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Both dramatic and musical theater are part of the tradition that has made Austria - especially Vienna - and the old Habsburg lands synonymous with high culture in Central Europe. Many works, often controversial originally but now considered as classics, are still performed regularly in Vienna, Prague, Budapest, or Krakow. This volume not only offers an excellent overview of the theatrical history of the region; it must also be seen as an innovative, cross-disciplinary attempt to analyse the inner workings and dynamics of theater through a discussion of the interplay between society, the audience, and performing artists ... Read more

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Thoughtful gift now a course adopted by music professor
I bought this text book for my niece before she embarked on a trip along with other academically selected student traveling for 3 months study abroad in Austria. She enjoyed the subject matter so much she brought it to the attention of her music professor. He was so impressed with the book's contents he adopted it as a course text book for the students to take with them for study credits as they were visiting the actual sites called out in the book. ... Read more

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Like all good historical novels, 'Broken Songs' reveals what it was like for ordinary people to live through the great events of the history books. Through the eyes of the mostly apolitical fifteen-year-old protagonist we experience the songs and flags, the radio propaganda of the last year of World War II; frequent air raids, taking shelter in the catacombs, emerging each time to assess the damage and see people digging bodies out of the rubble, often with their bare hands become the routine. In spite of her harsh and punitive mother, who thrusts too much responsibility for her younger half-brothers on her, there are moments of happiness, as friends and neighbors have to incorporate extraordinary experiences into their daily routine. ... Read more

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This collection of seventeen articles offers an investigation of some of the most important voices from Austria's theatre world between 1945 and 2001. They are for the most part critical voices engaged in the constantly evolving redefinition of a political state and its private citizens, undermining the status quo and the general complacency. They include both writers, producers and directors, for the written word must take shape on stage and the real debate of drama takes place in a public space. Therefore this volume attempts to include issues of staging and reception where possible. Taken as a whole this volume is intended to show the incredible richness and variety of the theatre scene in Austria. ... Read more

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missing pages
This book had at least 30 pages missing. The parts that I read is very good, bit whith the missing pages its worthless. Do not buy this item, it might be incomplete.
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Four novellas taken from two cycles of novellas entitled Die Liebe and Das Vermeachtnis Kains. ... Read more

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New translations of three thought-provoking love stories
LOVE contains new translations of three love stories by the infamous author of Venus in Furs, whose name has come down to us primarily as the term for a variety of sexual behaviour. But do not expect to find women with whips standing over cringing men in these tales. Sacher-Masoch was a much more complex writer who was considered a new Goethe by some of his contemporaries.

This book is a very good English-language introduction to the writings of Leopold von Sacher-Masoch. Not only does it provide new translations of three of his novellas, but it also has a six page Afterword by the translator that shows how these works fit into Sacher-Masoch's body of literature and literary themes. The author was planning a series of 36 novellas to be collectively called The Legacy of Cain. It was to consist of six stories on each of six themes: Love, Property, The State, War, Work, and Death. Only the two cycles on Love and Property were finished and finding English translations of any of them besides Venus in Furs have required the resources of major university libraries. This book contains the first three novellas of the Love sextet along with the prologue to the series which is called "The Wanderer." There appears to be an awakening scholarly interest in Sacher-Masoch's writings. This is the second book of translations by Michael O'Pecko, and Virginia Lewis has also recently translated a new book of the author's Jewish stories.

"The Wanderer" is the prolog to the whole Legacy of Cain series. In it a civilized man who is out hunting comes across a holy mystic wandering in the Carpathian mountains. The holy man attacks the narrator for being a hunter, a killer. A discussion begins in which the mystic claims we are all infected with the legacy of Cain's sin. The just person can only flee the world and its enticements to avoid the six things that are Cain's legacy: Love, Property, The State, War, Work, and Death. Confronted with this "Truth" the narrator returns to his village to ponder. The prolog ends and the stories begin.

Don Juan of Kolomea tells the tale of a man who falls in love and marries. He is blissfully happy until his wife has children. Feeling neglected by her, now that she spends her time with them, he seeks out lovers. But he can never recover the feelings of true love that he first had with his wife.

