!!!Literatur, österreichische
Literature, Austrian: The question if and to what extent one can speak
of "Austrian literature" as distinct from the literature of the other
German-speaking countries is controversial. Attempts to define the
specific nature of Austrian literature by assigning to it certain
characteristics, have proved to be one-sided, and in many cases
ideologically and politically biased.
\\
Reflections upon the independence of Austrian literature started in
the 2%%sup nd/% half of the 18%%sup th/% century, when the
difference from the literature of northern German countries, in
particular Prussia, became ever more obvious and when people
frequently complained about Austria lagging behind. At the same time
however, local literary forms, such as the Vienna popular comedy,
further developed and flourished. One important result of this
"drifting apart" was the fact that the usual model of classifying
German literature into different periods ("Sturm und Drang",
"Classical Age", "Romanticism", "Junges Deutschland", etc.) could not
be applied, or only in a limited sense, to the Austrian history of
literature.
\\
A further problem arises in the definition of Austrian literature in
respect of its authors. Are we to include all poets who are born in
the Austrian-Hungarian monarchy or only those who wrote in German and
were in some way attached to the territory of the present Republic of
Austria? Significant authors are often claimed to be part of Austrian
literature for questionable reasons, such as F. Kafka, E. E.
Kisch, E. Canetti or P. Celan. One must not underestimate the economic
dependence of Austrian authors on other German-speaking countries, in
which most of their work is usually published and read. This creates a
phenomenon whereby Austrian literature is mainly judged by its
production and reception abroad.
\\
In the Middle Ages literature was almost exclusively produced in
monasteries and abbeys, where liturgical hymns, sacred songs, etc.
were composed. The oldest literary documents are the Wiener Hundesegen
(9%%sup th/% /10%%sup th/% centuries), the Altdeutsche Genesis (last
quarter 12%%sup th/% century) and the Millstatt (Carinthian) Genesis
(around 1200). The oldest German-speaking author known by name was
Frau Ava, who died around 1127 near Melk. The work of Heinrich von
Melk, which castigates the sins of priests and laymen, dates back to
the 2%%sup nd/% half of the 12%%sup th/% century. The heyday of
Minnesong, climaxing with Walther von der Vogelweide, was the
beginning of the 13%%sup th/% century; at the same time the Courtly
Epics were developed, which told of knightly deeds and chivalry, and
the Middle High German heroic epics (Nibelungenlied, Kudrun, Dietrich
Epics). The itinerant professional poet Wernher der Gartenaere
(2%%sup nd/% half of 13%%sup th/% century) created the first
sociocritical village tale, the poetic narrative "Meier Helmbrecht";
the lyric poet Neidhart ("von Reuenthal"), the most successful lyric
author of the German Middle Ages and creator of courtly village
poetry, worked at the court of the Babenberg duke Friedrich II. The
minnesinger Ulrich von Liechtenstein composed the first autobiography;
in the 14%%sup th/% century the so-called "Neidhartspiele" became
popular, coarse farcical stories which focused on the differences
between peasants and knights. The diverse, partly autobiographical
poetic work of the Tirolean nobleman Oswald von Wolkenstein is
ascribed to the late Middle Ages. Annals and Chronicles provide a
record of the events of the time, mostly in concise form, only
occasionally in detailed description.
\\
A basic form of Austrian literature in the Middle Ages was
Spieldichtung; all types of sacred and secular plays were cultivated
from the 12%%sup th/% century onwards and became very popular
everywhere in the outgoing Middle Ages, particularly in the Alpine
regions ( Passion Plays, mystery plays, Fasnacht, or carnival, plays).
Urban artistic writing of later times as well as popular tales of
peasant life have their roots in these plays; the Alpine play
tradition continued to be popular during the Baroque period. The
Meistergesang (mastersinging) never gained a foothold in Austria.
