New essays introducing a broad range of novelists of the Weimar period. The Weimar Republic was a turbulent and fateful time in German history. Characterized by economic and political instability, polarization, and radicalism, the period witnessed the efforts of many German writers to play a leading political role, whether directly, in the chaotic years of 1918-1919, or indirectly, through their works. The novelists chosen range from such now-canonical authors as Alfred Doeblin, Hermann Hesse, and Heinrich Mann to bestselling writers of the time such as Erich Maria Remarque, B. Traven, Vicki Baum, and Hans Fallada. They also span the political spectrum, from the right-wing Ernst Junger to pacifists such as Remarque. The journalistic engagement of JosephRoth, otherwise well known as a novelist, and of the recently rediscovered writer Gabriele Tergit is also represented. Contributors: Paul Bishop, Roland Dollinger, Helen Chambers, Karin V. Gunnemann, David Midgley, Brian Murdoch, Fiona Sutton, Heather Valencia, Jenny Williams, Roger Woods. Karl Leydecker is Reader in German at the University of Kent.

The first full-length study in English of Heinrich Mann's literary work and political activism. Heinrich Mann, once counted among the most important literary figures in Germany, is known to most English-speaking readers only as the brother of Thomas Mann, or in connection with Marlene Dietrich and the film "The Blue Angel,"which was based on one of his novels. Only a few of his novels and stories and virtually none of his hundreds of provocative essays are available in English. But he deserves special attention for the window his work provides ontothe intellectual, social, and political history of Germany, especially Germany's struggle with the question of democracy in the early twentieth century. In his essays and novels, Mann exposed Germany's resistance to democracy wellbefore the First World War, and especially during the Revolution of 1918/19 and the Weimar Republic he made the education of the German people to democratic values and a democratic form of government the center of his life and work. Professor Gunnemann's book is the first work in English that explores Heinrich Mann's work in detail. Special attention is given to the history of the reception of Mann's works in Germany, which is also a history of that nation's self-understanding. Karin Verena Gunnemann is professor of German at Agnes Scott College in Atlanta.