META-LITERARY NARRATIVE IN READING EDUCATION: THE CASE OF CONTEMPORARY GERMAN YOUTH NOVELS

In this investigation, we study the presence of a transgressive poetic practice in German young readers' narrative from the 21st century that brings forth a myriad of advantages where the reader-literacy competence of the young readers are concerned. The term in question is deemed as metaliterature which is a textual modality that breaks the mould and creates the topic of the current conventions of traditional rhetoric which requires a more active participation on behalf of the reader throughout the process of how the work is to be perceived. With this intention in mind, three meta-literary resources frequently used in twelve contemporary young reader German novels have undergone investigation which reinforce their own nature of literary artefacts: intertextuality, metalepsis and meta-literary observations. These resources trigger the activation of reader-literary strategies during the receptive process of the work, given that it breaks and reveals basic codes in the art of the written word.