Journal of Austrian Studies最新文献

{"title":"Von November bis März (ABSTECHEN): A Prose Poem by Angelika Reitzer and an Interview with the Author","authors":"JAS Editors, Angelika Reitzer","doi":"10.1353/oas.2024.a921901","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/oas.2024.a921901","url":null,"abstract":"<span><span>In lieu of</span> an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:</span>\u0000<p> <ul> <li><!-- html_title --> Von November bis März (ABSTECHEN)<span>A Prose Poem by Angelika Reitzer and an Interview with the Author</span> <!-- /html_title --></li> <li> JAS Editors and Angelika Reitzer </li> </ul> <h2>Introduction</h2> <p>Angelika Reitzer is a contemporary Austrian writer and playwright who is making her mark on the international literary landscape. She was born in Graz in 1971 and subsequently studied literature and history in Salzburg and Berlin. Since 2001 she has made Vienna her permanent residence. Her many publications include novels such as <em>Taghelle Gegend</em> (2007), <em>unter uns</em> (2010), <em>Wir Erben</em> (2014), and <em>Obwohl es kalt ist draußen</em> (2018); a short story collection, <em>Frauen in Vasen</em> (2008); the libretto for the opera <em>Regina—einFest!</em> (2022); and numerous other works, including mini- dramas and texts for a film trilogy. Her play <em>Ein Kind seiner Zeit</em>, inspired by Hieronymus Bosch’s painting <em>Christ Child with a Walking Frame</em>, was performed in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. Her work has received numerous awards, including the 2009 Förderungspreis der Stadt Wien, the 2012 Otto Stoessl- Preis, the 2014 Literaturpreis des Landes Steiermark, and the 2016 Outstanding Artist Award for Literature. Reitzer has also been writer- in- residence at Bowling Green State University in 2012 and at Grinnell College in 2023. More information about Angelika Reitzer and her previous and upcoming work can be found on her website https://angelikareitzer.eu.</p> <p>The following is a short, previously unpublished piece by Reitzer, followed by an interview about this text and her oeuvre. <strong>[End Page 97]</strong></p> <h2>Von November bis März (ABSTECHEN)</h2> <p>Die Großeltern von Alois waren Knecht und Magd, sie konnten heiraten und einen kleinen Bauernhof mit dem Vulgonamen »Niachtn« erwerben. Niachtn heißt Nichts.</p> <p>Es war ein Aufstieg: Gerade noch Leibeigene, dann Kleinbauern mit Stall, einigen Hektar Ackergrund und ein Flecken Wald.</p> <p>Alois ist achtzehn, als sein Vater stirbt und er den Hof übernimmt, auf dem neben seiner Mutter und drei jüngeren Geschwistern noch einige Verwandte leben, alt, pflegebedürftig, einer mit Kropf. Diese rund zehnköpfige Familie versorgt er mit ein paar Kühen, Schweinen und Hühnern und dem, was auf den wenigen Feldern rund um das Haus wächst.</p> <p>Tierarzt, wie er es sich als junger Mann vorgenommen hat, wird er nicht.</p> <p>Alois hat bei seinem Onkel Kajetan, der Fleischhacker in Raaba war, gelernt, Schweine zu schlachten. Lange Zeit geht er von November bis März auf die Bauernhöfe in der Umgebung abstechen.</p> <p>Mit einem Bolzenschuss, auf oder durch die Schädeldecke, wird das Schwein betäubt, bevor es durch einen Halsbruststich getötet wird. Dabei setzt man das Stechmesser drei Finger breit vor dem Brustbein an und sticht sch","PeriodicalId":40350,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Austrian Studies","volume":"35 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2024-03-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140070254","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"In Memoriam: Robert Dassanowsky","authors":"","doi":"10.1353/oas.2024.a921906","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/oas.2024.a921906","url":null,"abstract":"<span><span>In lieu of</span> an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:</span>\u0000<p> <ul> <li><!-- html_title --> In Memoriam<span>Robert Dassanowsky</span> <!-- /html_title --></li> </ul> <p><em>From the Editors</em>: In October 2023, the Austrian Studies Association lost one of its most beloved and influential members, Robert Dassanowsky. Robert’s contributions to the Association and to the field of Austrian Studies were legion. To honor his memory we offer here a few brief tributes, first from ASA President Teresa Kovacs on behalf of the Association, and then from several colleagues who knew Robert well.