Anti-Semitism including the Holocaust
Anti-Semitism, a term coined in Europe at the end of the 19th century, is the hatred of Jews and Jewishness, the latter being perceived in…
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Modernism in Europe
We are living in a very singular moment of history. It is a moment of crisis, in the literal sense of that word. In every…
Social Realism
Hitler, Adolf (1889–1945)
Adolf Hitler was the dominant political figure in German Nazism. He became chairman of the Nazionalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei [the National Socialist German Workers’ Party or…
Zionism
Zionism is the umbrella term used to describe the various strains of Jewish nationalism that grew out of other 19th-century nationalist ideologies and movements. Zionist…
Vogel, Debora (1900–1942)
Debora Vogel (1900–42) was a Polish-Jewish writer, poet, art critic, essayist, philosopher, and translator. She is a key – yet unrecognised – figure in the…
Céline, Louis-Ferdinand (1894–1964)
Louis-Ferdinand Céline was one of the most controversial and innovative authors of the twentieth century. Known for his use of insults, slang, and ellipses in…
Maritain, Jacques (1882–1973)
Jacques Maritain was a leader among those who attempted to update and transform Catholic teaching for the modern world. Born to a Protestant republican, he…
Claudel, Paul (1868–1955)
Both the power of Paul Claudel’s writing and the controversial character of his politics were so well known in their time that Auden, in the…
National Socialism and Fascism
To appreciate that the various forms of fascism, particularly German National Socialism under Adolf Hitler’s Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (NSDAP, National Socialist German Workers' Party commonly…
Adorno, Theodor Wiesengrund (1903–69)
Born Theodor Ludwig Wiesengrund to an Italian Catholic mother and an assimilated Jewish father, Adorno would take his mother’s vaguely aristocratic last name. Philosopher, aesthetician,…
Ridge, Lola (1873–1941)
A proletarian modernist, the poet Lola Ridge is best known for her work published between 1918 and 1922, which coincided with her editorship of Broom…
Coughlin, Charles E. (October 25, 1891–October 27, 1979)
Father Charles Coughlin was an influential American Catholic priest who became famous for his controversial but extremely popular radio program, which aired from October 1926…
Entartete Kunst
Entartete Kunst (Degenerate Art) is a term that was used by Nazi authorities to identify, censure, and confiscate art they considered inconsistent with their ideology.…
Yakobson, Leonid (1904–1975)
A Russian dancer and choreographer, Leonid Veniaminovich Yakobson choreographed for the Kirov and Bolshoi ballets from 1930 to the early 1970s, during which time he…
Weininger, Otto (1880–1903)
Otto Weininger was an Austrian philosopher and racial theorist. Born in Vienna to Jewish parents, he committed suicide five months after the publication of Sex…
The Dreyfus Affair (1894–1906)
The Dreyfus Affair was a French political controversy resulting from the unjust conviction and imprisonment of Captain Alfred Dreyfus (1859–1935), a Jewish artillery officer, for…
Maurras, Charles (1868–1952)
Charles Maurras was a controversial French poet and political theorist. Born in southern France to a royalist mother, Maurras became notorious during the Dreyfus Affair…
Sombart, Werner (1863–1941)
Werner Sombart, German economist and sociologist, was born into an upper-class family in Ermsleben. After studying economics and law, Sombart received his doctoral degree from…
Lasker-Schüler, Else (1868–1945)
Else Lasker-Schüler can be regarded as the most important German female modernist and is one of the few women affiliated with the Expressionist movement. Her…
Feuchtwanger, Lion (1884–1958)
Born into a Jewish family in Munich, Lion Feuchtwanger lived in Berlin from 1925 to 1933 when Hitler’s accession to power forced him into exile,…
Kazan, Elia (1909–2003)
Elia Kazan is arguably one of the most influential directors of mid-century mainstream America. Kazan is renowned for his introduction of the Moscow Art Theatre’s…
Frankfurt School
The Frankfurt School (Institute für Sozialforschung) was founded in 1923 by Felix Weil and fellow students Max Horkheimer and Friedrich Pollack, and was originally endowed…
Propaganda
Propaganda is the term for a variety of communication phenomena developed in the 20th century. As such, its meaning has changed over time from a…
Treitschke, Heinrich von (1834–1896)
Heinrich Gotthard von Treitschke was a historian and political writer in the German Empire. Born in Dresden, Treitschke studied in Leipzig, Bonn, Tübingen, and Freiburg…