Homeopathy, Gender and Agency in German Romanticism: The Case of Bettina von Arnim and Annette von Droste-Hülshoff

Homeopathy, one of the most well-known forms of alternative medicine, first rose to popularity during the German Romantic period of the early nineteenth century and was championed by two of the most famous women writers of the time, Bettina von Arnim and Annette von Droste-Hülshoff. This thesis aims to demonstrate how homeopathy not only allowed these writers to negotiate greater agency but also influenced their presentation of the conditions for female agency in their writing. I strive to accomplish this through by first exploring these writers’ letters to understand their relationship with homeopathy then applying their described experiences to analyzing themes of nature, the power of writing, and female agency to von Arnim’s novel Das Leben der Hochgräfin Gritta von Rattenzuhausbeiuns and von Droste-Hülshoff’s prose fragment Ledwina.Bachelor of Art