
Weimar in Exile
The Antifascist Emigration in Europe and America
Jean-Michel Palmier(Author)
Verso Books (Publisher)
Published on 31. January 2017
Book
Paperback/Softback
864 pages
978-1-78478-644-1 (ISBN)
Description
In 1933 thousands of intellectuals, artists, writers, militants and other opponents of the Nazi regime fled Germany. They were, in the words of Heinrich Mann, "the best of Germany," refusing to remain citizens in this new state that legalized terror and brutality.
Exiled across the world, they continued the fight against Nazism in prose, poetry, painting, architecture, film and theater. Weimar in Exile follows these lives, from the rise of national socialism to their return to a ruined homeland, retracing their stories, struggles, setbacks and rare victories.
The dignity in exile of Walter Benjamin, Ernst Bloch, Bertolt Brecht, Alfred Doeblin, Hanns Eisler, Heinrich Mann, Thomas Mann, Anna Seghers, Ernst Toller, Stefan Zweig and many others provides a counterpoint to the story of Germany under the Nazis.
Exiled across the world, they continued the fight against Nazism in prose, poetry, painting, architecture, film and theater. Weimar in Exile follows these lives, from the rise of national socialism to their return to a ruined homeland, retracing their stories, struggles, setbacks and rare victories.
The dignity in exile of Walter Benjamin, Ernst Bloch, Bertolt Brecht, Alfred Doeblin, Hanns Eisler, Heinrich Mann, Thomas Mann, Anna Seghers, Ernst Toller, Stefan Zweig and many others provides a counterpoint to the story of Germany under the Nazis.
Reviews / Votes
A magisterial study. * Independent * Jean-Michel Palmier's book establishes more fully than any other the extent of emigration of Germany's greatest minds and talents, and that neither the exiles nor Germany ever fully recovered. * Financial Times * A monumental study, an impressive testament to the experiences, achievements and far-reaching influences of the refugees. * Scotsman * Jean-Michel Palmier published books on Georg Trakl, Hegel, Lenin, Lacan and Marcuse, as well as studies on German expressionism and a great work on the fate of anti-Nazi intellectuals, Weimar in Exile, celebrated by the Academie francaise. Everything fascinated him. He was a scholar who anxiously, almost mystically, quested after knowledge, and reminded one of a medieval philosopher even more than of a Renaissance man of letters. He was obsessed with art and culture. He was a surveyor of the past who tracked its faintest traces. * Le Monde Diplomatique * A monumental work * Le Monde * This is an extraordinary book: in its historical breadth, its command of literature, documents, and archival material, its ambitious scope, and its sweeping judgments. * Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies *More details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Dimensions
Height: 235 mm
Width: 156 mm
Thickness: 40 mm
Weight
1122 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-78478-644-1 (9781784786441)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

E-Book
01/2017
Verso Books
€33.99
Available for download
Previous edition

Book
07/2006
Verso Books
€57.13
Article exhausted; check for reprint
Persons
Jean-Michel Palmier was Professor of Aesthetics at Universite Paris I, specializing in German artistic movements of the 1920s and 30s. Weimar in Exile was awarded the Prix Eugene Piccard for a work of modern history by the Academie Francaise.