This volume of specially commissioned essays takes a fresh look at the Viennese Jewish dramatist and prose writer Arthur Schnitzler. Fascinatingly, Schnitzler's productive years spanned the final phase of the Habsburg monarchy, World War I, the First Austrian Republic, and the rise of National Socialism, and he realized earlier than many of his contemporaries the threat that racist anti-Semitism posed to the then almost complete assimilation of Austrian Jews. His writings also reflect the irresolvable conflict between emerging feminism and the relentless -scientific- discourse of misogyny,...

The Bulgarian-born scholar and author Elias Canetti was one of the most astute witnesses and analysts of the mass movements and wars of the first half of the 20th century. Born a Sephardic Jew and raised at first in the Bulgarian and Ladino languages, he chose to write in German. He was awarded the 1981 Nobel Prize in Literature for his oeuvre, which includes dramas, essays, diaries, aphorisms, the novel Die Blendung (Auto-da-Fe) and the long interdisciplinary treatise Masse und Macht (Crowds and Power). These works express Canetti's thought-provoking ideas on culture and the human psyche...

Devoted to collecting the finest Jewish writing from around the world, the Jewish Writing in the Contemporary World series consists of anthologies, by country, that are designed to present to the English-speaking world authors and works deserving international consideration. As a series, the books permit a broad examination of the international crosscurrents in Jewish thought and culture.Contemporary Jewish Writing in Austria presents a gathering of writers from several generations who have published a remarkable range of works in recent decades. The result is a diverse portrait...