Review Essays by Margarete Tiessen
German History, 2023
The two new books published by Stanley Corngold in 2022 are dedicated to Thomas Mann and the Euro... more The two new books published by Stanley Corngold in 2022 are dedicated to Thomas Mann and the European refugee scholars who met and cooperated at Princeton University and the city's Institute for Advanced Studies during the Second World War. Among the two publications, the book reviewed here foregrounds Mann's Princeton oeuvre rather than his interactions with other émigré intellectuals. Corngold holds the magnifying glass over the writings that emerged from the two and a half years-28 September 1938 to 17 March 1941-that Mann spent in Princeton as lecturer in the humanities. Himself affiliated with Princeton University for decades and overseeing many courses on European and German literature, Corngold's aim 'is to shape a cultural memory of Thomas Mann during his American exile in Princeton' and to bring to the fore 'what can be remembered of Mann's work and personality in Princeton today' (p. xi). Corngold has divided his study into five chapters. Chapters 2 and 4, analysing (respectively) Mann's political and literary writings of the Princeton months, are by far the longest and form the heart of the book; chapters 3 and 5, each only a few pages long, may be described as their conclusions. Corngold begins by recounting Mann's steps in the US until he received the offer of a teaching position at Princeton, an opportunity mediated by the writer's 'determined patroness' (p. 2) Agnes E. Meyer. Meyer also secured 'a substantial one-year's grant for him from the Rockefeller Foundation to support the appointment', Corngold explains (p. 3). Mann's time in Princeton was divided between artistic and political work. One novel was completed here, Lotte in Weimar, along with numerous lectures, speeches, newspaper articles and pleas before the American authorities for European friends fleeing from the Nazis. It was 'a stunningly productive period', as Corngold quotes his protagonist (p. 211). His analysis of the political essays that Mann wrote during the months in Princeton is especially interested in articles composed for periodicals such as The Nation, The New Republic, or The Saturday Review of Literature-pieces that have previously been neglected by Mann scholars, Corngold feels. Of course, with this focus, he plunges right into the decade-old debate over the sincerity of Mann's 'conversion to democracy' (p. 26) following the nationalist interjections of the First World War. Corngold is sure of such a conversion, identifying a 'stern adherence to rational republicanism' on the part of his subject (p. 28) from the 'Von deutscher Republik' (On the German Republic) speech of 1922 onwards. Analysing several of Mann's political essays and Princeton readings, Corngold unearths detail after detail of the writer's political philosophy. Perhaps, his reader finds herself wondering, the more interesting question is, thus, not whether or not Mann ever truly became a democrat but what kind of democracy he advocated. Corngold employs the notions of 'democratic socialism' (p. 79) and 'disciplined freedom' (p. 101) to specify Mann's vision for a political community that balanced the needs of the individual and of the whole of society. In other words, individual freedom was only ever truly achievable if it was 'exercised […]
Archiv für Geschichte des Buchwesens, 2020
Jahrbuch EXTREMISMUS & DEMOKRATIE, 2019
Die Krisis der europäischen Demokratie, München 1925 (Meyer & Jessen), 154 S.
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 2019
Bulletin of the German Historical Institute London, 2018
Papers by Margarete Tiessen
Deutsche Vierteljahrsschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Geistesgeschichte
ZusammenfassungDie Ideengeschichte der »Cambridge School« ist sicherlich nur als eine mögliche me... more ZusammenfassungDie Ideengeschichte der »Cambridge School« ist sicherlich nur als eine mögliche methodische Nachfolgerin der alten »Geistesgeschichte« zu sehen, stellt aber doch gleichzeitig ihre wirkungsmächtigste Ablösung dar. Der Beitrag diskutiert das Verhältnis von Quentin Skinners Historiographie politischen Denkens und der Literaturwissenschaft und leitet damit über zu den Unterschieden zwischen der Ideengeschichte der »Cambridge School« und der deutschen Geistesgeschichte der Zwischenkriegszeit. Abschließend diskutiert er das Potenzial der Ideengeschichte für die Literaturwissenschaft sowie die Bedeutung der Literatur für die historische Erforschung von politischem Denken und politischen Ideen.
De Gruyter eBooks, Nov 21, 2022
Jahrbuch Extremismus & Demokratie (E & D), 2019
Varia by Margarete Tiessen
Martin Beckstein and Ralph Weber in conservation with Frauke Höntzsch, Margarete Tiessen and Adri... more Martin Beckstein and Ralph Weber in conservation with Frauke Höntzsch, Margarete Tiessen and Adrian Blau - organized and hosted by Andreas Busen
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Review Essays by Margarete Tiessen
Papers by Margarete Tiessen
Varia by Margarete Tiessen