</p> <h2>________</h2> <p>Dear Members of the Austrian Studies Association,</p> <p>It is difficult for me to write this small text in memory of Robert Dassanowsky, who passed away on October 10, 2023. Not because there is nothing to say about Robert, but on the contrary, because there is so much to say about him while I am still struggling to find the right words after his death has come so unexpectedly for most of us and leaves a great void.</p> <p>Robert was an excellent scholar with singular expertise in Austrian film, literature, and Austrofascism, which is evident not only in his numerous publications in this field but also in the film studies program he established at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs, which was his home institution since 1993. Next to his academic work, he was dedicated to supporting young and promising directors, which is visible in his work as a producer and head of Belvedere Film, which promotes innovative cinematic works from Austria. <strong>[End Page xi]</strong></p> <p>Robert has been a pillar of the Austrian Studies Association for many years and, frankly, it is hard to imagine our association without him. Robert has supported the ASA in various capacities: as President, as Board Member at large, and most recently as PR and Fundraising Board Member. Robert has always been concerned with the well-being of the ASA. He has consistently worked to make our organization visible and has been a driving force in expanding its network. This not only means that he constantly reminded us that the ASA must go beyond literature and literary studies, but also that he knew how to challenge the narrow boundaries of the purely academic field and connect the ASA with various cultural institutions and artists.</p> <p>Robert had good foresight and he was committed to the constant expansion and internationalization of the ASA until the very end. I am infinitely grateful to him for this constant inspiration. This foresight is also reflected in the fact that he went above and beyond to support young scholars. I have experienced this myself, as it was Robert who motivated me to join the ASA Board in countless conversations when I was still a doctoral student at the University of Vienna. And I have heard from so many others in recent weeks whom Robert supported in a similar way, which has reminded me once again of th","PeriodicalId":40350,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Austrian Studies","volume":"100 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2024-03-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140076744","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Empty Signs, Historical Imaginaries: The Entangled Nationalization of Names and Naming in a Late Habsburg Borderland by Ágoston Berecz (review)","authors":"Andrew Behrendt","doi":"10.1353/oas.2024.a921902","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/oas.2024.a921902","url":null,"abstract":"<span><span>In lieu of</span> an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:</span>\u0000<p> <span>Reviewed by:</span> <ul> <li><!-- html_title --> <em>Empty Signs, Historical Imaginaries: The Entangled Nationalization of Names and Naming in a Late Habsburg Borderland</em> by Ágoston Berecz <!-- /html_title --></li> <li> Andrew Behrendt </li> </ul> Ágoston Berecz, <em>Empty Signs, Historical Imaginaries: The Entangled Nationalization of Names and Naming in a Late Habsburg Borderland</em>. New York and Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2020. 350 pp. <p>Erudite and ingenious, Ágoston Berecz’s <em>Empty Signs, Historical Imaginaries</em> lends new vigor to the historiography of nationalism in East Central Europe. It takes hold of a frustratingly understudied subject, “nationality policies and national conflicts” in Hungary between 1867 and 1914; adds another that is notoriously difficult to source, namely ground- level responses to nationalist activism, especially among peasants; and jointly explores both through the methodological innovation of applying linguistic analysis—particularly onomastics, the study of proper names. The “borderland” of the subtitle refers to Transylvania and the Banat, where an ascendant, assimilationist Magyar elite pursued various means of undermining its rival Romanian and Saxon/pan-German nationalisms. Berecz draws our attention to the importance of personal, familial, and geographic names in this uneven three-way competition whereby they became “sites of memory” in nationalist metanarratives and “projection screens for visions of national history” (8–9). The result is a rich, multifaceted book whose prismatic examination sheds light on countless details of nationalization as a fluid process more than it delivers wholesale revelations of some settled outcome.