Josephus trilogy

The three historical novels The Jewish War (1932), The Sons (1935) and The Day Will Come (1942) by the writer Lion Feuchtwanger are referred to as the Josephus Trilogy . Their theme is the life and work of the ancient historian Flavius ​​Josephus . The three volumes build on each other and cover the period from youth to the death of the Jewish chronicler. Volume 3 - “The day will come” - was also published under the title “The Promised Land” (Greifenverlag Rudolstadt, 1954).

In the afterword of the second volume, "The Sons", Feuchtwanger explained that the continuation volume - accordingly only two volumes were originally planned - had already been “designed to its end and largely executed” in 1932. These documents, along with the existing scientific material, were destroyed when the National Socialists looted his house in Berlin, Mahlerstraße in March 1933. More recent work, which is based on an analysis of Feuchtwanger's previously unpublished diaries, agree that a script for a second volume in 1933 did not exist. Accordingly, Feuchtwanger recorded every planning for further work and even minor progress on his scripts in his diaries in detail. However, it does not mention work or sketches on a second volume.

expenditure

• First editions :
  • The Jewish War: Propylaeen Verlag , Berlin 1932, 477 pp.
  • The sons: Querido Verlag , Amsterdam 1935, 542 pp.
  • The day will come: Bermann-Fischer , Stockholm 1945, 413 pp.
• Collected works in individual volumes: Aufbau, Berlin.
  • The Jewish War: Vol. 2, 2nd edition 1998, ISBN 3-351-01661-1 .
  • Die Söhne: Vol. 3, 2nd edition 1998, ISBN 3-351-01755-3 .
  • The day will come: Vol. 4, 1st edition 1997, ISBN 3-351-01664-6 .
• Paperback: Structure of the Taschenbuch Verlag, Berlin 2002.
  • The Jewish War: ISBN 3-7466-5602-8 .
  • The sons: ISBN 3-7466-5603-6 .
  • The day will come: ISBN 3-7466-5604-4 .

literature

• Andrea Bunzel: La trilogie de Josèphe, de Lion Feuchtwanger: Histoire et écriture romanesque. Presses Universitaires de la Méditerranée PULM, Montpellier 2007.
• Werner Jahn: Lion Feuchtwanger's view of history in his Josephus trilogy. Greifenverlag, Rudolstadt 1954.
• Doris Reischl: The present in the historical novel: on the function of the figure constellations in Lion Feuchtwanger's Josephus trilogy. Regensburg scripts on literary studies 4th University of Regensburg, Regensburg 1997.

Web links

• The historical novels of the Josephus trilogy on HaGalil
• Detlef Blasche: Early Christianity in Lion Feuchtwanger's Josephus Trilogy

References and comments

1. ↑ Detlef Blasche: Early Christianity in Lion Feuchtwanger's Josephus Trilogy. P. 4
2. ↑ Andrea Bunzel: La trilogie de Josèphe, de Lion Feuchtwanger. P. 27