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Although the title of the book is "A Essay on German Literary Thought in the 20th Century", it does not cover everything. Most of the chapters deal with German aesthetic thought in the 20th century. The book is divided into three parts: the first part studies the German "literary sociology" thought, mainly introducing the aesthetic and artistic thoughts of Lukacs, Hauser, Adorno, and Benjamin; the second part discusses "reception theory", that is, the "reception aesthetics" of the Federal Republic of Germany and the "reception theory" of the Democratic Republic of Germany; the third part studies the aesthetic thoughts of famous German writers, such as the theory and practice of Thomas Mann, Brecht, Bör, and Grass. The author makes full use of German literature to present his own opinions.

Since the 20th century, the development of comparative literature has been controversial. Especially after being shaped by critical theory, it has become increasingly separated from literature itself, thus falling into a disciplinary crisis. The current resumption of the concept of world literature should be an attempt to cope with the crisis situation. How to understand and define "world literature" has become an indispensable conceptual vision in seeking a new world order and civilization pattern. Reopening the way of thinking about understanding "world literature" is one of the core issues in today's academic research. In order to jointly discuss this core topic, the School of Liberal Arts of Beijing Normal University held the third "Ideology and Methods" International High-end Dialogue and Academic Forum in 2015. The conference invited more than 20 well-known scholars from the United States, Germany, the United Kingdom, France, Slovakia, South Korea and other places to conduct in-depth discussions on "What is world literature? The tension between locality and universality." This book is the proceedings of this important international symposium.