Reinhart Koselleck’s metaphorical language: an application of historical semantics to one of its founding figures
Koselleck 100
Willibald Steinmetz – Anyone who reads Koselleck’s texts in the original German will be aware of two striking features in the ways he uses language: first, a frequent recourse to certain metaphorical expressions, and second, an extensive use of a limited number of rather peculiar words, or, contrariwise, of familiar words in an idiosyncratic way. Not a few of those idiosyncratic expressions, especially the verbs, are used by Koselleck in ways that lay bare the hidden metaphorical resonances they contain.
