Abstract

This dissertation investigates the Nietzsche reception of Thomas Mann and Menno ter Braak in the light of Fascism as well as the biographical connections and intellectual parallelism between the two authors. ;Menno ter Braak was the most prominent literary and cultural critic in the Netherlands, the literary editor of the newspaper Het vaderland, a founder of the literary journal Forum, novelist, playwright, and with the rise of Nazism, a member of the Dutch "Comite van Waakzaamheid van anti-nationaalsocialistische intellectuelen," alerting the Dutch people to the dangers posed by National Socialism. ;Two important common factors in the intellectual biography of Ter Braak and Thomas Mann are the influence of Nietzsche and the rejection of Fascism. Like Thomas Mann who maintained his stand as an opponent of Fascism, Ter Braak, too, was such a strong opponent of Fascism that he committed suicide in 1940 when German troops invaded Holland. Like Thomas Mann again, he was significantly influenced by Nietzsche. Nietzsche's philosophy had an extensive influence on Ter Braak's view of Christian culture, democracy, egalitarianism, socialism and Fascism. ;On the surface, both of them attempted to dissociate Nietzsche from Fascism and denied any connections between the two. However, my research points out a discord between Thomas Mann as a political essayist and Mann as a literary writer and individual and shows that although he attempted to detach Nietzsche from Fascism in his essays, he was, in his innermost mind, conscious of the connection between the two and showed it in his literary works and diary. In the case of Menno ter Braak, it turns out that his view of the connection between Nietzsche and Fascism, though not dialectical and dualistic from the beginning like that of Thomas Mann, underwent a significant change in course of time. While he was an enthusiastic defender of Nietzsche in 1934, his position seems to have changed by 1939, and he now viewed Nietzsche as at least partly responsible for National Socialist thinkers' misuse of his philosophy