Georg Lukacs's Theory of the Novel

Abstract

The rather belated discovery of the work of Georg Lukacs in the West and, most recently, in this country, has tended to solidify the notion of a very deep split between the early, non-Marxist and the later Marxist Lukacs. It is certainly true that a sharp distinction in tone and purpose sets off such early essays as Die Seele und die Formen (1911) and Die Theorie des Romans (1914-15) from recently translated essays on literary subjects such as the Studies in European Realism (1953) or the political pamphlet Wieder den mij3verstandenen Realismus (1957) published here under the title Realism. But the distinction can be overstated and misunderstood. It would be unsound, for instance, to hold on to the reassuring assumption that all the evil in the later Lukacs came in as a result of his Marxist conversion; a considerable degree of continuity exists between a pre-Marxist work such as Die Theorie des Romans and the Marxist Geschichte und Klassenbewuf3tsein; it would be impossible for an admirer of the former to dismiss the latter entirely. There is a similar danger in an oversimplified view of a good early and a bad late Lukacs. The works on realism have been treated very harshly on their American publication by such diverse critics as Harold Rosenberg (in Dissent) and Peter Demetz (in the Yale Review); on the other hand, The Theory of the Novel is being called by Harry Levin! (JHI, January-March 1965, p. 150)