Background
Lion Feuchtwanger was born on July 21, 1884 in Munich, Bavaria, Germany. He was the oldest of nine children of Sigmund Feuchtwanger, a businessman, and Johanna (Bodenheimer) Feuchtwanger.
1935
Portrait of German playwrights and authors Lion Feuchtwanger (1884 - 1958) (left) and Bertold Brecht (1898 - 1956) as they sit together, 1935. Photo by Fred Stein Archive
1951
Photo of German novelist and playwright Lion Feuchtwanger seated, reading a book, 1951.
Thierschstraße 46 Munich, Bavaria, 80538 Germany
Lion Feuchtwanger studied at the Wilhelmsgymnasium.
University of Munich, Munich, Bavaria, Germany
In 1907 Lion Feuchtwanger received his Doctor of Philosophy degree from the University of Munich.
Lion Feuchtwanger
Lion Feuchtwanger
Lion Feuchtwanger (1884-1958), German novelist and dramatist. Photo by Popperfoto
(A novel set in 14th Century Germany and Austria where Mar...)
A novel set in 14th Century Germany and Austria where Margarete, is the ugly Duchess of Tyrol whom we meet at the age of 12 and follow her life.
https://www.amazon.com/Ugly-Duchess-Historical-Romance/dp/B000N2N9JO/?tag=2022091-20
1923
(Joseph ben Matthias, Judæan aristocrat and Jerusalem Temp...)
Joseph ben Matthias, Judæan aristocrat and Jerusalem Temple priest of the first rank, steps out into the boundless, magnificent city of Rome. He's clever, handsome, fêted by his Jewish hosts, and on a righteous mission to free three venerable old Jews wrongfully imprisoned as rebels. Joseph secures an audience with Nero's beautiful young Empress, Poppæa. Charmed by Joseph's zeal, she asks the Minister of Oriental Affairs to release the prisoners. The Minister seizes the opportunity to trade his assent for an edict guaranteed to outrage and mobilize the Jews of Judea.
https://www.amazon.com/War-Jews-Historical-Josephus-Imperial/dp/150578672X/?tag=2022091-20
1932
(First published in 1934 but fully imagining the future of...)
First published in 1934 but fully imagining the future of Germany over the ensuing years, The Oppermanns tells the compelling story of a remarkable German Jewish family confronted by Hitler's rise to power. Compared to works by Voltaire and Zola on its original publication, this prescient novel strives to awaken an often unsuspecting, sometimes politically naive, or else willfully blind world to the consequences of its stance in the face of national events--in this case, the rising tide of Nazism in 1930s Germany. The past and future meet in the saga of the Oppermanns, for three generations a family commercially well established in Berlin. In assimilated citizens like them, the emancipated Jew in Germany has become a fact. In a Berlin inhabited by troops in brown shirts, however, the Oppermanns have more to fear than an alien discomfort. For along with the swastikas and fascist salutes come discrimination, deceit, betrayal, and a tragedy that history has proved to be as true as this novel's astonishing, profoundly moving tale.
https://www.amazon.com/Oppermanns-Novel-Lion-Feuchtwanger/dp/0786708808/?tag=2022091-20
1934
(Lion Feuchtwanger's second volume of the "Josephus" trilo...)
Lion Feuchtwanger's second volume of the "Josephus" trilogy takes up the story of Josephus at the time when he had become a power in Rome, and Rome was determined to be the only power in the world. Through the novelist's eyes the reader relives the dramatic events of Titus's reign---the Fire, the Plague, the visit from Judea of the exotic and exquisite princess Berenice. He travels with Joseph to Judea, sits in the councils of the Jewish fathers in the days of their great sorrow, searches for information about a certain prophet said to have been crucified at Jerusalem. Thus he is sharing in the strange spectacle of a new faith coming to birth. Feuchtwanger paints his hero against the background of great historical events, against the background of an era that more than almost any other was adventurous and colorful and profoundly stirred by the eternally crucial questions of the destiny of human civilization.
https://www.amazon.com/Jew-Rome-Trilogy-Historical-Josephus-ebook/dp/B00FPRPVZ2/?tag=2022091-20
1935
(In the present volume, "The Emperor and His Jew," the ear...)
