Initially a conservative nationalist who supported the German Empire and World War I, Thomas Mann became a committed proponent of democracy after 1919. His profound political transformation began with his work on the novel The Magic Mountain, started in 1912 and published in 1924. This shift was first publicly expressed in his speech On the German Republic (1922) and culminated in his resolute literary opposition to National Socialism in German Address (1930). The lecture explores Mann’s essays and prose during these turbulent years of Germany’s first democracy.
About Claudio Steiger
Dr. Claudio Steiger holds a Ph.D. in history and is also a Germanist and journalist. He has worked extensively on the Mann family, with positions at the University of Neuchâtel, the Thomas Mann Archive at ETH Zurich, and the Buddenbrookhaus in Lübeck. He has written for Neue Zürcher Zeitung and Tages-Anzeiger and currently serves as a research associate and curator at the Reich President Friedrich Ebert Memorial in Heidelberg.