\\
During the period of Humanism Vienna was a literary and intellectual
centre; the combination of "philosophia christiana" and humanist
culture, and revival of the formal canon of the world of Antiquity in
Neo-Latin literature resulted in a rich production of literature,
which included everything from occasional poetry, epic verse and drama
to tractates; the most famous example being Konrad Celtis, forerunner
of Neo-Latin writers of the early 16%%sup th/% century.
\\
During the Counter-Reformation and later during the Baroque period the
gap between south-German/Austrian and north-German literature became
more evident. While the Protestant writing of the north took over
elements of French classicism, the south developed a Catholic
literature which was influenced by the Italian and Spanish Baroque.
The written word played an important role for the Counter-Reformation:
With the description of exemplary lives, the lives of Saints,
collections of legends and Jesuit dramas, authors tried to fight
Lutheranism. The Catholic chorale, songs and poems in praise of the
Virgin Mary, and in particular sermons, which reached the height of
popularity in the late 17%%sup th/% century and whose most important
representative, Abraham a Sancta Clara, created works of powerful
expression, received fresh impetus. In spite of the repressive
attitude of the Habsburg dynasty, Austria was able to maintain a
Protestant literary tradition, such as in the work of the
Lower-Austrian noblewoman Catharina Regina von Greiffenberg, whose
spiritual sonnets represent a high point of Baroque poetry.
\\
In the centre of Baroque Literature were the richly staged Baroque
theatre and the plays written and performed by various religious
orders. Festive performances at court and in church with their
impressive use of luxurious costumes, as well as extempore plays and
comedies or farces (Hanswurstspiel), represented by J. A.
Stranitzky, G. Prehauser, J. Perinet and J. F. Kurz-Bernardon,
enjoyed great popularity. During the conflict about Hanswurst plays
("Hanswurststreit") in the middle of the 18%%sup th/% century,
Philipp Hafner opposed the dictate of the north-German rationalists
and promoted the further development of these popular theatre forms
into the traditional Viennese popular comedy, which amalgamated
elements of Commedia dell´arte with the tradition of English
theatre.
\\
Outstanding examples of Baroque narrative art are the chivalric
romances and picaresque novels of the Upper-Austrian Johann Beer.
\\
In the following years Austrian literature developed on the
foundations of the Baroque. The first highlight of the "age of reason"
in Austrian literature was made possible by the tolerant, enlightened
policies of Emperor Joseph II; polemical treatises, pamphlets,
and papers on a variety of subjects of public interest were published
in great numbers; from then on Austrian intellectuals associated the
era of Josephinism with the concept of freedom and rulers who
respected the dignity of their subjects. This flood of publications
came to an end with the beginning of another reactionary period under
Emperor Franz I, and "revolutionary" authors were oppressed. The
war of independence against Napoleon also inspired Austrian patriotic
writers: I. F. Castelli, the brothers H. J. and M. Collin,
J. Hormayr, J. C. Zedlitz and K. Pichler, in whose salon the
literary world of Vienna came together.
\\
It has invariably been with a good deal of surprise that literary
historiographers have reported the sudden appearance of a number of
significant Austrian writers in the 1%%sup st/% half of the
19%%sup th/% century: F. Grillparzer, A. Stifter, F. Raimund, J.
Nestroy, E. Bauernfeld, F. Halm, E. Feuchtersleben, N. Lenau, A.
Gruen, J. N. Vogl, J. G. Seidl. It is interesting to note
that their work had already started to move away from contemporary
literary trends in the German-speaking countries, with respect to the
subject treated (mainly Austrian motifs, in particular with
Grillparzer) as well as language. In his essay "Worin unterscheiden
sich die oesterreichischen Autoren von den uebrigen?" ("What
distinguishes Austrian writers from others?"; 1837) Grillparzer was
the first to try to define the position of Austrian literature. The
Viennese popular comedy experienced its prime in the attractive
burlesques and parodies of Nestroy and the no less popular fantasy
plays of Raimund; a realistic narrative style was championed by the
widely-read American novels of C. Sealsfield, a native of Moravia; the
political commitment of authors such as N. Lenau or E. Bauernfeld was
stifled from the very beginning; for them, as for most other writers,
the burden of revolutionary (pre-March) censorship under State
Chancellor Metternich became almost unbearable. However, what the
Austrian writers had expected from the revolution of 1848 was only
realized for a short period of time.