In the present volume, "The Emperor and His Jew," the earlier young and ambitious emissary of Judea to the court of Nero (in "The Judean War") and the militant writer who held the ear of Titus (in "The Jew of Rome") has reached the fullness of years and wisdom. Now he engages in the subtlest and in many ways the most dangerous period of his career. In the East the Jewish fanatics were challenging the might of Rome; and everywhere, even in the family of the Emperor, the Christians were exerting a passive but disturbing force. The time had come for all men to take their stand, and Josephus, who had thought to live and die both a Roman and a defender of the Jewish perspective and cause, was forced to make a choice. This situation intensifies the deep personal conflict in the mind of Josephus, and in this book Feuchtwanger attempts to analyze Josephus' mind and to find motives for his apparently paradoxical actions and views. In its detail, the "Josephus" trilogy's final work leads the reader through the utterly fascinating daily life of Roman society. At the court of Domitian, in the apartments of the beautiful Empress, Lucia, in the Senate, and in the homes of the financial and intellectual leaders of Rome, Feuchtwanger walks with the ease and confidence of a man born to the toga. It was Josephus's fate to be feared and hated by three of the most powerful men in the world and to survive them all. His life was beset by the ambiguity of his intellect; his death was glorified by the clear simplicity of his faith
https://www.amazon.com/Emperor-His-Jew-Historical-Josephus-ebook/dp/B00FTUMABI/?tag=2022091-20
1942
(Feuchtwanger, famous for his historical novels, tells the...)
Feuchtwanger, famous for his historical novels, tells the story of Goya's life and his transition from court painter for Charles IV to a painter with a political conscience who used his art to protest Spain's repressive policies.
https://www.amazon.com/This-Hour-Novel-About-Goya/dp/B000QBNPZ0/?tag=2022091-20
1951
(This is a lyrical translation of story of Alphonso VII of...)
This is a lyrical translation of story of Alphonso VII of Castile and his love for a Jewish woman, La Fermosa. For her he forgot his kingdom, his future and his wife. It has all of the drama, intrigue, compassion, cruelty, bloodshed and ceremony of the Spanish Middle ages. Daughter of a wealthy Jewish financier, Raquel accompanies her father to Castile where he becomes the finance manager to the volatile Alphonso. When Alphonso falls in love with her, demanding she become his mistress, her father must decide whether to sacrifice his daughter or the future of his people. Full of pageantry, prejudice and profane love this novel is mesmerizing.
https://www.amazon.com/Raquel-Jewess-Toledo-Signet-D1477/dp/B0011V1LCS/?tag=2022091-20
1954
Lion Feuchtwanger was born on July 21, 1884 in Munich, Bavaria, Germany. He was the oldest of nine children of Sigmund Feuchtwanger, a businessman, and Johanna (Bodenheimer) Feuchtwanger.
Lion Feuchtwanger received an excellent education growing up in Munich, and he was refined both by private instruction and at the Wilhelms-Gymnasium. He attended Berlin University, where he studied philosophy, literature and language. For graduate studies, he moved on to Munich University, and earned his Doctor of Philosophy degree in 1907. For his dissertation, Feuchtwanger wrote an extensive study on Heinrich Heine’s unfinished historical novel Der Rabbi von Bacharach.
After graduation, Lion Feuchtwanger faced the prospect of a career in the family business, which was expected of him. However, he refused and took a job as a drama critic for the publication Die Schaubuehne (The Stage). In this position, which lasted until 1911, Feuchtwanger gained a reputation as a competent drama critic. He also began participating in the Bohemian movement that was spreading through Munich, and in 1910 penned a novel entitled Der toenerne Gott (translated as The God of Clay), which he later discounted as being immature.
During this time, Feuchtwanger was also writing plays, and he met and began courting Marta Loffler, whom he married in 1912. The couple had a daughter at the end of that same year, but the child did not survive its first year. The death shattered the young couple and influenced several of Feuchtwanger's later works. After a few years of traveling through Italy and Tunisia, the couple returned to Germany just in time for the outbreak of World War I, whereupon Feuchtwanger was drafted into the German army. However, because of bleeding ulcers, he was discharged and again took up the pen, largely concentrating on plays, including Warren Hastings in 1916 and Die Kriegsgefangenen (translated as The Prisoners of War) in 1919. In 1920, Feuchtwanger published a dramatic novel entitled Thomas Wendt, which revolved around a writer who was caught up in a revolutionary movement.