</p> <p>Berecz sets out with an exceptionally compelling introduction, which, in conjunction with the largely summative conclusion, readers may find useful as a kind of conceptual atlas as they make their way through this dense text. Of particular note is Berecz’s critique of the modernist school of nationalism studies (to which I confess myself a disciple), as it not only offers a reasonably persuasive case for the ethno- nationalist school but is also simply a more substantive discussion of applied theory than is typical for the field.</p> <p>The book is split into three parts, each corresponding to what Berecz dubs a “level of analysis” (19) and each containing three chapters that are <strong>[End Page 107]</strong> thematically mirrored by a chapter in the other parts. The first section, “Peasants,” dedicates three chapters to the conventions of that social class when assigning first names to their children, defining or changing their family names, and understanding the place- names and etymologies of their home communities. Using the ELITES08 and Historical Population Database of Transylvania datasets as well as Frigyes Pesty’s 1864 toponymical survey, Berecz finds that","PeriodicalId":40350,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Austrian Studies","volume":"44 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2024-03-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140070245","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Stefan Zweig und Jakob Wassermann: Eine Lebensbekanntschaft im Licht ihrer Korrespondenz (1908–1933) by Marlen Eckl and Jeffrey B. Berlin (review)","authors":"Birger Vanwesenbeeck","doi":"10.1353/oas.2024.a921910","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/oas.2024.a921910","url":null,"abstract":"<span><span>In lieu of</span> an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:</span>\u0000<p> <span>Reviewed by:</span> <ul> <li><!-- html_title --> <em>Stefan Zweig und Jakob Wassermann: Eine Lebensbekanntschaft im Licht ihrer Korrespondenz (1908–1933)</em> by Marlen Eckl and Jeffrey B. Berlin <!-- /html_title --></li> <li> Birger Vanwesenbeeck </li> </ul> Marlen Eckl and Jeffrey B. Berlin, <em>Stefan Zweig und Jakob Wassermann: Eine Lebensbekanntschaft im Licht ihrer Korrespondenz (1908–1933)</em>. Schriftenreihe des Stefan Zweig Zentrum Salzburg 16. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann, 2023. 218 pp. <p>Marlen Eckl and Jeffrey B. Berlin’s <em>Stefan Zweig und Jakob Wassermann</em>, the sixteenth volume in the Schriftenreihe series of the Stefan Zweig Zentrum Salzburg, marks the latest addition to the ongoing “Jewish turn” in Zweig studies. Composed of the previously unpublished letters and postcards from Wassermann to Zweig (Zweig’s correspondence to Wassermann has unfortunately not been recovered) and duly contextualized by Eckl and Berlin with cross-references to diary entries as well as to other correspondences, <em>Stefan Zweig und Jakob Wassermann</em> sheds new light on two popular early twentieth-century writers—one German, the other Austrian—for whom the <strong>[End Page 123]</strong> question of Jewish identity constituted a recurring topic across the quarter-century of their correspondence. “Lebensbekanntschaft” is an accurate term to describe Zweig and Wassermann’s relationship for, even though it never quite developed into an intimate friendship (as Eckl and Berlin point out, in only two letters does Wassermann address Zweig by his first name), their shared stake in the literary enterprise (both had the same German publisher for many years) as well as their lived experiences of the specter of antisemitism meant that they often turned to each other in moments of crisis.