Die Wahrheit des Wunders in „Der phantastische Paragraph“ (1928) von Mela Hartwig ¹

This article examines the function and use of Wunder (miracles) in Mela Hartwig’s novella Der phantastische Paragraph, originally part of her 1928 Ekstasen collection. While existing scholarship has largely emphasized psychoanalytic readings—interpreting the protagonist, Sabine Seltsam, as a hysteric entangled in delusional fantasies of pregnancy—this essay offers a different perspective. It argues that Hartwig employs the miracle to subvert the structural principles of the psychoanalytic case study. The first part of the essay situates Hartwig’s use of the miracle in dialogue with her broader oeuvre and the literary currents of her time, reading her strategies in productive tension with the rationalist worldview of her father, Theodor Hartwig, who rejected belief in miracles as superstition. The second part analyzes Der phantastische Paragraph, showing how Hartwig uses the miracle to gesture toward the unrepresentable and to create a ‘symptom’ that resists the truth-seeking frameworks of both the courts and psychoanalysis. Far from portraying Sabine as merely deluded, the novella depicts her radical reclaiming of interpretive authority, as she asserts control over her own life narrative. This analysis highlights the centrality of the miracle motif in Der phantastische Paragraph and signals the need for further investigation of its significance across Hartwig’s broader oeuvre.