Article

Name: Paradigm shift: the opposition between exile and inner emigration literature, or a distanced criticism of Nazism (as illustrated by the example of Lion Feuchtwanger's novel «False Nero»)

Authors: T. S. Simyan

Yerevan State University, Yerevan, Armenia

In the section Study of literature

Abstract: The purpose of this paper is to show the paradigm shift in the German literary field after 1933, using the German literary field as an example to illustrate the origin of Exilliteratur (exile literature). Lion Feuchtwanger's novel «False Nero» (Der falsche Nero, 1936) is used as an example to describe the reasons for a distanced modeling of historical events in Germany of the 1930s. We attempt to briefly answer the following questions: How does «outside» and «inside» literature come into being after the 1930s? Why does Feuchtwanger write his historical novel as a parable? Analysis shows that the German Exilliteratur appears at the time of vigorous and systematic interference of political-field actors into the literary field. The distanced description of the inner political events in Germany in the novel «False Nero» is associated not only with Feuchtwanger's ethical responsibility but also with the influence of Nietzsche and Brecht.

Keywords: exile literature (exilliteratur), inner emigration (innere emigration), nazism, historical novel, historical novel poetics

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