Geschichte (1827-1853). I have since published a book, Dark Images, Secret Hints (2007), and a series of articles on the role of Judaism in the work of Walter Benjamin and the influence of his friendship with Gershom Scholem.

My next project focused on the history and memory of the Second World War and its aftermath in the Low Countries. I published several of articles on the construction of narratives surrounding wartime collaboration and its legal sanctioning after the war in Belgium, and on the same themes in the novels of Hugo Claus and Erwin Mortier.

  • MERTENS, B., 2020. ‘Hoop op iets vaags’: Ambiguity, Unreliability and Indeterminacy in Erwin Mortier’s Marcel (1999) Dutch Crossing: Journal of Low Countries Studies. 44(3), 314-330
  • MERTENS, B., 2020. 'Dread, Desire and Destruction: The Historical Sublime in Erwin Mortier's Marcel (1999)' Journal of Modern Literature. 44(1), 165-182
  • DE CAUTER, L. and MERTENS, B. (TRANSLATOR), 2019. The Dwarf in the Chess Machine: Benjamin's Hidden Doctrine nai010.
  • MERTENS, B. and DAVISON, S., 2017. A Portrait of Hugo Claus as a Young Artist: the Influence of James Joyce on The Sorrow of Belgium Modern Language Review. 112(2), 413-439
  • MERTENS, B., 2015. Het Vlaamse proza over de Tweede Wereldoorlog Internationale Neerlandistiek. 53(3), 265-269
  • MERTENS, B., 2013. (Judicious) Interpretation: Walter Benjamin reads the early German Romantics History of European Ideas. n/a(n/a), n/a
  • MERTENS, B., 2013. 'An explosion of vitality and creativity'? Memory and historiography of the Second World War in Belgium and the Netherlands Dutch Crossing: Journal of Low Countries Studies. 37(1), 41-56
  • MERTENS, B., 2013. From perpetrator to victim and back again: the long shadow of the Second World War in Belgium. In: KARNER, C. and MERTENS, B., eds., The use and abuse of memory: interpreting World War II in contemporary European politics Transaction Publishers. 101-119
  • KARNER, C. and MERTENS, B., eds., 2013. The use and abuse of memory: interpreting World War II in contemporary European politics Transaction Publishers.
  • KARNER, C. and MERTENS, B., 2013. Introduction: Memories and analogies of World War II. In: KARNER, C. and MERTENS, B., eds., The use and abuse of memory: interpreting World War II in contemporary European politics Transaction Publishers. 1-21
  • MERTENS, B., 2012. "The concept of art criticism in German Romanticism": Walter Benjamin's epistemological exercise book. In: CARROLL, J., GILES, S. and OERGEL, M., eds., Aesthetics and modernity from Schiller to the Frankfurt School Peter Lang. 255-274
  • MERTENS, B., 2009. German-Jewish Popular Culture before the Holocaust: Kafka’s Kitsch (review) Journal of Jewish Studies. 60(2), 364
  • MERTENS, B., 2007. Dark images, secret hints: Benjamin, Scholem, Molitor and the Jewish tradition Bern: P. Lang.
  • MERTENS, B., 2006. "Hope, yes, but not for us": Messianism and redemption in the work of Walter Benjamin. In: CRISTAUDO, W. and BAKER, W., eds., Messianism, apocalypse and redemption in 20th century German thought Adelaide: ATF Press. 63-77
  • GERIGK, H. and MERTENS, B. (TRANSLATOR), 2006. Narrative Technique as 'Maieutics': Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punisment. In: JONES, S. and MILNE, L., eds., Dostoevsky: On the Threshold of Other Worlds: Essays in Honor of Malcolm V. Jones Bramcote Press. 170-174
  • MERTENS, B., 2005. The Arcades Project: a Talmud for our times? New Formations. 54, 60-73
  • MERTENS, B., 2003. 'The True Words of the Mystic': Gershom Scholem and Franz Joseph Molitor Australian Journal for Jewish Studies. 17, 131-153
  • MERTENS, B., 2002. "This still remarkable book": Franz Joseph Molitor's Judaeo-Christian synthesis Journal of Modern Jewish Studies. 1(2), 167-181
  • MERTENS, B., 2002. The Anxiety of Influence: Benjamin, Scholem and Molitor: selected papers from the Conference of University Teachers of German, University of Southampton, April 2000 In: Millennial Essays on Film and other German Studies. 127-141
  • LAERMANS, R., VANDEN ABEELE, M. and MERTENS, B. (TRANSLATOR), 1998. The Lucidity of the Obscene Needcompany/International Theatre and Film Books.

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