\\
In the multiracial state of the Austrian-Hungarian monarchy, with the
capital of Vienna as its unquestioned centre, Austrian literature
continued to acquire an independent profile in the 2%%sup nd/% half
of the 19%%sup th/% century as well. The social commitment of
naturalism was anticipated by M. v. Ebner-Eschenbach in her
touching village stories; at the same time the former second
lieutenant F. v. Saar wrote melancholy and pessimistic narratives
and saw himself as a link between late classicism and Austrian modern
literature around 1900. L. Anzengruber and P. Rosegger were the first
to depict the native peasant world, the "discovery of the province"
became a catchphrase and popular subject. Vernacular Literature
culminated in the work of F. Stelzhamer; R. v. Kralik in
Gralbund and E. v. Handel-Mazzetti gave new strength to Catholic
literary tradition.
\\
At the turn of the century the authors of "Junges Wien" (Young
Vienna), A. Schnitzler, R. Beer-Hofmann, H. v. Hofmannsthal
and H. Bahr took up the new movements of the modern age, such as
decadence and symbolism, neo-Romanticism and impressionism, and formed
them in a specific manner. Schnitzler´s dramas and prose painted
a powerful portrait of bourgeois society during the monarchy, while
Hofmannsthal focused on "death" and the "inadequacy" of language; his
"Letter by Lord Chandos" (1902) became a key text of this era. At that
time essential impulses began in Austria, which still influence world
literature. Schnitzler carried the "inner monologue" to even greater
heights, Hofmannsthal revived antique tragedy and the mediaeval
mystery play and stimulated the Austrian Baroque theatre tradition.
Language criticism was also the main concern of the great polemicist
K. Kraus, who, with his own periodical, "Die Fackel", created a
satirical sociocritical medium of the time (1899-1936). In Tirol the
group "Jung-Tirol" gathered around A. Pichler; in 1910 L. v.
Ficker founded the periodical "Der Brenner". Young authors, such as G.
Trakl, F. Werfel, S. Zweig, M. Brod and F. Kafka started to publish
their works; they were all to gain world-wide recognition. R. M.
Rilke decisively stimulated the language of modern poetry; R. Musil
created one of the pioneering narrative works of the period with his
essayistic monumental novel "Der Mann ohne Eigenschaften" ("The Man
Without Qualities"); Kafka´s works, some of which were
fragmentary or published posthumously, represent a very intense
document of painful experience; H. Broch´s "epistemological"
novel was the last attempt to revive the totality of this literary
genre.
\\
The collapse of the Habsburg monarchy, anticipated by many Austrian
writers, was a severe trauma and aroused in many of them the desire to
conjure up once again the atmosphere of the old Empire of the
1%%sup st/% Republic (K. Kraus, F. Werfel, H. v. Hofmannsthal,
R. Musil, F. v. Herzmanovsky-Orlando, O. Stoessel, F. Braun,
F. T. Csokor); the downfall of the monarchy found its exemplary
depiction in the narrative work of J. Roth ("Radetzkymarsch", 1932).
\\
The rise of social democracy had led to the formation of a
working-class literature; beginning in 1910, Expressionismwas
developed, which gathered numerous young authors (R. Mueller, A.
Bronnen) in the struggle against the generation of their fathers and
conventional morality.