</p> <p>This is not to say that Zweig and Wassermann agreed on all matters Jewish, nor is it to disregard the stark contrast in their respective economic backgrounds. Indeed, as Eckl and Berlin make clear from the start, the poverty in which Wassermann grew up made for a rather more laborious path toward literary success than did the trajectory of Zweig, who, coming from an upper middle-class Viennese family, was, as Wassermann put it in one of his letters to him, “ein Kind des Luxus” (7). Part, then, of what makes <em>Stefan Zweig und Jakob Wassermann</em> such a fascinating and rewarding read is that it puts fully on display the heterogeneity of German-language Jewish intellectuals (among the other Jewish writers that make frequent appearances in the volume are Martin Buber, Raoul Auernheimer, and Arthur Schnitzler) and their various positions regarding the ruling political questions of the day. Thus, although Zweig and Wassermann were united in their critique of Zionism, they rejected it on different grounds. Whereas the former celebrated a Jewish cosmopolitanism ","PeriodicalId":40350,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Austrian Studies","volume":"44 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2024-03-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140070430","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Hermann Broch und die österreichische Moderne. Literatur, Kunst und Wissenschaftsphilosophie Hrsg., Paul Michael Lützeler und Thomas Borgard (review)","authors":"Martin A. Hainz","doi":"10.1353/oas.2024.a921911","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/oas.2024.a921911","url":null,"abstract":"<span><span>In lieu of</span> an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:</span>\u0000<p> <span>Reviewed by:</span> <ul> <li><!-- html_title --> <em>Hermann Broch und die österreichische Moderne. Literatur, Kunst und Wissenschaftsphilosophie</em> Hrsg., Paul Michael Lützeler und Thomas Borgard <!-- /html_title --></li> <li> Martin A. Hainz </li> </ul> Paul Michael Lützeler und Thomas Borgard, Hrsg., <em>Hermann Broch und die österreichische Moderne. Literatur, Kunst und Wissenschaftsphilosophie</em>. Paderborn: Brill Fink, 2023. 282 S. <p>Hermann Broch ist ein paradigmatischer Moderner in einem zuweilen geradezu paradigmatisch unmodernen Land gewesen. Vielleicht auch darum bringt Österreich diese Moderne hervor: Die Mobilität—und dann noch die “Mobilität der Erde” (7)—ist ein wesentliches Motiv dessen, was hier nicht immer gedieh und gedeiht. Gegen den bloßen Zerfall des Überkommenen zu <strong>[End Page 125]</strong> Schlimmerem stellt er eine “Systemtheorie” (7), deren Kontexte und Inspirationen oder Voraussetzungen wie auch Hemmnisse der vorliegende Band beleuchtet, den Paul Michael Lützeler und Thomas Bogard basierend auf einem Wiener Symposion nun vorlegen.</p> <p>Es geht um eine Umwälzung, revolutionär, aber auch diese beobachtend. Broch schreibt modern und von der nicht nur “ästhetischen Revolution”, etwa in Gestalt der “Durchbrechung und Überholung der Poetik-Konvention” (11) gegeben, die er an unter anderem James Joyce wahrnimmt. Lützeler beschreibt eben dies in seinem wunderbaren Beitrag, der die Paradoxie der Irritation einfängt—auch Broch mag “langsam das Organ für das Neue verliere(n)” (15), wenn er auf Canetti mit “skeptischer Anerkennung” (15) reagiert; und diese (darum: Selbst-)Beobachtung ist eine, die Lützeler aus der Korrespondenz Brochs wörtlich <em>zitiert</em>.</p> <p>Barbara Mahlmann-Bauer beschreibt die Entdeckung der Dissonanz an Broch und Schönberg. Dieser Kontakt impliziert schon die Erweiterung zu Alban Berg, aber auch Karl Kraus, dessen “Eloquenz” (30) die Leserschaft die Relevanz des Ausdrucks für das zu Sagende entdecken lasse—Gegenmodell zum niemals so scharfen Kitsch, den diese “Konzessionslosigkeit” (31) nicht auszeichnen kann. Hieraus ergibt sich die ethische und ästhetische Allianz, rund um die <em>Schlafwandler</em> Brochs dargelegt: “Die Musik ist Sprache” (41), wie Anton Webern hierzu schließlich zitiert wird.