cover image Vienna's Golden Autumn, 1866-1938

Vienna's Golden Autumn, 1866-1938

Hilde Spiel. George Weidenfeld & Nicholson, $0 (247pp) ISBN 978-1-55584-136-2

In this popular survey of Austria's cultural flowering from the Battle of Koniggratz in 1866 to the Anschluss of 1938, a Vienna-born writer and editor describes the unique contributions of writers, artists, actors, musicians, philosophers and scientists of the period. Here are sensible, sensitive comments about ideas, design and style, satire, the monarchy, the rise of the bourgeoisie, cafe life, outdoor activities, theater and opera, and anti-Semitism. Inevitably, Spiel's focus is on individuals of Jewish originamong them, satirist Karl Kraus, writers Hofmannsthal and Schnitzler, composers Johann Strauss, Mahler and Schonberg, philosophers Wittgenstein and Schlick, psychologists Freud, Adler and Weininger, cultural patricians Fanny von Arnstein, Sophie Todesco and Berta Zuckerkandl. Spiel is inconsistent in nomenclature and incorrectly states that Franz Werfel's best-known novel is about Albanians (rather than Armenians), but generally her information is reliable and well balanced. Photos. (September 21)