Peter Weiss

Kai Evers (University of California, Irvine)

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 8 Nov 1916
Died 10 May 1982
Activity 1936-1982

Places

Born in Germany
Active in Germany; Sweden

Activities

Primary

Novelist
Playwright / Dramatist

Other

Autobiographer
Essayist
Painter
Political writer

Resources

Weiss' Works

Save to Bookshelf

Peter Weiss is regarded as one of the few major European authors of his generation. A central figure in the German-Jewish literary tradition, he was among the first and most important writers to address the horrors of the Holocaust. His early autobiographical texts

Abschied von den Eltern

[

Leavetaking

, 1962] and

Fluchtpunkt

[

Vanishing Point

, 1963] are modern German classics. His

opus magnum

, the three-part

Die Ästhetik des Widerstands

[

The Aesthetics of Resistance

, 1975-81], an epic

roman d'essai

about the antifascist resistance movement from the late thirties to 1947, is acknowledged today as a towering achievement in German literature. With the international success of his plays

Marat/Sade

(1964) and

Die Ermittlung

[

The Investigation

, 1965], Weiss became a leading playwright in the…

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3158 words

Citation: Evers, Kai. "Peter Weiss". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 05 October 2004 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=5467, accessed 23 November 2024.]