Die entzauberte Idylle

This anthology contains significant texts by more than forty Czech writers, thus reconstructing the changing image of Vienna in 19th and 20th century Czech literature. Despite a considerable heterogeneity of the material both in genre and in length, a text corpus with coherent themes and motifs has emerged in which reproaches raised against Vienna on the basis of personal experiences of unjust treatment as well as emotional projections are balanced with their relativization. The text excerpts are, with few exceptions, in chronological order and are all preceded by a short bio-bibliography of the author. A critical apparatus containing notes for further reference completes the book. In her preliminary remarks, the editor analyses the reception of Vienna in Czech literature in its entire range, from the position of both a literary critic and a literary historian, bringing it into perspective against the background of cultural history. The study A Historical Look at Czech Vienna by Monica Glettler provides an introduction to the social historical aspects. By examining Vienna as a topos from the Czech point of view, this anthology constitutes a contribution to imagology. It provides an insight into themes which are quite specific to Vienna but have been largely left aside in Austrian literature although Czechs constituted a high percentage of the Vienna population until 1918.