</p> <p>Broch und Hofmannsthal porträtiert Mathias Mayer. Auch hier ist es der Zerfall, teils aufgrund der Analyse nicht nur sichtbar, sondern eingeleitet, der ein klareres Denken ermöglicht und zugleich als notwendig darlegt. Angesichts der zugleich großen Differenzen ist es eine Nähe “wider Willen”, “Broch muss [. . .] mehr Gefallen gefunden haben an vielen Texten dieses von ihm gleichwohl aus großem Abstand gesehenen Autors” (54), als ihm lieb gewesen sein mag. Die Lektüren Brochs sind intensiv, aber nicht überall belegt, insbesondere den <em>Schwierigen</em> betreffend, wo sonst die “Ethik-Konze","PeriodicalId":40350,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Austrian Studies","volume":"40 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2024-03-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140098469","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Passages: Crossings, Borders, Openings: In Conversation with Austrian Writers: The Austrian-American Podium Dialog ed. by Margarete Lamb-Faffelberger and Gabriele Petricek (review)","authors":"Aaron Carpenter","doi":"10.1353/oas.2024.a921915","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/oas.2024.a921915","url":null,"abstract":"<span><span>In lieu of</span> an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:</span>\u0000<p> <span>Reviewed by:</span> <ul> <li><!-- html_title --> <em>Passages: Crossings, Borders, Openings: In Conversation with Austrian Writers: The Austrian-American Podium Dialog</em> ed. by Margarete Lamb-Faffelberger and Gabriele Petricek <!-- /html_title --></li> <li> Aaron Carpenter </li> </ul> Margarete Lamb-Faffelberger and Gabriele Petricek, eds., <em>Passages: Crossings, Borders, Openings: In Conversation with Austrian Writers: The Austrian-American Podium Dialog</em>. Lausanne: Peter Lang, 2022. 404 pp. <p>The book <em>Passages: Crossings, Borders, Openings: In Conversation with Austrian Writers</em>, edited by Margarete Lamb-Faffelberger and Gabriele Petricek, came together as part of the Austrian-American Podium Dialog that brought writers from Austria to the Austrian Studies conference. It is a collection of short stories by contemporary Austrian writers, conversations with students, and academic essays.</p> <p>The first part of the book is a collection of short stories, essays, and excerpts of larger works from these authors both in the German original and English translations done by the editors and guest contributors. The Austrian writers showcased in this book are a diverse group: some are of migrant background, while others write about themes related to ecocriticism or make connections between Austrian history (especially World War II) and today.</p> <p>The second part of the book is a series of four interviews of several of the authors with Lamb-Faffelberger and several of her advanced German undergraduate students who took part in workshops with the authors. These interviews cover topics such as what inspires the authors and how they know when a work is finished. The students also posed several interesting questions to the writers about their perspectives when they write, such as <strong>[End Page 137]</strong> how Dimitré Dinev chose to write in the perspective of a child in his works or the alternative realities that Patricia Brooks uses in her novels. Lamb-Faffelberger’s comments on preparing her undergraduate students of different levels of German proficiency for the shop talk sessions with the writers are interesting but brief. I would be interested, perhaps in a future article, in hearing more about how she developed her course to read the authors’ works in class and about some of the challenges of working with students to prepare questions to ask the authors in the workshop.</p> <p>The third part of the book is a series of academic essays on several of the authors and works that were covered in the first part of the book. These essays are based on the writers presentation of their works and subsequent conversations with them during the dialogues. The comparisons with other authors from Austria help to place these modern Austrian authors in the context of Austrian literary history. Several scholars noted certain themes running across ","PeriodicalId":40350,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Austrian Studies","volume":"276 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2024-03-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140070143","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Assimilation