This article examines the first German PEN Club (established in 1924) as a semi-formal agent of cultural diplomacy after the First World War. It shows that leading figures in the German PEN negotiated a role in the International PEN which blended PEN's ostensibly non-political literary internationalism with the national interests of the young Weimar Republic. It explores their mutually expedient relationship with the German Foreign Ministry their efforts to influence state cultural diplomacy and their use of the International PEN framework to test alternative visions of international order. The article complicates the notion that PEN was an ‘instrument’ or ‘extended arm’ of foreign policy by underlining the agency of PEN intellectuals and by showing how PEN was part of a wider search for new ways to shape international affairs and find ideological compromise in an era often seen through a dominant lens of confrontation and polarisation.

本文考察了第一次世界大战之后作为文化外交的半正式代理的第一家德国笔会（PEN Club）（成立于1924年）。它表明，德国笔会的主要人物在国际笔会中发挥了作用，这将笔会表面上的非政治文学国际主义与年轻的魏玛共和国的国家利益融合在一起。它探讨了他们与德国外交部的权宜之计关系，他们影响国家文化外交的努力以及他们使用国际笔会框架来检验国际秩序的其他观点。