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UC Berkeley UC Berkeley Electronic Theses and Dissertations Title Constituting a Self through an Indian Other. A Study of Select Works by Stefan Zweig and Hermann Hesse Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/8179t458 Author Manthripragada, Ashwin Jayant Publication Date 2014 Peer reviewed|Thesis/dissertation eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California Constituting a Self through an Indian Other. A Study of Select Works by Stefan Zweig and Hermann Hesse by Ashwin Jayant Manthripragada A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in German in the Graduate Division of the University of California, Berkeley Committee in charge: Professor Winfried Kudszus, Chair Professor Karen Feldman Professor Robert P. Goldman Fall 2014 Abstract Constituting a Self through an Indian Other. A Study of Select Works by Stefan Zweig and Hermann Hesse by Ashwin Jayant Manthripragada Doctor of Philosophy in German University of California, Berkeley Professor Winfried Kudszus, Chair This study explains how “India” can sometimes be used in German-language literature in non- Orientalist terms. As I closely analyze Stefan Zweig’s Die Augen des ewigen Bruders: Eine Legende, his essay “Die indische Gefahr für England,” and Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha all within a postcolonial theoretical framework, I argue that these texts that either take place in India or contend with Indian themes are less about India than about coming to terms with self-identity. With Zweig’s work, I demonstrate how India is used as a means toward self-reflection and self- critique. Accordingly, I turn to Zweig’s fraught relationship to the Austro-Hungarian Empire as well as interest in internationalism to verify, through historical and biographical analysis, how these texts that are ostensibly about an Other are inexorably a means of constituting a Self. Since with Zweig’s texts I establish that “Indienliteratur” can be read in postcolonial terms, I move in a different direction with my reading of Hesse’s “German-Indian” story by not taking recourse to locating its cultural identity. I borrow analytical developments I make previously on the relationship between individual and community/national identity in order to engage with identity on a philosophical scale. I examine how Siddhartha, a text that condemns every kind of teaching, paradoxically helped teach individualistic identity formation in the era of U.S. Counterculture. 1 To Amma, Appa, Ajay i Acknowledgements In these next pages, I want desperately to thank the birds whose chirp gave calm to my keyboard, the ocean whose waves caught the rhythm of my running breaks, the cafés whose aroma stirred my work, the neighborhoods of Berkeley, Berlin and Bombay. I want desperately to thank the unknown, the mundane, the non-academic, the times in-between, passing poetry, music, emotions, meditative thoughts, altered states, ice cream, movies and dancing… every single member of my great family, and all my dear friends, wheeled, biped, quadruped alike. But if this dissertation is a lesson in focus, so too shall be these acknowledgements. I therefore name here those who were involved more directly in helping me obtain this doctoral degree. I begin with two who have recently departed. First, I thank my high school German teacher, Frau Fredette, whose jovial enthusiasm planted the seeds of this endeavor. Second, I thank my buddy Tom. Together, in ninth grade, we decided to enroll in German—to be different. I thank all my Berkeley instructors, teachers, mentors, and gurus. Prof. Winfried Kudszus, my Doktorvater, and Prof. em. Hinrich C. Seeba, my undergraduate adviser, have been my two guiding hands. Where Prof. Kudszus cultivates a freedom to take literary scholarship in uncharted directions, Prof. Seeba cultivates an appreciation of literature’s cultural and historical underpinning. Though distinct from one another in approach, they have in common their consummate ability to inspire, to illuminate, and to educate. I would not be in this position without them, and I am fortunate now to call them my friends. I thank my second committee member, Prof. Karen Feldman, who taught me the importance of (re)defining the terminology I use. The clarity of this dissertation is indebted to her keen, constructive criticism, especially at the level of organization and concision. I keep her voice in my head; I hope she won’t mind. I thank my outside committee member from Sanskrit, Prof. Robert P. Goldman, as well as Dr. Sally Goldman, for their unwavering support and genuine enthusiasm for reading my work. I learn so much from their humility. I thank Nikolas Euba, our invaluable pedagogy instructor. His trust in me as a teacher is a continuous source for building my confidence. I would not be in this position without him, and I am fortunate to call him my friend. I wholeheartedly thank the Staff of Floor E, whose incomparable skills have made my graduate years