“PATHOS OF THE EARTHlY PROGRESS”: ERICH AUERBACH’S EVERYDAYS

Abstract

The article presents a brief intellectual biography of Erich Auerbach covering the early period of his academic career and the history of his forced departure from Nazi Germany. The author focuses on the sources of Auerbach’s interest to the issues of “reality” and “everyday life”. The figures of Walter Benjamin,   Ludwig   Binswanger,   Leo Spitzer,   and   Werner   Krauss   are   presented as poetic characters of Auerbach’s biography in order to contextualize the tragic nature of the era in which these scholars had to invent their identity.