In 1966, Emil Staiger, one of the most prominent literary scholars in literary studies of the postwar era, gave a talk on literature and the public. In his speech, which initiated what came to be known as the Zürcher Literaturstreit, Staiger developed a normative idea of literature as an agent of social cohesion. Around the same time, a new literary culture emerged in Switzerland, one which challenged Staiger's conception by exploring literature's critical potential. This article argues that this more modern direction taken by German Swiss literature was the result of transnational dynamics. Focusing on three examples of literature written by a new generation of Swiss authors (Walter, Federspiel, Bichsel), the article explores the various transnational alliances these authors built with modernist authors, mostly beyond the German‐speaking world, as a means of breaking with literary conventions. Leaving the logic of a national literary history behind, the article argues that seemingly local literary conflicts in 1960s Switzerland arose out of transnational dynamics.