Violent Modernists : The Aesthetics of Destruction in Twentieth-Century German Literature / Kai Evers.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Evers, Kai, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Literature--History and criticism.

Literature.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (1 p.)

Place of Publication:

Evanston, Illinois Northwestern University Press 2013

Chicago : Northwestern University Press, 2013.

Language Note:

English.

Summary:

Kai Evers's Violent Modernists: The Aesthetics of Destruction in Twentieth-Century German Literature develops a new understanding of German modernism that moves beyond the oversimplified dichotomy of an avant-garde prone to aggression on the one hand and a modernism opposed to violence on the other. Analyzing works by Robert Musil, Franz Kafka, Karl Kraus, Walter Benjamin, Elias Canetti, and others, Evers argues that these authors are among the most innovative thinkers on violence and its impact on contemporary concepts of the self, history, and society.

Contents:

Modernity, modernism, and violence

Causing violence: Robert Musil's The confusions of young Torless and the path to an antireductionist theory of violence

War, violence, and the malleable self: Robert Musil's postwar critique of violence in The man without qualities

Kafka's poetics of the knife: on violence, truth, and ambivalence in In the penal colony

Chemical warfare and destructive satires: Canetti and Benjamin's search for the murderous substance of satire.

Notes:

CC BY-NC-ND

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9780810167278

0810167271

9780810129306

0810129302

Access Restriction:

Open Access Unrestricted online access