Ernst Toller

Rhys W. Williams (Swansea University)

Ed. by Gerhard P. Knapp, University of Utah
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.4.1: German-language Writing and Culture: Germany, 500-present.
Vol. editors: Gerhard P. Knapp (University of Utah), Jennifer Marston William (Purdue University), Herbert Rowland (Purdue University), Jill E. Twark (East Carolina University)

Dates

Born 1 Dec 1893
Died 22 May 1939
Activity 1913-1939

Places

Born in Germany
Active in Germany; United States

Activities

Primary

Playwright / Dramatist

Resources

An innovative playwright and poet, a socialist revolutionary and politician, a government member in the ill-fated 1919 Bavarian Soviet Republic (Räterepublik), a political prisoner and an exiled German Jew, Ernst Toller's own biography – with the exception of its tragic ending – almost reads like fiction. Toller's life was, indeed, later fictionalized in the eponymous play published by Tankred Dorst (1925-) in 1968. In several of its stations and facets, however, Toller's life is also representative for the experiences shared by many of his contemporaries: a generation of writers and intellectuals traumatized by war, persecuted and ultimately expatriated by the National Socialists. Today Toller remains …

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1403 words

Citation: Williams, Rhys W.. "Ernst Toller". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 29 September 2006 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=5463, accessed 21 November 2024.]

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