This book examines the discourse on 'primitive thinking' in early twentieth century Germany. It explores texts from the social sciences, writings on art and language and - most centrally - literary works by Robert Musil, Walter Benjamin, Gottfried Benn and Robert Muller, focusing on three figurations of alterity prominent in European primitivism: indigenous cultures, children, and the mentally ill.

Igor Stravinsky's "The Rite of Spring" was premiered in 1913 by Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes under the choreography of Vaslav Nijinsky, in the Theatre des Champs Elysees in Paris. To this day it is considered the biggest theater scandal of the twentieth century. With its revolutionary score and choreography, "The Rite of Spring" can be seen as one of modernism's great breakthrough events, and it is the most choreographed ballet in the world. Addressing the ballet's context and history, this anthology includes a selection of archival documentation alongside contributions by artists and performers Eleanor Antin, Marc Bauer, Dara Friedman, Millicent Hodson and Kenneth Archer, Karen Kilimnik, Sara Masuger, Vaslav Nijinksy, Silke Otto-Knapp, Yvonne Rainer and Babette Mangolte, Lucy Stein, Alexis Marguerite Teplin, Julie Verhoeven and Mary Wigman, among others.

This collection aims to contribute to current discussion on the relationship between literature and knowledge, and attempts to develop a historical epistemology of literature. The aim is not to determine the essential epistemological conditions of literature as such or those of a universalistic author-subject, but instead, to think about the historicity of literary knowledge starting from the objectivity of its forms.

This volume explores the usefulness and limitations of the concept of literary primitivism. The individual essays propose theories of primitivism and reconstruct its historical and theoretical background. Using literary examples, they reveal the contours of literary primitivism and explain its relationship to primitivism in the visual arts. The overall picture that emerges from the analysis is of primitivism as a powerful force in the development of literary modernity.