Günderrode was friends with the Brentano family and valued the intellectual and literary exchange that she had with Clemens, Kunigunde (Gunda) and later with Bettina Brentano, although their friendship came to an abrupt end shortly before Günderrode’s death. In her correspondence with the Brentanos, Günderrode considers the preconditions and possibilities of closeness. In an undated letter to Clemens Brentano, presented here, and one that was included in Bettina von Arnims Die Günderode, Günderrode addresses the question of self-alienation in epistolary correspondence. That is: the image of Günderrode that Clemens Brentano presented in his previous letter seems to have little do with the real individual. In the act of writing, according to Günderrode, feelings become ossified. Günderrode writes, to be sure, in a grotesquely humorous tone, but the underlying thought remains distinctly philosophical: in letters, one might strive for closeness with another, but in doing so, the writer risks becoming alienated from themselves.

Alienation is also the primary topic of Günderrode’s letter to Gunda Brentano. The increasing one-sidedness of their communication makes closeness impossible. Günderrode uses theatrical metaphors to illustrate the complex relationship between candour and the artifice of (self-)presentation: “I had thought you could be led to a box not too far away from the stage, and I could have the actors (thoughts, fancies, feelings) play before you but I would not have you led behind the curtain, or at all to see the innermost workings. – But I can’t do it, Gunda, at least it’s too difficult for me, either I have to seal off the playhouse entirely or unveil its innermost part.”