Peter Metzel joined the department in 2017. After receiving a B.A. in Germanistik and Politikwissenschaft from the Ernst-Moritz-Arndt-Universität Greifswald in 2014, he graduated from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with a M.A. in German Studies. In his B.A. thesis he worked on disgust as a problem in the depiction of nature in early Enlightenment poetry, focusing on poets such as B.H. Brockes, B. Feind, J.J. Ebeling, and A. von Haller. From this project stems his interest in the problem of all-encompassing affirmation of the world in poetry of different historical contexts as well as the influence of Enlightenment thinking on authors as diverse as Friedrich Schlegel and Arno Schmidt. His current interests also include the development of semiotics since the 18th century and the interplay of ethics and aesthetics in G.E. Lessing’s dramatic work.