The pious dance
The pious dance (subtitle: The adventure book of a youth ) was the first of seven novels by Klaus Mann . It was published in 1926 by Enoch Verlag, Hamburg, and is considered to be one of the first German-language homosexual novels.
action
The protagonist Andreas comes from a middle-class family. The eighteen-year-old poet travels to Berlin to discover big city life. There he immersed himself in the bohemian atmosphere and tried to process the hopes and goals of his generation in a literary way. He travels to Paris after his male love , but remains lonely.
Emergence
Klaus Mann published the novel at the age of nineteen. Like his main character, he came from an upper-class, intellectual-artistic background. It is therefore obvious that the novel has autobiographical features, especially since Klaus Mann lived in Berlin in 1924 and had traveled to Paris in the spring of 1925.
effect
With this novel, Klaus Mann publicly acknowledged his homosexuality. The pious dance was a respectable success for the author and was well received by the audience, although homosexuality was a criminal offense in the Weimar Republic . Critics criticized Mann's open portrayal of same-sex love as tasteless sexual debauchery. In their opinion, the success was only due to the fact that the author was the son of the writer Thomas Mann .
literature
- Klaus Mann: The pious dance. The adventure book of a youth (= Rororo 23687). Extended new edition. With an afterword by Detlef Grumbach . Rowohlt-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Reinbek near Hamburg 2004, ISBN 3-499-23687-7 .
- Klaus Mann: The turning point. A life report (= Rororo 24409). Extended new edition. Edited with text variants and drafts in the appendix and with an afterword by Fredric Kroll . Rowohlt-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Reinbek near Hamburg 2006, ISBN 3-499-24409-8 .
- Nicole Schaenzler: Klaus Mann as the narrator. Studies on his novels "Der pious dance" and "Der Vulkan" (= literature and media studies. Vol. 33 = Kassel studies on German-language literary history. Vol. 6). Igel-Verlag Wissenschaft, Paderborn 1995, ISBN 3-927104-94-9 (also: Darmstadt, University, dissertation, 1994).
