Totalität als Faszination

Throughout his life Ernst Jünger tried to identify a significance behind “all that happens”, even if this should be revealed as “dreadful” or imbued with “some alien meaning”. The conference proceedings investigate this search for a historically and ideologically acceptable meaning of both general and personal experience. The volume aims to consider both Jünger’s political esthetics and his perception of language in the light of the philosophical tradition and the literary conflict between the Romantic and the Modern, following his development from the war diaries through the political journalism of the period between the world wars to the narrative works of the contemporary period. The proposition set out here is that Jünger’s work represents cultural practices of life and survival, constantly shifting between combat and art – and indeed in such a way that both ideological and esthetic aspects are granted equal consideration.