\\
The increasing radicalisation of the political camps in the 1920s was
also eventually reflected in literature; a number of successful
authors (R. Hohlbaum, B. Brehm, K. H. Strobl, F. K. Ginzkey,
M. Jelusich, M. Mell, M. Grengg, J. Weinheber) at the beginning of the
1930s moved, more or less openly, to the camp of the National
Socialists and thus contributed to the division of Austrian literature
even before 1938; In May 1933 a meeting of the PEN Club in Ragusa
became a turning point, which resulted in an open split and the
resignation of "national" authors from the PEN Club. In the "Bund
deutscher Schriftsteller Oesterreichs" (Federation of German Writers
of Austria) the members and sympathizers of the NSDAP (National
Socialist German Worker´s Party) gathered in an illegal cover
organisation, which energetically worked towards the Anschluss.
Meanwhile many authors (K. H. Waggerl, J. Perkonig, O. Leitgeb)
contented themselves with writing about the sheltered world of "rural
life" or chose historical and heroic topics (M. Jelusich, R.
Hohlbaum); those who did not want to give up their critical democratic
writing, and those who were of Jewish descent, had to leave the
country (such as E. Canetti, J. Roth, R. Musil, R. Neumann, B.
Viertel, S. Zweig, F. Werfel, H. Broch, F. T. Csokor and Oe. v.
Horváth); some of them, such as the young dramatist Jura Soyfer
and A. J. Koenig, stayed on too long and were sent to
concentration camps, where they were killed. Others tacitly integrated
themselves and opted for "inner emigration" (A. Lernet-Holenia, R.
Henz).
\\
The often postulated "New Beginning" of Austrian literature in 1945
did not quite correspond to reality; numerous authors who were
successful during the Third Reich (G. Fussenegger, K. H. Waggerl, F.
Tumler, etc.) continued to be published after its fall; the surviving
emigrants were, on the whole, reluctant to return, and the tendency to
pass over in silence the years of Nazi occupation also made itself
felt in the field of literature; a projected "Literature Purification
Law" (1946) never took effect.
\\
With the avant-garde periodical "Plan" (1945-1948) O. Basil was able
to continue the tradition of Austrian modern literature; young
authors, such as I. Aichinger ("Die groessere Hoffnung", 1948), C.
Busta, P. Celan and E. Fried, published their work in "Plan". How to
come to terms with the past slowly became a central subject for many
writers, as in the dramas of F. Hochwaelder and the novels of H. Zand,
G. Fritsch and H. Lebert ("Die Wolfshaut" 1960); events of the 1920s
up to 1927, when the Ministry of Justice was set fire to, were dealt
with by H. v. Doderer in his monumental novels "Die
Strudlhofstiege" (1951) and "Die Daemonen" (1956). I. Bachmann
describes in her work basic experiences such as bewilderment,
alienation, the striving for identity, and at the same time vehemently
denounces the cruelty of a society dominated by men. A new dimension
of language criticism was developed by the "Wiener Gruppe" around F.
Achleitner, H. C. Artmann, K. Bayer, G. Ruehm and O. Wiener in
the course of systematic experiments with language as a "material";
their dialect poems, montages and "concrete poetry" profoundly
extended the "grammar of modernism". This treatment of language found
its continuation in the pointedly funny sound poems of E. Jandl as
well as in the often hermetic texts of F. Mayroecker.
\\
In 1958 the "Forum Stadtpark" was founded in Graz, whose periodical
"manuskripte" soon became the most important literary review; in 1973
the "Grazer Autorenversammlung" (Graz Authors´ Assembly) was
established in conscious opposition to the Austrian PEN Club; the
majority of the Austrian avant-garde became its members.
\\
The tradition of Austrian "language scepticism", mainly influenced by
Ludwig Wittgenstein, is continued in the work of two outstanding
authors of Austrian contemporary literature: Thomas Bernhard and Peter
Handke, who have left their mark on German-language literature as a
whole. While the texts of Bernhard, denying the possibility of
narration, revolve in almost monomaniacal fashion around the hostility
of the "native" landscape, the coldness of personal relations and the
hopelessness of life which is destined for death, Handke, who started
his career as a young rebel ("Offending the Audience", 1966), in his
later works finds new confidence in language, telling of a world "that
hides itself again and again, a world that is humanly possible, a good
world." In the mid-1970s the social-liberal reform euphoria of the
early Kreisky era also caused a new awakening in Austrian literature.
