Representing the German Nation: History and Identity in Twentieth-Century Germany

Abstract

Questions concerning the representation of have for some time been central to debates in both literary criticism and historiography. This collection of essays is concerned with these issues of representation, interpretation and identity. Modern Germany - with its dramatic political ruptures from late unification in 1871 through to the formation of two opposing German states - provides a case study for an analysis of these themes. This study brings together historians and literary critics to look at the controversial issue of representations of identity in Germany since the war. In looking at works by Mann and Brecht, at the symbolism of Berlin, and at the writing of the Holocaust, it tries to engage directly with the image and reality of Germanness and the different constructs between East and West Germany.