professionally smooth and whose steady gestures of kindness and care have made them memorable. They magically make administrative offices feel like home. I thank my students, whose eagerness to learn is the greatest source of inspiration. Many have become good friends, penpals, even colleagues. Their accomplishments continue to astound me. I thank my entire, lovable cohort. I also thank all the generous colleagues and teachers in German, Sanskrit, Comparative Literature, and Otherwise from all over the world, and their extensions, who have shown me that academic rigor can be compassionate and not cutthroat, that academic work can be socially relevant and not detached. Special thanks go to Klemens Renoldner and Eva Alteneder of the Stefan Zweig Centre, Salzburg, for their direct involvement in this dissertation and their staunch, kind support. The following people I thank with a tear in my eye. They are brilliant thinkers cut from the cloth of compassion. My conversations with them are embedded in this work. I thank Emina Mušanović, my counterpart, my sister. We are embers and ashes, scorched by the same passionate, lyrical fire. She is a shining phoenix who teaches me resilience. I thank John Kaiser. He teaches me how to care selflessly, how to love obsessively, how to glorify goofballdom. I thank Dagmar Theison. I hope to be as brazen and cool as she is. She nourishes as a mother does. She teaches me to let go. I thank Katie Sinnott, the artist beyond compare. Her visions paint the ii world with luminescence, and I bask in their glow. I thank the gentle Kevin Gordon. He can assure and reassure like playful sunrise. I thank Yelena Fenik and her understanding, Heidi Bruder and her sincerity, Noriko Milman and her backing. I thank Malaika Gray and her calm, Clay Reber and his tenderness and bravery, Sheila Bienenfeld and her wisdom, William Kaiser and his wit and willpower. I thank Sai Krishna Duriseti and Dee Dee Auborg and our laughter. Again, I thank all my friends and family, people who remind me of the beauty and magnificence of life. If I began a list, I wouldn’t know when or where to stop. Relatives alone like my “cosines,” Kakkas, Kakkis, Dodammas, Dodappas, Aunties and Uncles would fill volumes, ancestors like Thathayya and Ammamma would fill another set, and friends, old and new, from here and there, would fill yet another. My network in Germany including “meine zweite Ahuja Familie” would fill even one more. I end, then, with my father, mother and brother, to whom I dedicate this work, whom I thank like I thank the universe. iii Contents Dedication i Acknowledgments ii Introduction 1 The Insufficiency of Orientalism 2 The Expanding Postcolonial Discourse 5 The Significance of Nuance 7 What to Expect 9 Chapter 1 Reading Stefan Zweig’s Die Augen des ewigen Bruders: Eine Legende Through a Postcolonial Lens 10 The Oxymoronic New Legend 11 The Book as the Gateway to the World 12 Epigraphic Incongruity 14 A Critique on Retelling 16 Groundwork for Narrative Analysis 17 The Eastern Empire 19 Chapter 2 Self-Reflection in Die Augen des ewigen Bruders 22 Camaraderie across Enemy Lines 23 Dismissing Nation 25 Die Augen and Tagore 26 Die Augen and Freud 29 Relinquishing the Sword, Crossing Boundaries 30 The Problem of Hemispheres 33 The Ill-fated Possibility of Universalism 37 Reading Virata’s Quandary through Walter Benjamin’s “Critique of Violence”: Universal Ethics or Moral Relativism? 37 Self-Reflection as Self-Critique: “Moral Ambiguity is Synonymous with Moral Complexity, Not Lack of Moral Resolve” 41 iv Chapter 3 Self-Critique in Die Augen des ewigen Bruders 43 Medieval Critique: Necessarily a Christian Legend? 46 Early Modern Critique: Not a Chronicle 47 Entertaining and Rejecting Romanticism 49 Veritas 53 Die Augen as Modern Philosophical Text: a Comparison with Schopenhauer’s Sanskrit Terminology 54 Chapter 4 The Fear of Postcolonialism 62 The Indian Threat to England 62 Postcolonialism in the Midst of Viennese Modernism 63 The Fascination with Empire 68 Terrorism, Fear, Surveillance… and Nationhood 71 The European Master Narrative 79 Conclusion 81 Chapter 5 Siddhartha, the Paradox, and the Counterculture 82 The Paradox of Siddhartha’s Teachings and the Paradox of Counterculture 84 The Paradox of Language 86 The Nomenclature of the Counterculture 90 “The Compulsion to Identify” 94 Conclusion 96 Works Cited 98 v Introduction In broad terms, this dissertation is a study of the constitution of a Self through an Other and ensuing inescapable relationships of power. In narrower terms, through the examination of three German-language texts published in the early twentieth century that feature a contact with Indian themes, this dissertation is a study of the constitution of a Self through an Indian Other and an ensuing discourse of European hegemony. The constructively vexing problem of hegemony that continues to erupt at the sites of contact between West and East, Occident and Orient, Empire and Colony sets a crucial context within which I read these texts.