Young authors, such as M. Scharang, G. Roth, G. Wolfgruber, W.
Kappacher, F. Innerhofer and E. Jelinek, came out with works which
depict social grievances in an authentic, provocative and
disillusionizing manner; in drama this includes works by W. Bauer, P.
Turrini, F. Mitterer, W. Schwab and Jelinek, who create a sensation
through their radical demolition of bourgeois values. A change to
subjectivity and introspection at the end of the 1970s, demonstrated
by authors such as Handke in the working group "Langsame Heimkehr"
(1979-1981), and in particular by J. Winkler in the trilogy "Das wilde
Kaernten" (1984), was again followed by authors of the 1980s and 1990s
who believed in the power of narrative, i.e. E. Hackl in his detached
documentary stories about the fate of women and girls and C. Ransmayr
in his Ovid novel "Die letzte Welt" (1988) which oscillates between
the ancient and the modern world. Numerous young authors follow
Austrian narrative traditions (M. Koehlmeier, N. Gstrein, R. Schindel,
E. Gstettner, etc.).
!Literature
J. W. Nagl, J. Zeidler and E. Castle,
Deutsch-oesterreichische Literaturgeschichte, 1898-1937; J. Nadler,
Literaturgeschichte Oesterr., 1948; A. Schmidt, Dichtung und Dichter
Oesterreichs im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert, 2 vols., 1964; C. Magris, Der
habsburgische Mythos in der oesterreichischen Literatur, 1966; H.
Spiel (ed.), Die zeitgenoessische Literatur Oesterreichs, 1976; F.
Aspetsberger (ed.), Staat und Gesellschaft in der modernen
oesterreichsichen Literatur, 1977; H. Zeman (ed.), Die
oesterreichische Literatur. Eine Dokumentation ihrer
literarhistorischen Entwicklung, 4 vols., 1979-1989; W. Weiss, Die
oesterreichische Literatur der Gegenwart, in: M. Durzak (ed.),
Deutsche Gegenwartsliteratur, 1981; K. K. Polheim (ed.),
Literatur aus Oesterreich - oesterreichische Literatur. Ein
Bonner Symposion, 1981; H. Seidler, Oesterr. Vormaerz und Goethezeit,
1982; K. Bartsch et al. (eds.), Fuer und wider eine
oesterreichische Literatur, 1982; K. Amann, P. E. N.
Politik, Emigration, Nationalsozialismus, 1984; H. Giebisch and G.
Gugitz, Bio-bibliographisches Literaturlexikon Oesterr.,
%%sup 2/%1985; F. Aspetsberger et al. (eds.), Literatur der
Nachkriegszeit und der 50er Jahre in Oesterreich, 1984; M. G.
Hall, Oesterr. Verlagsgeschichte 1918-38, 2 vols., 1985; G. Renner,
Oesterr. Schriftsteller und der National-Sozialismus (1933-40), 1986;
S. Patsch, Oesterr. Schriftsteller im Exil, 1986; S. P. Scheichl and
G. Stieg, Oesterr. Literatur des 20. Jahrhunderts, 1986; E.
Fischer and W. Haefs (eds.), Hirnwelten funkeln. Literatur des
Expressionismus in Wien, 1988; K. Rossbacher, Literatur und
Liberalismus, 1992; H. Zeman (ed.), Geschichte der Literatur in
Oesterreich von den Anfaengen bis zur Gegenwart, 7 vols., 1994ff.; W.
Schmidt-Dengler, J. Sonnleitner and K. Zeyringer (eds.),
Literaturgeschichte: Oesterreich. Prolegomena und Fallstudien, 1995.
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