GERMAN WRITERS AND POLITICS,

Transcription

1 GERMAN WRITERS AND POLITICS,

2 WARWICK STUDIES IN THE EUROPEAN HUMANITIES General Editors: Tom Winnifrith ( ), Chairman, Department of English and Comparative Literary Studies and Michael Mallett (1990-), Professor of History, University of Warwick. This series is designed for publications deriving from the European Humanities Research Centre at the University of Warwick, which was founded to promote interdisciplinary and comparative research in the European Humanities. The Centre's aims, pursued through research projects, conferences, seminars and visiting fellowships, include the dissemination of research findings; this series of publications is the Centre's primary means to this end. Richard Dove and Stephen Lamb (editors) GERMAN WRITERS AND POLITICS, Nicholas Hewitt (editor) THE CULTURE OF RECONSTRUCTION J. R. Mulryne and Margaret Shewring (editors) WAR, LITERATURE AND THE ARTS IN SIXTEENTH-CENTURY EUROPE THEATRE OF THE ENGLISH AND ITALIAN RENAISSANCE Brian Rigby and Nicholas Hewitt (editors) FRANCE AND THE MASS MEDIA Margaret Tudeau-Clayton and Martin Warner (editors) ADDRESSING FRANK KERMODE: ESSAYS IN CRITICISM AND INTERPRETATION Tom Winnifrith and Cyril Barrett (editors) THE PHILOSOPHY OF LEISURE LEISURE IN ART AND LITERATURE Tom Winnifrith (editor) PERSPECTIVES ON ALBANIA

3 German Writers and Politics Edited by Richard Dove Senior Lecturer in German, Thames Polytechnic and Stephen Lamb Lecturer in German Studies, University of Warwick M

4 Richard Dove and Stephen Lamb 1992 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1992 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London W1 P 9HE. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. First published 1992 by THE MACMILLAN PRESS LTD Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 2XS and London Companies and representatives throughout the world ISBN ISBN (ebook) DOI / A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

5 Contents Notes on the Contributors Acknowledgements vii X Introduction: Commitment and the Illusion of Power Riclulrd Dove and Stephen Lamb 1 1 Artists, Intellectuals and the German Independent Socialist Party: some Preliminary Reflections Riclulrd Sheppard 13 2 Rene Schickele and the 1918 Revolution Margaret Rogister 30 3 Kurt Tucholsky's Analysis of the Revolution Ian King 44 4 Ernst Toller: the Redemptive Power of the Failed Revolutionary Frank Trommler 60 5 Weimar and the Political Film: from Die Weber to Kuhle Wampe John Warren 76 6 From Social Fascism to Popular Front: Communist Party Policy as Reflected in the Works of Friedrich Wolf, Anna Seghers and Willi Bredel Anthony Grenville 89 7 Politics and the War Novel: the Political Conception and Reception of Novels about the First World War Hans-Harald Miiller 103 v

6 vi Contents 8 'Militant Humanism': a Concept of the Third Way in Exile Thomas Koebner Literary Exile in Great Britain J. M. Ritchie Forms of Conviction: the Problem of Belief in Anti-Fascist Plays by Bruckner, Toller and Wolf Tom Kuhn Ernst Toller and the Exigencies of Exile N. A. Furness Ernst Toller and Ireland Joachim Fischer Adventurism, Propaganda or Commitment? German Writers in the Spanish Civil War Alexander Ostmann 207 Index of Names 220

7 Notes on the Contributors Richard Dove is Senior Lecturer in German at Thames Polytechnic, London. His most recent publication is He was a German. A Biography of Ernst Toller. He has also published a full-length study of Toller's plays as well as articles on modern German literature. He is now working on a study of refugee writers in Britain Joachim Fischer is Lecturer in German at the University of Limerick, Ireland. His research interests are in the area of Irish/German cultural relations and he is currently working on a thesis on the Irish image of Germany N. A. Furness was Professor of German at Edinburgh University from 1969 until his retirement in He has researched various aspects of nineteenth- and twentieth-century German drama and has published widely on Buchner, Hebbel, Toller and German Expressionism. He is now working on a study of Otto Lehmann-Ruf5biild t. Anthony Grenville is Lecturer in German at the University of Bristol. His main area of research is the interaction between history and literature in the inter war years, including articles on Thomas Mann, Bertolt Brecht, Odon von Horvath and Anna Seghers. His book on the literature and history of the Weimar Republic is to appear shortly, and a book on literary works reflecting German Communist Party policy is in preparation. W. J. (Ian) King, is Senior Lecturer in German at South Bank Polytechnic, London. He has published numerous articles on Tucholsky, Carl von Ossietzky and aspects of contemporary German politics. He is the author of Kurt Tucholsky als politischer Publizist (1983). Thomas Koebner is Director of the Deutsche Film- und Fernsehakademie in Berlin. He is the author of two books on Hermann Broch and editor of volumes on Tendenzen der deutschen Literatur seit vii

