Sympathy for the Abyss: A Study in the Novel of German Modernism: Kafka, Broch, Musil, and Thomas Mann

by Stephen D. Dowden

The series Studien zur deutschen Literatur (Studies in German Literature) presents outstanding analyses of German-speaking literature from the early modern period to the present day. It particularly embraces comparative, cultural and historical-epistemological questions and serves as a tradition-steeped forum for innovative literary research. All submitted manuscripts undergo a double peer-review process. Please contact the editor Marcus Boehm (marcus.boehm [at] degruyter.com) for further information regarding manuscript submission and subsidies.

195 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1986

Reviews

[N · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is analytic in nature — it throughly dissects each imaginary world of Broch, Musil, Kafka, Mann (modernists) and many other writers and it is grounded by historical background, authors’ personal experience, and compare genres/styles with past forms.


Broch The Sleepwalkers
Musil The Man Without Qualities
Kafka The Trial
Mann Doktor Faustus

main books…
Don Quixote is mentioned multiple times & is compared to Broch and Kafka’s literary styles
the “Cervantic irony”.
“quixotic illusion”

[A L]

Very clear; a good companion with Blanchot in clarifying the Kantian epistemological background in modernist aesthetics.