SOURCE: Waldstein, Edith. “Political Communications and the Conversational Novel.” In Bettine von Arnim and the Politics of Romantic Conversation, pp. 59-93. Columbia, S.C.: Camden House, 1988.

In the following excerpt, Waldstein refutes the common critical dismissal of Arnim's political writing as the work of a dilettante.

The connection between Bettine von Arnim's cultural activity and the society in which she lived cannot be fully understood without a review of the social and political activities in which she was involved.¹ This aspect of her life has until recently been overlooked in literary history. Critics tend either not to discuss it at all or to recognize, but discredit, her political engagement. Lilienfein and Haberland/Pehnt, for example, conclude that Bettine von Arnim was a political dilettante.¹ While such criticism is relatively mild, others are harsh and confusing. Hans von Arnim, for example, begins one of his chapters, entitled “Auf politischen...