as Abjection in Franz Kafka's \"Ein Bericht für eine Akademie\"","authors":"Christian Schuetz","doi":"10.1353/oas.2024.a921900","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/oas.2024.a921900","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Abstract:</p><p>In detailing the cultural techniques required for his behavioral transition from ape to human following capture, Franz Kafka’s Rotpeter addresses not just physical but also cultural differences between apes and humans. The report can be interpreted as a satirical allegory of Jewish assimilation, a commentary that echoes Jay Geller’s notion of the “hierarchical differentiations that characterize antisemitism” (26). Although clothed, Rotpeter retains an ape’s body while exhibiting human behavior and thought patterns. The narrative implies that Rotpeter’s evolution entails cultural techniques of both domestication and hominization, rendering him neither wholly ape nor entirely human. This liminality leads Rotpeter to retroactively fetishize himself as a difference-embodying object while concurrently turning himself into a difference-encountering subject. The blurring of lines between the subject and object positions in Rotpeter’s subjectivity encapsulates the inherent ambiguity at the core of both abjection and Jewish assimilation.</p></p>","PeriodicalId":40350,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Austrian Studies","volume":"19 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2024-03-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140070248","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Misfire: The Sarajevo Assassination and the Winding Road to World War I by Paul Miller-Melamed (review)","authors":"Eric Grube","doi":"10.1353/oas.2024.a921904","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/oas.2024.a921904","url":null,"abstract":"&lt;span&gt;&lt;span&gt;In lieu of&lt;/span&gt; an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:&lt;/span&gt;\u0000&lt;p&gt; &lt;span&gt;Reviewed by:&lt;/span&gt; &lt;ul&gt; &lt;li&gt;&lt;!-- html_title --&gt; &lt;em&gt;Misfire: The Sarajevo Assassination and the Winding Road to World War I&lt;/em&gt; by Paul Miller-Melamed &lt;!-- /html_title --&gt;&lt;/li&gt; &lt;li&gt; Eric Grube &lt;/li&gt; &lt;/ul&gt; Paul Miller-Melamed, &lt;em&gt;Misfire: The Sarajevo Assassination and the Winding Road to World War I&lt;/em&gt;. New York: Oxford UP, 2022. 280 pp. &lt;p&gt;Paul Miller-Melamed’s &lt;em&gt;Misfire: The Sarajevo Assassination and the Winding Road to World War I&lt;/em&gt; is an attempt at yet another monograph concerning the origins of the First World War. For his main thesis, Miller-Melamed asserts that the assassination in and of itself was not the “cause” of the later conflict, which he argues arose strictly due to the brinkmanship, bravado, miscalculations, and miscommunications of the statesmen of Austria-Hungary, and to a lesser extent Serbia, Russia, and Germany. To be sure, there’s hardly anything novel there, especially for historians familiar with the topic, which he himself states outright. Indeed, with the outbreak of World War I, there was plenty of blame to go around, and one can find it where-and whenever one decides to focus. Thus, the strength of this book lies not with this well-established thesis. Instead, this work shines because of the author’s more nuanced sub-claims, which stem from his coverage of the complex Balkan affairs in the decades before the war.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;More specifically, throughout the book Miller-Melamed adroitly dismisses a litany of popular myths that have arisen around the murders, ranging from the seemingly trivial to the deeply analytical. The most &lt;strong&gt;[End Page 111]&lt;/strong&gt; intriguing claim here is when he dismantles presumptions of official Serbian condonation, complicity, and premeditated policy to help the Black Hand carry out this infamous deed. Indeed, he presents the Black Hand as not just a reductive, if fittingly ominous, misnomer but also as a red herring. He urges us to consider and recognize not some abstract, grandiose conspiracy but instead, the agency of each Bosnian individual who clumsily planned and carried out the assassination. As such, we get a deep, almost dossier-style profile of the young, militant activists, none of whom (he asserts) has any teleological connection to the terrorism that has haunted the twenty-first century. Thus does he shift the narrative to emphasize the motivations, lifestyles, and actions of this loosely fraternal Bosnian group rather than the nefarious Black Hand. But in so doing, he does not lose sight of nuance, being sure to address the ties of each Bosnian youth to certain agents in Serbia, many of whom had more prosaic, domestic political reasons for pushing for trouble abroad.