German pop literature (German:Popliteratur orPop-Literatur) has been a movement inGerman-language literature with multiple waves in the second half of the 20th century and early 21st century. It emerged in the 1960s, when it was heavily influenced by Americanbeat literature, and was followed by a second generation in the 1980s that overlapped withpunk subculture. It saw a renaissance in the 1990s and 2000s, when the concept became associated with several authors who received significant publicity.
The term pop literature was coined by the Austrian poetH. C. Artmann in 1964 and seriously entered German literature whenRolf Dieter Brinkmann andRalf-Rainer Rygulla [de] published the anthologyAcid. Neue amerikanische Szene in 1969. The wave of pop literature that followed was understood as a protest against the politics of post-war German literature represented byGroup 47. The pop literature authors were initially very influenced by Americanbeat literature, embraced commercialsubcultures and wrote in everyday language.[1]
A second wave of pop literature emerged in the early 1980s and its participants were more careful to distinguish themselves from the1968 protest culture, with which the older pop literature had some overlap. This generation had overlap withpunk subculture. It includedPeter Glaser [de],Rainald Goetz andDiedrich Diederichsen.[2]
The 1990s saw a major renaissance for German pop literature. Prominent works from this generation includeFaserland (1995) byChristian Kracht andSoloalbum [de] (1998) byBenjamin von Stuckrad-Barre. One of the more publicized events from this wave was when five pop literature authors—Stuckrad-Barre, Kracht,Eckhart Nickel,Alexander von Schönburg andJoachim Bessing [de]—held a meeting atHotel Adlon in Berlin in 1999, after which their pop cultural discussions were published in the bookTristesse Royale. Das popkulturelle Quintett.[3]