WHENEVER “GERMANY” AND “EXILE” appear in the same sentence, it is safe to assume that at issue is the mass exodus of cultural and intellectual life from Nazi Germany in the wake of the National Socialist takeover. Typically, this exile within the German historical context fits neatly between two dates: 1933 and 1945. A closer look at this time frame, however, reveals obvious cracks: more often than not, the reality of exile would last well beyond the end of the Second World War, because for many a return to Germany proved a losing proposition. The names of writers, artists, and intellectuals who were unable or unwilling to return are legion: the German theater critic, poet, and novelist Hans Sahl, Thomas Mann, Lion Feuchtwanger, the Austrian poet Mascha Kaléko (1907–75), the novelist Vicki Baum (1888–1960), and the composer Arnold Schoenberg, to name just a few. Did their exile end because it had become moot upon the collapse of Nazi Germany? Or had it already ended because their decision against returning “home” predated 1945? The watershed year 1933, too, proves more pervious than it would appear at first sight: German authors such as Annette Kolb (1870–1967), Hermann Hesse, or the philosopher Ernst Bloch (1885–1977) had already experienced exile in Switzerland with the onset of the First World War, years before their forced departure from Nazi Germany. In short, both dates, 1933 and 1945, are useful only insofar as they remain permeable, allowing for a before and an after.

This chapter examines German exile before 1933, though it goes well beyond Martin Korol’s notion of “Präexil” (preexile) with which he captures the exile years in neutral Switzerland during the First World War. If one were to give a specific date at which the extended story of exile begins—treacherous as this may be—it would be 1789, the outset of the French Revolution, which was to have a lasting influence on Germany and Europe as a whole. Doing so would be in keeping with Czech writer Milan Kundera’s exilic “arch” spanning exactly 200 years: “the first date [1789] gave birth to a great European character, the Émigré (either the Great Traitor or the Great Victim, according to one’s outlook).