Kerstin Ruth's work The Poetics of Discarded Objects systematically examines the literary representation of discarded objects in 19th-century literature, with a focus on Keller's works, exploring their evaluative, structural, and selective mechanisms within realist poetics. The book elaborates on the narrative potential and meaning-generating mechanisms of discarded objects in themes such as growth, intergenerational inheritance, memory, and self-construction. Ruth employs a New Historicist methodology to construct a dialogue between literature and material cultural history, attempting a cultural-historical reconstruction of literary texts. While her study does not interpret from a New Materialist perspective, it profoundly reveals the entangled relationship between humans and discarded objects and the narrative potential of objects, aligning with the core concerns of New Materialism. This article reviews Ruth's research from a New Materialist perspective to enrich understanding.

I. The Cultural Poetics of Discarded Objects

This section explores the cultural poetic significance of discarded objects in German realist literature of the late 19th century. Discarded objects occupy a prominent position in both characters' living spaces and narrative structures, linked to the increasing quantity of objects during industrialization and the urgent societal and personal need for their management. The human-object relationship manifests as possession, collection, sale, or destruction, with objects categorized as "discarded" being products of specific discursive constructions tied to cultural formation and identity mechanisms. Discarded objects oscillate between memory and forgetting, preservation and disposal, marking fractures or dissolution in old values, meaningful associations, or symbolic systems. Ruth treats discarded objects as cultural signifiers, arguing that their aesthetic representation in literature critically reflects on the construction of cultural value systems while actively participating in it through narrative practice. The literary field transcends mere observation and reflection, playing an active role in reshaping cultural order.

II. The Relationship Between "Discarded Objects" and Bildung

This section examines the connection between object depiction and the protagonist's Bildung in Keller's novel Green Henry. Henry's growth experiences form a metonymic association with discarded objects, hinting at his lack of systematic guidance and foreshadowing his eventual failure. Contrasted with Goethe's Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship, Henry's collecting behavior exposes his intellectual deficiency, devolving into self-destruction. His collected objects become bound to traumatic memories and are ultimately degraded as waste. Henry's abandonment of these objects signifies both an erasure of the past and a latent desire for self-reconstruction. The violence inherent in discarding operates on both personal and societal levels. After leaving school, Henry moves to his uncle's rural home, where old and new objects coexist harmoniously—though more as a collection of chance. The decisive factors leading Henry to pursue art are all contingent. By the novel's end, Henry transitions from a collector to a seller of discarded objects, with his paintings sold cheaply and the pawnshop window becoming a cruel display. While Frau Margret's secondhand shop stimulates children's imagination with its richness, the Munich pawnshop reduces objects to mere economic value. Henry's old paintings encapsulate lost time, shattered ambitions, and a diminished sense of self-worth. Through human-object interactions, the novel reveals how modern individuals rely on object order to construct, orient, and stabilize their existence—though this construction is marked by contingency, violence, and temporality. Discarded objects highlight crises of order, value, and meaning. The novel also contrasts legal documents with literary narratives in value transmission, underscoring literature's functional significance in modernity. Keller's sympathetic stance toward useless objects/people is evident. Drawing on Narratology Toward Objects, the narrative role of objects can be divided into narratological and experiential functions. The depiction of discarded objects in Green Henry mimics 19th-century domestic collecting and secondhand trade, advancing the theme of Bildung while playing a crucial role in the story's structure and evoking characters' emotional experiences.

III. Space: The Narrative Function of Domestic Spaces and Household Objects in the Novel

Chapter Three examines the narrative function of domestic spaces and household objects from a spatial perspective. Inherited household items not only carry emotional and familial memories but also contrast with industrially produced furniture, creating narrative tension. These objects concretize family heritage, class identity, and gender order, reflecting characters' pursuit of self-identity and social status. Through Keller's Epigram—particularly Regina and The Ghost-Seer—Ruth reveals the poetic function of domestic interiors in shaping female figures and constructing test narratives. The depiction of household objects generates suspense, unravels mysteries, drives plot progression, and serves as a meta-narrative medium for reflecting on creative techniques. The Poor Baroness uses rented-room furnishings to depict class transitions, while the scientist Reinhard's study in Epigram echoes and revises Goethe's Faust, reflecting Keller's cautious stance toward natural science. This chapter not only explores spatial representation but also traces objects' temporal transformations, embodying shifts in class order, scientific paradigms, and literary history. Ruth notes that traces of objects are used to construct "enigmas," aligning with the "active mystery-I" type and resonating with 19th-century European detective fiction trends.

IV. The Temporality of Objects: Memory, Forgetting, and Literary Representation

Chapter Four explores the shifting value of objects over time and their complex relationship with memory. Object value changes follow two paths: (1) objects become meaningless waste when severed from memory, or (2) objects bearing traumatic memories are discarded to reconstruct the self. Keller's Two Pocket Watches uses the watches' dialogue to illustrate their emotional ties, yet they are abandoned for evoking memories of failed love. In Raabe's The Archives of Birdsong Valley, Fielding's burning of his home and "museum of the soul" challenges bourgeois values, reflecting his intolerance of familial memory and pursuit of memory purity. Object destruction gives rise to dual textual production—private records and literary representation. In Stifter's My Great-Grandfather's Portfolio, ancestral objects' transformation into waste reflects temporal erosion and generational crisis. Gerstäcker's When We Die depicts personal relics' value obliteration in a monetary economy through auction scenes. These works collectively emphasize literature's redemptive function, granting discarded objects renewed meaning through aesthetic transformation. Keller's poem The Swiss Armory resonates with 19th-century museum trends, showing how technological progress turned ancient weapons from tools into cultural symbols, revealing both collective memory construction and historical preservation dilemmas. The text ultimately advocates a dialectical historical attitude—innovating while inheriting.

V. The Dual Fabric of Material History and Formal Aesthetics

Centering on the concept of "fabric," this chapter examines the multifaceted meanings of discarded textiles in 19th-century literature. Part one discusses discarded fabric as essential papermaking material and the affinity between ragpickers and poets. Part two interprets fabric as a symbol of knowledge order in Keller's Don Correa. Part three elevates the fabric concept to narratology, exploring realist texts' textual texture. Ruth's research systematically investigates discarded-object depictions in Keller's works, constructing a dialogue between cultural-historical materials and literary texts. Her meticulous textual analysis advances Keller and realist literature studies, offering significant reference value for New Materialist-oriented literary research.