8 viii Notes on the Contributors 1945, Weimars Ende. Prognosen und Diagnosen in der deutschen Literatur und politischen Publizistik (1982), Medium Film - das Ende der Literatur? (1985) and of Alfred Kerr's English exile diaries. He is also the editor of various journals, including the Internationales ]ahrbuch fiir Exilforschung and Medienwissenschaft. Tom Kuhn lectures on twentieth-century German literature at the University of Oxford. He is Fellow and Tutor in German at St Hugh's College. His translation and edition (with K. J. Leeder) of memoir material, The Young Brecht, was published in 1991 and he is preparing a study of German drama Stephen Lamb is Lecturer in German Studies at the University of Warwick. His main research interests are in German literature and politics in the twentieth century. He has published articles on various aspects of the life and work of Ernst Toller, intellectuals and the Munich Soviet Republic, and the new German cinema. He is preparing a study of the life and work of Ernst Toller. Hans-Harald Muller is Professor of German at the University of Hamburg. He is the author of numerous publications on literary history and theory including Barockforschung (1973), Intellektueller Linksradikalismus in der Weimarer Republik (1977) and Der Krieg und die Schriftsteller (1986). He is also the editor of Theodor Plivier and Leo Perutz. Alexander Ostmann is Principal Lecturer in German at the City of London Polytechnic. He wrote his doctoral thesis at the Free University of Berlin on the political role of legends in history. His recent research has focused on literary and philosophical aspects of fascist and Marxist ideology. His paper on 'The Existentialist Dimension of Fascism' was published in The History of European Ideas (1991). Professor J. M. Ritchie is the author, editor or translator of some thirteen books and fifty articles on German themes. For his book German Literature under National Socialism and other publications he was awarded a D.Litt. by the University of Aberdeen, where he is now Director of the Research Centre for Germans and Austrians in Exile in Great Britain. He holds the 'Grofies Verdienstkreuz' for his services to German studies.

9 Notes on the Contributors ix Margaret Rogister is Lecturer in German at the University of Durham. Her research interests include the art, history and literature of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, with particular emphasis on comparative literature. She is currently working on artists and writers who emigrated to Switzerland during the first world war and has recently published an article on 'Romain Rolland: one German view'. Richard Sheppard is the Fellow and Tutor in German at Magdalen College, Oxford and Lecturer in German at Christ College, Oxford. Most of his research has focused on European Modernism, particularly Dada and Expressionism. He is currently preparing a study of the image of the academic across various artistic media in Britain and the USA, and is writing a book on artists, intellectuals and the USPD. Frank Trommler is Professor of German and Comparative Literature at the University of Pennsylvannia, Philadelphia, USA. He has written extensively on German literature. culture and history since the nineteenth century, on German-American cultural relations, and on the relationship of culture and technology. Among his major publications are Roman und Wirklichkeit (1966), Sozialistische Literatur in Deutschland (1976), Die Kultur der Weimarer Republik (1978, with J. Hermand), and as editor, America and the Germans (1985) and Germanistik in den USA (1989). John Warren is Lecturer in German at Oxford Polytechnic. His research interests focus on the performing arts and culture and politics in the Austrian First Republic. He has published on Max Reinhardt, and the Zeitoper. He is co-editor of Austria in the Thirties.

10 Acknowledgements The editors are grateful to the German Academic Exchange Service and the Goethe-Institut for their generous support of the Symposium which formed the basis of this volume. X