Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Literature and Politics: Selected Writings

Literature and Politics: Selected Writings

Musil, Robert
Amann, Klaus
Payne, Philip

Paperback

Series: Critical Century

PhilosophyLiterary Criticism

ISBN10: 1916809618
ISBN13: 9781916809611
Publisher: Eris
Published: Jun 3 2025
Pages: 564
Weight: 1.08
Height: 1.17 Width: 4.92 Depth: 7.72
Language: English

Politics is will and not truth. A very primitive formulation, but rich in consequences.

Robert Musil was keenly aware of literature's vulnerability to what he called the over-reach and encroachment of politics, but he was also an acute observer of the ways in which literature and politics interact. Literature and Politics presents Musil's writings on the relationship between literature and politics from World War I through World War II and elucidates his personal struggle to bear witness during the Age of Totalitarianism.

In essays, addresses, aphorisms, and unpublished notes on current events, Musil charted the increasing dangers posed to artists and intellectuals by projects of ideological conscription, as well as the broader threats posed by nationalism and other extreme forms of collectivism. His political thinking was unfailingly supple and nuanced, but at its heart was a passionate belief in the rich and irreducible nature of individual creative work as the bulwark of a free, ethical, and pluralistic society. The main texts are translated by Genese Grill and Klaus Amann provides an invaluable Introduction to Musil's political thought, while Philip Payne introduces Musil's On Stupidity (which he has also translated into English).

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