Literature in Vienna at the Turn of the Centuries Introduction: Notes on Literature in Vienna at the Turn of the Centuries
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 February 2013
Summary
One who deals with fin-de-siècle Vienna is often confronted with clichés. Elisabeth Leinfellner-Rupertsberger sums it up:
Das Wien und mit ihm das Österreich der Jahrhundertwende sind zu einer Utopie im ursprünglichen Sinne des Wortes geworden, zu einem raum-und zeitlosen Mythos, einem Pandämonium mit mythischen Versatzstücken: dem guten alten Kaiser, der täglich seinen Tafelspitz ißt — so schon bei Josef Roth; dem weisen Ratgeber, Freud; der dämonischen Verführerin, Alma Mahler-Werfel; dem hauslosen Kaffeehausliteraten, Peter Altenberg; dem leutseligen Bürgermeister, der nur ein kleines bisserl antisemitisch ist, Lueger; und dem exilierten und in Österreich erst nach seinem Tod langsam bekanntgewordenen und schließlich in einer Apotheose verklärten Denker, Ludwig Wittgenstein.
Leinfellner-Rupertsberger presents the Austrian turn of the century in an ironic way as a patchwork of true but incomplete impressions, as a time that had to cope with a variety of political and social changes such as the collapse of the Habsburgian monarchy, the breaking apart of the “VielvÖlkerstaat,” and the rise of nationalism.
The articles in this book aim to explore the contrasts and similarities of both turns of the centuries around 1900 and 2000 and to show how the aesthetics of literature and its historical background have influenced each other and how they have changed during a century. They seek to sound the continuities and discontinuities in Austrian literature, especially of literature in Vienna by highlighting the city's role in the development of Austrian culture now and then.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Literature in Vienna at the Turn of the CenturiesContinuities and Discontinuities around 1900 and 2000, pp. 1 - 24Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2002