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;To prove this point about the agency of these young Bosnian men, Miller-Melamed could stand to be more explicit in his use of sources. He pulls heavily from the trial proceedings of these Bosnian ag","PeriodicalId":40350,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Austrian Studies","volume":"19 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2024-03-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140070145","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Stefan Zweig. Zwiesprache des Ich mit der Welt hrsg. Eva Plank (review)","authors":"Walter Tschacher","doi":"10.1353/oas.2024.a921912","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/oas.2024.a921912","url":null,"abstract":"&lt;span&gt;&lt;span&gt;In lieu of&lt;/span&gt; an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:&lt;/span&gt;\u0000&lt;p&gt; &lt;span&gt;Reviewed by:&lt;/span&gt; &lt;ul&gt; &lt;li&gt;&lt;!-- html_title --&gt; &lt;em&gt;Stefan Zweig. Zwiesprache des Ich mit der Welt&lt;/em&gt; hrsg. Eva Plank &lt;!-- /html_title --&gt;&lt;/li&gt; &lt;li&gt; Walter Tschacher &lt;/li&gt; &lt;/ul&gt; Eva Plank, Hrsg., &lt;em&gt;Stefan Zweig. Zwiesprache des Ich mit der Welt&lt;/em&gt;. Schriften zu jüdischer Literatur, Kunst, Musik und Politik. Würzburg: Königshausen und Neumann, 2023. 575 S. &lt;p&gt;Der vorliegende Band enthält 170 Texte von Stefan Zweig, die vor allem seine publizistische Tätigkeit dokumentieren. Die zwischen 1900 und 1940 verfassten Texte erschienen, von wenigen Ausnahmen abgesehen, vorwiegend in Zeitungen und Zeitschriften, oder wurden bisher nicht veröffentlicht. Manche Beiträge erstrecken sich über mehrere Seiten, andere wiederum bestehen aus nur zwei oder drei Sätzen. Wie bereits im Buchtitel angedeutet, wurden die Artikel unter dem Gesichtspunkt jüdischer Themen ausgewählt. Im Anhang werden alle in den Texten genannten Personen mit biographischen Angaben aufgelistet. In den meisten Fällen existierte bisher nur der Text der Erstveröffentlichung, d.h. die hier wieder zugänglichen Arbeiten dürften den meisten heutigen Lesern und Leserinnen unbekannt sein. Das Buch besteht aus zwei Hauptabschnitten: 1. Literatur, Kunst, Musik, Sigmund Freud, Lyrik, Autobiographisches; und 2. Geschichte, Politik, Zeitgeschehen.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;Der umfangreichste Abschnitt ist der Literatur gewidmet. Es handelt sich hier um Rezensionen, Autorenporträts, Nachrufe, Einleitungen zu Werken, etc. Die einzelnen Autoren werden in alphabetischer Reihenfolge behandelt, wären sie dagegen chronologisch aufgelistet worden, hätte man eine kurze Literaturgeschichte meist jüdischer Autoren vor sich. Von einigen Ausnahmen abgesehen (z.B. Herzl, Joseph Roth, Rathenau, Döblin, Wassermann, Werfel) geht es um unbekannte und oft jüngere Schriftsteller, die Zweig einem größeren Publikum bekannt machen will. Umfangreichere Autorenporträts befassen sich mit Personen (z.B., Herzl Wassermann), die Zweig persönlich gut kannte und Einfluss auf seine Arbeit hatten.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;Ein separates Kapitel befasst sich ausschließlich mit Sigmund Freud. Beide Männer standen seit 1908 im Briefkontakt, der sich zu einer—wenn auch nicht immer ungetrübten—Freundschaft entwickelte, die bis zu Freuds &lt;strong&gt;[End Page 128]&lt;/strong&gt; Tod 1939 dauerte. Zweig war fasziniert von Freuds psychoanalytischen Arbeiten und erkannte deren Bedeutung für seine Zeit: “[Die] Gedanken, die kühnen und oftmals genialen Deutungen, mit denen Sigmund Freud unsere Gegenwart beschenkt und herausgefordert hat, sind als Tat nicht mehr zu bestreiten und zu widerlegen. Sie sind lebendig und haben Leben erzeugt. Weit über Deutschland, über