The Man Who Re-Enlisted tells another story of true love led astray. This time the lovers are young and poor. They are deeply in love, but her great beauty draws the attention of a rich man. She chooses security and wealth over true love and poverty. Yet this is a small town and the two must see each other in passing as the years go on. We see the man's unending love yearning for the unattainable through the eyes of his fellow villagers.

In Moonlight, a married woman becomes bored with her life in the country and takes her husband's friend as a lover. Everything comes crashing down when her husband finds out, and she is left only a shadow of her former self, playing Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata night after night.

These stories take us into another world. This is the 19th century in the Carpathian Mountains of rural Austria-Hungary. The people who live here were called "Little Russians" because they spoke a dialect of Ukrainian. Today we know them as Rusyns or Western Ukrainians. If you are looking for the Hollywood version of love that conquers all, these are not the stories for you. But if you want to see how the impulse of love plays out against the realities of 19th century life and, despite the intensity, doesn't always have a happy ending, you will find much to enjoy here. Sacher-Masoch will take you to another time and place and fill your soul with the poignancy of his characters.

Note from the translator
In the interests of full disclosure, I am the translator of this work.The following is the text from the book jacket:

As a young writer, Leopold von Sacher-Masoch (1836-1895) planned an ambitious cycle of thirty six novellas grouped around six themes:love, property, the state, war, work, and death.Only the first volume, entitled Love, was completed as planned.Three of Love's six novellas, along with a prologue, are presented here.Like many progressive writers of the nineteenth century, Sacher-Masoch was intrigued by the variations of love that didnot conform easily to the era's conventional portraits and explored those themes in this collection.His work is notable for its psychological insight in a pre-Freudian era and for his ability to evoke the exoticism of the "Wild East" of the Habsburg empire's Slavic territories. ... Read more

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Leopold von Sacher-Masoch (1836-1895), whose name has been immortalised in the term masochism, is known today predominantly for his novel "Venus in Furs" and for his tales of dominant women and suffering men. This collection features some of his best-known Jewish tales which display the author's warm sense of humanity as well as his considerable sense of humour. Sacher-Masoch's unusual ability to capture the essence of a person or place with a telling detail brings the vanished world of Galician Jewry back to life in all its splendour and squalor, mixing the greys, browns, and blacks of European Realism with the bright, sparkling colours of legend, myth, fairy tale, and tradition. ... Read more

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The book examines Sigmund Freud's life and work, and sees tragedy as a concept of central importance in both. Politzer shows how for Freud the tragic experience - later formulated as the Oedipus complex - was at the root of the development of human civilization. In the light of this idea, he examines Freud's interpretation of Sophocles, Shakespeare, and Michelangelo's statue Moses. He also looks at the relationship with Jung in terms of the father-son conflict. A final chapter, designated 'appendix' portrays the younger generation of the 1970's 'flower-power' movement, as a 'post-Oedipal generation'. Politzer's book is also a celebration of Sigmund Freud as a literary author in his own right. ... Read more

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A classic, in-depth intellectual psychoanalysis of the first true psychoanalyzer.
Skillfully rendered into English by award-winning translator Michael Mitchell, and now featuring a new introduction, Freud & Tragedy is a classic examination of the father of psychology, Sigmund Freud. Exploring tragedy as a concept critical to Freud's works and life, Freud & Tragedy covers Freud's interpretation of Sophocles and Shakespeare; his relationship with Jung in the dynamic of father-son conflict; his concept of the "death principle"; and much more. In addition to deconstructing the sources of Freud's views on humanity, Freud & Tragedy also honors Freud as a literary author in his own right. A classic, in-depth intellectual psychoanalysis of the first true psychoanalyzer. ... Read more

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Odon von Horvath (1901-1939) is one of the most important theatre writers in the 1930s. His reputation rests largely on the four plays in this collection, which he called Volksstucke (popular plays), although he had no desire to embrace this tradition uncritically. Reflected in these plays is the sympathy for the situation of the exploited classes, as well as the concern for the way language is used for deception and self-deception. The hollow characters come across as potentially receptive to fascism. A latent brutality is unmasked, a lack of genuine feeling -- all lying hidden under a veneer of facile sentimentality. ... Read more

