Create a new account

It's simple, and free.

Max Frisch's novel Homo Faber

Max Frisch's novel Homo Faber explores a number of contemporary themes, and one of the central issues can be described as probability versus destiny in human life. This is an ancient theme as human beings have long sought to discover whether their actions are ruled by accident or design, and at different times people have believed that one or the other was more important in human affairs. In periods of strong faith, destiny is considered to be the power that guides human life, but in a more secular age such as our own, the idea of any external entity or force being responsible for the course of individual human life is given less credence. The analysis of this issue in Frisch is related to the need his characters experience to examine the self and to understand themselves and their relationship to the rest of the world.

Characters like Faber are trying to find their way in a world that makes it difficult for them to achieve the self-knowledge they need. Faber is a representative of modern life, a man who has found some accommodation with the issue of determinism versus free will largely by ignoring it. He has decided to live his life as if it were predictable and controlled, and for him the way to achieve some sense of certainty in his life is to avoid relationships with others, relationships which might challenge his understanding and create a sense of uncertainty where presently there is none. Walter Faber is known in the title as Homo Faber, indicating that he represents all of mankind in the modern world, meaning the new man. His consciousness is the center of the novel, for he narrates his own story. Frisch thus takes the reader inside the mind of this modern man where the reader can experience the man's desire for isolation and his reaction to the different elements he encounters in the technological world in which he lives. Faber's need for self-knowledge and his search becomes something the reader can share as i...

Page 1 of 13 Next >

More on Max Frisch's novel Homo Faber...

Loading...
APA     MLA     Chicago
Max Frisch's novel Homo Faber. (1969, December 31). In LotsofEssays.com. Retrieved 11:50, March 28, 2024, from https://www.lotsofessays.com/viewpaper/1690287.html