Europa, über unseren Kontinent hinaus gibt es kein psychologisches Denken mehr ohne oder gegen sie” (298). Zwar idealisiert Zweig sowohl die Psychoanalyse als auch Freud, die Person, aber er tritt andererseits auch nicht als unterw","PeriodicalId":40350,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Austrian Studies","volume":"112 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2024-03-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140070437","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Austrian Riveter: Writing from Austria ed. by Rosie Goldsmith et al (review)","authors":"Vincent Kling","doi":"10.1353/oas.2024.a921916","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/oas.2024.a921916","url":null,"abstract":"&lt;span&gt;&lt;span&gt;In lieu of&lt;/span&gt; an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:&lt;/span&gt;\u0000&lt;p&gt; &lt;span&gt;Reviewed by:&lt;/span&gt; &lt;ul&gt; &lt;li&gt;&lt;!-- html_title --&gt; &lt;em&gt;The Austrian Riveter: Writing from Austria&lt;/em&gt; ed. by Rosie Goldsmith et al &lt;!-- /html_title --&gt;&lt;/li&gt; &lt;li&gt; Vincent Kling &lt;/li&gt; &lt;/ul&gt; Rosie Goldsmith et al., eds. &lt;em&gt;The Austrian Riveter: Writing from Austria&lt;/em&gt;. Riveter Eleventh Edition, April 2023. 232 pp. &lt;p&gt;Education guides learners from the unknown to the known, an axiom teachers can forget for lack of challenging exercise. Most readers of this journal teach and so have probably been asked by interested colleagues outside our own specialty what they should read. If those asking know German, they can be directed to personal favorites as well as to various anthologies and histories or to critical discussions like Joanna Drynda and Marta Wimmer, eds., &lt;em&gt;Neue Stimmen aus Österreich: 11 Einblicke in die Literatur der Jahrtausendwende&lt;/em&gt; or Hermann Korte, ed., &lt;em&gt;Österreichische Gegenwartsliteratur&lt;/em&gt;, a special edition of &lt;em&gt;Text + Kritik&lt;/em&gt;. But what about the interested but inexperienced reader—they still do exist—who does not read German but wants a fairly full picture of contemporary Austrian literature? Many specialists, precisely because they are that, might be at a loss for a reliable resource.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;Here is where the present volume is invaluable as a compendium, a one-stop anthology of translated excerpts, reviews, and brief critical articles that form a trustworthy guide for general readers. A good many excerpts are from works not yet fully translated, and a few of them are labeled as “Recommended for Translation.” There is in addition a QR code (231) linking to a bibliography, compiled by Lara Bulloch, of “Austrian fiction, non-fiction and poetry, translated and published in the UK and USA between 2013 and 2023.” The &lt;em&gt;Riveter&lt;/em&gt; series, which is edited by Rosie Goldsmith—I confess it took me a moment to work out “Rosie the Riveter”—focuses on various contemporary literatures; this edition commemorates Austria’s status as guest of honor at the Leipzig Book Fair in April 2023. It was funded by the Austrian Cultural Forum London as an initiative of the European Literature Network. Among others, the editors include Goldsmith (“Riveter-in-Chief”), Sheridan Marshall, Tess Lewis, and Jamie Bulloch.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;The perennial question of what Austrian literature is arises once again in an interview between Goldsmith and Katja Gasser (5–7), and the volume includes sections on “Austrian History” (10–29), “Vienna” (32–51), “Stefan Zweig and Europe” (53–56), “Writing about Europe” (60–66), “Literature beyond Vienna” (67–77), “Austrian Jews” (78–99), “Austrian Publishing” (109–24), “Translation” (125–30), “Austrian Women” (131–57), “Austrian Poetry” (159–80), “Where Writing Emerges” (181–90), “Austrian Borderlands” (193–99), “Rural Life” (200–205), “Children and Young Adults” &lt;strong&gt;[End Page 139]&lt;/strong&gt; (206–12), and “Austrian Crime","PeriodicalId":40350,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Austrian Studies","volume":"52 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2024-03-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140070255","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}