The research activities of the professorship concentrate on the study of narrative literary texts of the 17th to the 21st century from the perspective of the history of ideas and motifs as well as from the perspective of the genres of poetry and the theory of intermediality. A special focus is currently on the study of narrative literature of the 19th century from a perspective that attempts to combine questions of the history of ideas with questions of aesthetics of effect under the motto "suspense" (see "Projects").