What does the living image mean in Henry Seaman's masquerade essay?

Heinrich Mann was born on March 27, 1871[1]

In a wealthy merchant family in Lübeck, after his father died

With his younger brother Thomas Mann

Man came from a poor family and worked as a bookstore clerk and press clerk. He studied at university in Munich and later specialized in writing. After 1894, he successively published works such as "In a Family", "In a Lazy Man's Paradise" and "The Trash Professor" (1905), embarking on the path of critical realism.

He first traveled to France in 1893 and then to Italy. Around the end of the First World War, he traveled between Munich and Berlin. Settled in Berlin in 1925. During World War I, he and his brother Thomas argued about whether to support or oppose the war, which almost led to the breakdown of brotherhood. When Thomas congratulated Heinrich on his 71st birthday in 1942, he finally admitted that he had gone astray in the past and that his brother was fighting for democracy and against imperialist wars.

Heinrich Mann is undoubtedly one of the most outstanding critical realist writers in Germany in the first half of the twentieth century. He worked hard all his life and wrote a large number of literary works. Heinrich Mann was a great novelist, mainly engaged in writing novels, but he never stopped writing short stories from the beginning until his later years. He has published nearly sixty short stories, almost all of which have been widely circulated and have been very popular among readers including our country.

Between 1911 and 1914, he completed his masterpiece "The Servant" . Dietrich Heslin, the protagonist of the novel, has bullied the weak and feared the strong since he was a child. He is a slave in front of the strong and a tyrant in front of the weak. He is a typical example of the German bourgeoisie in the imperialist stage and a typical loyal and obedient servant of the German Empire. "The Servant" is the first part of Heinrich Mann's "Empire Trilogy" (the other two are "The Pauper" and "The Head"), and it is also the most successful one.

After the outbreak of the November Revolution in 1918, Heinrich Mann had high hopes for the Weimar Republic. However, with the rise of the Nazis, his illusions were gradually disillusioned and he began to lash out at power politics. During this period, he created four "Japanese and Chinese novels", which described the decadence and decline of bourgeois society from different angles.

Since 1924, he has paid close attention to the development of the Soviet socialist system and saw the hope of realizing his democratic ideals.

In 1931 he was elected president of the Prussian Academy of Arts and Sciences. With the rise of the Nazis, his illusions about the Weimar Republic gradually became disillusioned.

After Hitler came to power in 1933, he was expelled from the country, his works were burned, and he was forced to live in exile in France. During his exile, he actively engaged in the anti-fascist struggle with Gorky, Romain Rolland, and Babisse.

In 1935, He Beshear led a delegation of German writers to participate in the "International Congress of Writers for the Defense of Culture" held in Paris.

In 1938, he served as chairman of the "German Popular Front" in Paris.

He went to California, USA, in 1940 and stayed there until his death. While in exile in France, he completed the long historical novel "Henry IV" (1935-1938, including "The Youth of Henry IV" and "The Completion of Henry IV"). The novel is based on the religious wars in France in the 16th century. It uses a realistic approach to describe French King Henry IV's achievements in complying with the people's wishes and unifying France, creating an image of a king who represents the interests of the people, in sharp contrast to the arrogant Hitler at the time. With its humanitarian ideological content and perfect artistic form, the work has become an example of historical novel creation.

He went to the United States in 1940 and settled in Santa Monica, California. In 1949, he was elected as the chairman of the German Democratic Republic and the Academy of Arts and Sciences, and won the first-class national scholarship. He died on March 12, 1950, before leaving to return to Germany.

Artistic works

Editor

Heinrich Mann created 19 novels, 55 short stories, 11 screenplays and a large number of works during his lifetime. Political commentaries and essays.

Artistically, he was deeply influenced by Stendhal, Flaubert, France and Zola; ideologically, he started from the rebellious position of the bourgeoisie, turned to radical democracy, and held a critical attitude towards bourgeois society. , and finally transformed into a stance that affirmed the socialist system from political and moral aspects. Between 1911 and 1914, he completed his outstanding novel "The Servant", which was first partially published in Munich's "Die Zeit". It was censored for satirizing the German Empire and was not published until 1918. The protagonist of the novel, Dietrich Heslin, is the son of a paper mill owner. He has been cowardly and cruel since he was a child, bullying the weak and afraid of the strong. In front of the strong, he is a slave, in front of the weak, he is a tyrant. His character is typical of the German bourgeoisie in the imperialist stage, and he is a typical loyal and obedient servant of the German Empire. The novel also shows the decline of liberalism and the opportunistic line of social democrats through the images of Old Booker and Fisher. "Servant" is the first and most successful part of the "Empire Trilogy". The other two - "The Pauper" (1917) and "The Head" (1925) are much weaker in art. In the second part, the author describes the contradiction between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie and shows the reasons why the working class failed to prevent the outbreak of war. The third part describes the collusion between those in power and the capitalists in the German Empire.

Heinrich Mann's prose and political commentary also played an important role in his creation. His "On Zola" (1915) predicted the outcome of the failure of the imperialist war amidst the jingoistic war noise at that time and expressed his feelings for the imperialist war. belief in democracy. During the Weimar Revolution and the Republic of China, he published "Power and Man" (1919), "The Dictatorship of Reason" (1923), "Seven Years" (1929) and "Spirit". and Cause" (1931) and other collections of political essays and essays. During the period of exile

He also published "The Collection of Hatred" (1933), "The Collection of Courage" (1939) and the autobiography "Observations of an Era" (1946). These political treatises and essays inherited the literary criticism and fighting tradition of the German Enlightenment and expressed his yearning for revolution and socialism. Among his 11 plays, "The Great Love", which describes the status of artists in capitalist society, and "Madame Le Gros", which describes the French Revolution, are the best.