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Austrian literature holds a special place in the German-language literature of our day. Despite the high regard in which Austrian authors are held, it has nevertheless always been more difficult for Austrian women writers to find a place in the literary canon. ESCAPING EXPECTATIONS offers therefore not only a fascinating collection of stories, but also a unique opportunity for the reading public to explore the often overlooked female side of contemporary Austrian literature. These diverse, well-written and often gripping texts by women authors reveal much about women's lives and about the lives of women writers in the Austrian milieu. ... Read more

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A truly ground breaking anthology
Impressively compiled and edited by contemporary Austrian literature expert Barbara Neuwirth, and ably translated into English by Pamela S. Saur (Professor of German, Lamar University, Beaumont, Texas), Escaping Expectations: Stories By Austrian Women Writers is a truly ground breaking anthology offering a unique look into the female perspective of contemporary Austrian literature. A diverse selection of tales about interpersonal relationships, struggles against implacable bureaucracy, and the endurance of the human spirit, make Escaping Expectations a unique and welcome contribution to international literary and women's studies supplemental reading lists and academic reference collections. ... Read more

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In the course of the twentieth century, Austria has been transformed from the centre of a multi-ethnic and multi-lingual empire of fifty-three million people to a republic of approximately eight million predominantly German-speaking citizens. The demise of the Habsburg Empire, the traumas of two world wars, the barbarism of fascism, and the political stability and economic prosperity of the Second Austrian Republic have all played a significant role in shaping modern Austrian identities. The short stories included in this volume, written by such authors as Ingeborg Bachmann, Thomas Bernhard, Hugo von Hofmannsthal, Robert Musil, Joseph Roth, and Arthur Schnitzler, present a vivid array of Austrian characters whose lives have been shaped by both major historical events and the concerns and contingencies of everyday existence. ... Read more

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Austria has experienced extraordinary change and turmoil during this and the previous centuries. Nevertheless, the study of its culture and history tends to be overshadowed by that of its larger neighbors, Germany and Russia; this applies even more so to the study of Austrian women who suffer a double marginalization within this configuration. However, the climate is changing, and Womens Studies in particular is becoming a recognized academic field not only in its own right, but also as a constitutive part of Austrian Studies in general. This volume, the first one of its kind in English, represents an important contribution. It brings together scholars from different disciplines who address the history of women in Austria, as well as their place in contemporary Austrian society, from a variety of theoretical and methodological perspectives, thus shedding new light on contemporary Austria in the context of its rich and complicated history. ... Read more

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The rediscovery of the writings of Veza Canetti (1897-1963) was one of the literary events of the 1990s in German-speaking Europe. In her stories Canetti shows a taste for the grotesque, a commitment to the underdog, a forensic understanding of the psychology of wives trapped in traditional marriages, as well as wit and irony. "Viennese Short Stories" assembles the fiction Canetti published in her lifetime between 1932-1937 aside from her two novels ("The Yellow Street" and "The Tortoises").These stories appeared in Viennese newspapers, first the socialistic "Arbeiter-Zeitung" and, after its closure, in exile journals and, finally, adopting a rather different tone and style, in the censored press of the 'corporate state' under Chancellor Kurt von Schuschnigg. She writes about women as wives, daughters, and employees, about working-class children who are taught the harsh rules of middle-class life at an early age, about the street violence during the workers' revolt in February 1934, and the lowly status of maids.Her favourite pseudonym, Veza Magd (maid), showed her allegiance to this marginalised group, whose sense of ethics underscores their dignity, which Canetti champions.She has an acute eye for the dynamics of power in human relationships, be they based on differences in class or sex or both. She is moralistic and engaged but funny; her stories are traditional rather than Chekhovian in their twists of plot and use of the final punchline. In his introduction Julian Preece shows how Veza Canetti was an unrivalled observer of the life of the Viennese poor on the eve of Nazism. Until now Veza Canetti's literary career was overshadowed by her more famous husband, Elias Canetti (1905-1994, Nobel Prize, 1981). His failure to tell the world of her work until shortly before his death, made her two novels, three plays, and short stories even more intriguing. ... Read more