London German Studies XVI: Pacifist and Anti-Militarist Writing in German, 1889-1928

From Bertha von Suttner to Erich Maria Remarque
Edited by Andreas Kramer and Ritchie Robertson
1 December 2018
Institute of Germanic Studies Publications
London German Studies
Institute of Modern Languages Research
210 × 149 mm
307 pp
Formats:
Paperback: 978-0-85457-268-7
Paperback £38.00
Paperback $47.50
Description: 
Historical research has dispelled a number of myths surrounding Word War I: whereas the outbreak of war was greeted by the urban middle classes with frenzied enthusiasm, in working-class areas and smaller towns the mood was more of foreboding. Little attention has so far been paid to those who opposed the war and its underlying culture of militarism, though opposition to war and militarism has a distinguished German pedigree. This volume explores opposition to war and militarism among a range of German-language authors in a period roughly defined by two international bestsellers: Suttner’s 'Die Waffen nieder' (1889) and Remarque’s 'Im Westen nichts Neues' (1928). Major figures (Kraus, Schnitzler, Zweig) have not lacked attention, but some of the authors discussed here (Andreas Latzko, Hans Chlumberg) are still far from being household names. These essays remind us that the period’s opposition to war and militarism manifested itself in a broad range of literary forms and publications, providing a different emphasis from previous volumes exploring connections between German-language literature and pacifism.

Table of contents: 

Introduction
Martin Ceadel: Three Degrees of European Opposition to War: Anti-Militarism, Pacificism, and Pacifism in the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries
Edward T. Larkin: Alfred Hermann Fried’s Mein Kriegstagebuch: A Pacifist Encounters War
Barbara Burns: Waging War on War: Bertha von Suttner as Writer and Campaigner
Steffen Bruendel: Die Ambivalenz des Schreckens. Literarische Positionierungen zum Krieg vor und nach 1914
Catherine Smale: ‘Auf uns sinken die Toten’: Anti-War Sentiment in Expressionist Women’s Writing from the First World War
Anke Gilleir: ‘Lasst die Hand / Vom Schwerte’? Frauen, Gender und Krieg in Deutschland. Stimmen vom Rande
Deborah Holmes: ‘… die Menschheit verdient ein Massaker ohne Ende’. The Warlike Pacifism of Grete Meisel-Hess
Günter Rinke: Georg Kaiser und der Pazifismus
Lisa Marie Anderson: The Meaning of Failure and the Failure of Meaning: Ernst Toller on Pacifist Language and Literature in Interwar Germany
Dagmar Heißler: ‘Den Gefallenen des Weltkrieges’ gewidmet: Hans Chlumbergs Drama Wunder um Verdun
Frank Krause: Family Virtues and Social Critique: Andreas Latzko’s Anti-War Prose (1917–1918)
Ingo Cornils: The Politics of Conscience: Hermann Hesse’s Struggle with Pacifism
Malcolm Spencer: ‘Eine Liebe ohne Schuhsohlen’: Robert Musil and Pacifism
Ritchie Robertson: Alfred Döblin as Pacifist and Chauvinist: Die drei Sprünge des Wang-lun and Wartime Propaganda
Matthias Hennig: Paul Scheerbart: Anti-Militarismus als Kosmo-Politismus
Metin Toprak: Hans Paasche. Vom Kolonialoffizier zum Antikolonialisten und Pazifisten
Andreas Kramer: Eine pazifistische Internationale. René Schickele und Die weißen Blätter
Elisabeth Attlmayr: Anti-War Sentiments on Page 2: The Feuilleton of the Arbeiterzeitung and the Great War
Thorsten Unger: ‘Auf den Weltkrieg muß der Weltfriede folgen.‘ Siegfried Balders Reclam-Tarnschrift Zwei Fragen (1918)
Matthias Uecker: Photography, Propaganda and Pacifism – Ernst Friedrich’s ‘Krieg dem Kriege’ (1924)
Nicholas Martin: War in Peace: Pacifist and Anti-War Writing in the Battle for Control of German Great War Memory, 1927–1930 292
Notes on Contributors