1938: The Life of Galileo to The Private Life of the Master Race

Chronology of World, British and American Literature

Bertolt Brecht. German. 1938. Play. The Life of Galileo. 15 episodes. Galileo as self-serving, unheroic, willing to compromise principles in the face of pressure. Galileo’s recantation and complex motivation for doing so.

Jean-Paul Sartre. French. 1938. Novel. Nausea. People can’t help existing, but no reason for existing; absurdity of human life. With no reason to live, he is free, despite loneliness of freedom. Only escape from oppressiveness of existence is creation. Resolves to write a book.

Nikos Kazantzakis. Greek. 1938. Poetry. The Odyssey: A Modern Sequel. The continued adventures of Odysseus representing modern man’s hopes and travails.

Thornton Wilder. American. 1938. Play. Our Town. Daily life, love and marriage and death in a typical turn-of-century New England town.

Bertolt Brecht. German. 1938. Play. The Private Life of the Master Race. Collection of 24 dramatic scenes, each revealing Hitler’s atrocities from 1933-1938.