Jost Hermand Livres

The rich conceptual and experiential relays between music and philosophy—echoes of what Theodor W. Adorno once called Klangfiguren, or "sound figures"—resonate with heightened intensity during the period of modernity that extends from early German Idealism to the Critical Theory of the Frankfurt School. This volume traces the political, historical, and philosophical trajectories of a specifically German tradition in which thinkers take recourse to music, both as an aesthetic practice and as the object of their speculative work. The contributors examine the texts of such highly influential writers and thinkers as Schelling, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Bloch, Mann, Adorno, and Lukács in relation to individual composers including Beethoven, Wagner, Schönberg, and Eisler. Their explorations of the complexities that arise in conceptualizing music as a mode of representation and philosophy as a mode of aesthetic practice thematize the ways in which the fields of music and philosophy are altered when either attempts to express itself in terms defined by the other. Contributors: Albrecht Betz, Lydia Goehr, Beatrice Hanssen, Jost Hermand, David Farrell Krell, Ludger Lütkehaus, Margaret Moore, Rebekah Pryor Paré, Gerhard Richter, Hans Rudolf Vaget, Samuel Weber

Old Dreams of a New Reich, the translation of Jost Hermand's comprehensive study of prefascist and fascist utopias (Der alte Traum vom neuen Reich), examines tracts and futuristic novels crucial to the development and final radicalization of German national sentiments from the second part of the eighteenth century. Scholars and propagandists used the glorified virtues of ancient German tribes to create the cult of Germanic values.These works offer a vivid insight into the public imagination between 1871 and 1945, and into the highly successful media machinations employed by the Right as it used all literary genres - including avant-gardistic works as well as pulp novels and works of science fiction - to manipulate the general public.

The terms Heimat, nation, or fatherland have had such controversial histories that they elude all attempts at a one-dimensional definition.Over the course of modern German history, Heimat has come to mean virtually anything: a romantic nostalgia for preindustrial conditions; a conservative emphasis on various attributes; a feeling of ecological responsibility for a particular region; an aversion for the ugliness brought about by industry; a glorification of the German peasantry as the wellspring of national health; and much more.The contributions to this volume critically examine selected aspects of these concepts, including eighteenth-century patriotism, attitudes of German-Americans, German-Jewish understanding of Heimat, the Heimatschutz movement, Nazi appropriations of history, the Heimat film, Heidegger's and Adorno's notions of Heimat, and German geopolitics.

Focusing on the ideological battles faced by German composers since the late seventeenth century, this work delves into how these conflicts influenced significant musical creations. It examines the impacts of various movements, including Pietism, Lutheranism, fascism, and exile, as well as the modernism prevalent in the early Federal Republic of Germany. Through this exploration, the book highlights the intricate relationship between music and socio-political contexts throughout German history.

This volume collects the papers presented at a conference that took place in Berkeley, California, in October 1997 in honor of Heinrich Heine's two-hundredth birthday. The theme of that conference was Heine's identity, which was formed and reformed, revised and modified, in relationship to the politics, religion, and nationalism of his era. Several speakers focused on Heine's Jewish identity and most contributions touched on his relationship to the politics of his era. The resulting essays offer a more differentiated understanding of Heine's predicaments and choices, as well as the parameters placed on him by the exigencies of the time. What this volume therefore achieves is not a radically new vision of Heine, but one that recognizes the ambivalences and vacillations, as well as the development and consistency, of his complex identity.

Who is remembering the German Democratic Republic, and how do they go about it? This volume of "contentious memories" brings together essays and critical responses in a look back at three aspects of GDR studies. It presents an opportunity for self-reflection on German Studies' past and ongoing engagement with the GDR and post-unification transformations. It seeks to evaluate old questions and raises new ones concerning the historical knowledge of GDR culture and our interpretations of it. Finally, it examines blindspots and self-deceptions of the past as well as those forming all too quickly in the present.

Three Claims to Cultural Representation -- [1]. Nazi Fascism -- Cultural-Political Preconditions -- Enemy Stereotypes -- Stated Objectives -- The Ideal of an "Eternally German" Culture -- Approaches to Practical Implementation -- Consequences for the Arts -- Architecture -- Painting and Sculpture -- Music -- Literature -- Theater -- Radio, Film, and the Press -- Class-Specific Successes of National Socialist Cultural Policies -- [2]. Inner Emigration -- Between Aversion and Accommodation -- Forms of Artistic Expression -- Literature -- Painting and Sculpture -- Music -- [3]. Exile -- Fragmentation of the German Exile Community -- Places of Refuge -- Possibilities for an Effective Antifascism -- Consequences for the Arts -- Literature -- Theater -- Film -- Painting, Graphic Art, and Photomontage -- Music -- Visions of a "Liberated" Culture in Post-Fascist Germany.

Dieser Band enthält 30 Essays, Aufsätze, Vorträge, Miszellen und Polemiken zur Methodik der Literaturwissenschaft, mit denen sich ihr Autor zwischen 1959 und 2009 an die germanistische Fachwelt wandte. Ihr Ziel war, den vielfältigen Ausflüchten ins Werkimmanente, Formalästhetische, Allgemeinmenschliche oder Postmodernistische eine sozialgeschichtliche Sehweise entgegenzusetzen, die sich einer historisierenden Optik auf das jeweils Vergangene verpflichtet fühlt und eine gegenwartsbetonte Haltung befürwortet.

Diese Festschrift ist dem international bekannten Germanisten Klaus L. Berghahn zu seinem 70. Geburtstag gewidmet. Der Band enthält Beiträge von Freunden, Kollegen und ehemaligen Schülern und greift vor allem diejenigen Forschungsgebiete auf, mit denen sich Klaus L. Berghahn im Laufe seiner akademischen Tätigkeit besonders intensiv beschäftigt hat: der ästhetischen Theoriebildung, dem Werk Friedrich Schillers, der deutsch-jüdischen Symbiose und der deutschen Literatur des 19. und 20. Jahrhunderts.

Über 3 Millionen deutsche Kinder zwischen 7 und 16 Jahren sind in der Zeit von 1940 bis 1945 im Zuge der 'Erweiterten Kinderlandverschickung' aus den bombenbedrohten Großstädten aufs Land verschickt worden. Ziel war es, die Jugendlichen schon frühzeitig dem NS-Staat gefügig zu machen. Jost Hermand berichtet aus eigener Erfahrung über die brutale Realität des Lagerlebens, das bei vielen Betroffenen bis heute traumatische Folgen zeitigt.