In the years following the war, Feuchtwanger completed several plays and wrote the first drafts for a handful of novels. He also began tackling serious social issues, which he would later be remembered for by many critics. For example, in the play Jud Suess (1918), which he adapted into a novel in 1921, Feuchtwanger recounted a notorious eighteenth-century anti-Semitic tale set in Württemberg, Germany. When he completed the book, Feuchtwanger met resistance with German publishers, who felt the work to be too "Jewish." However, the book finally made it to publication in 1925 and went on to be Feuchtwanger’s first worldwide bestseller.
In 1925 Feuchtwanger moved to Berlin and began working on PEP, which he finished in 1928. At this time, Hitler and the Nazis were rising to power, and signs of Nazism were all around Feuchtwanger. When he published Eifolg, Hitler was only three years from assuming power in Germany. The eight-hundred-page novel revolves around the imprisonment of a character named Krueger, and the efforts of his lover, Johanna Krain, to free him. Krueger, an art curator, is put into prison because the works he has displayed at his gallery was found offensive by an increasingly conservative Munich. All the while, the city is embroiled in political turmoil, as a right-wing group gains ever more acceptance and ultimately power. A character named Rupert Kutzner, who leads the group, represents Hitler.
Two years after completing Erfolg, Feuchtwanger published the first volume of Der juedische Krieg, an historical novel about the life of Jewish historian Flavius Josephus, who lived in the first-century A.D. The same year, Feuchtwanger went on a lengthy lecture tour of the United Slates and Britain. While away, Hitler finally ascended to power and the Nazis raided Feuchtwanger’s home, and many of his manuscripts were destroyed. His doctorate from Munich University was also revoked. Feuchtwanger was forced to move to France, where he continued to work, both on his books and in anti-fascist causes. The 1934 novel Die Geschwister Oppennann (translated as The Oppermanns) and two more volumes about Josephus were just a few of the books he published during the days leading up to World War II.
When the war did finally break out, Feuchtwanger was imprisoned in an internment camp by the French government, but he was later released. When France capitulated to Germany in 1940, Feuchtwanger was again imprisoned, but this time he had a death sentence on his head. With the help of his wife, he made a daring escape and was able to flee to America. He recounted the escape and flight in 1941's Der Teufel in Frankreich (translated as The Devil in France). This was followed by two other politically-oriented novels: 1943’s Die Brueder Lautensack (translated as Double Double, Toil and Trouble), as well as one about the French Resistance in 1944.
Still under the threat of a death sentence in Germany for his writings and political views, Feuchtwanger had no choice but to stay in the United States, where he continued to write several more historical novels, including Waffen fuer Amerika (Proud Destiny) in 1947. Other novels that he published during his American exile include Goya oder der arge Weg der Erkenntnis (translated as This Is the Hour; 1951), Spanische Ballade (translated as Raquel, the Jewess of Toledo; 1955), and Jefta und seine Tochter (translated as Jephta and His Daughter; 1957). After being troubled by the Communist backlash taking place in American, he also wrote the play Wahn oder der Teufel in Boston (translated as The Devil in Boston), which he completed in 1948.
In his last years of life, Feuchtwanger slipped further and further into isolation. Although he yearned to return to his homeland, he had grown content in America, and was afraid to leave for fear he would not be permitted to return. So he devoted his time working on historical novels, as well as conducting research. When he died in December of 1958, Feuchtwanger left a half unfinished manuscript of a historical novel called Das Haus der Desdemona (translated as The House of Desdemona).
(In the present volume, "The Emperor and His Jew," the ear...)
1942(Feuchtwanger, famous for his historical novels, tells the...)
1951(First published in 1934 but fully imagining the future of...)
1934(Lion Feuchtwanger's second volume of the "Josephus" trilo...)
1935(A novel set in 14th Century Germany and Austria where Mar...)
1923(Joseph ben Matthias, Judæan aristocrat and Jerusalem Temp...)
1932(This is a lyrical translation of story of Alphonso VII of...)
1954(A historical novel involving Antoinette, Louis XVI, Volta...)
1947(This book describes author's experiences in an internment...)
1941(This is a novel of a young French woman who fights agains...)
1944(This book is also known as Power.)
1925In May, 1912 Lion Feuchtwanger married Marta Loeffler. She was pregnant at the wedding, but the child died shortly after birth.