Richard Beer-Hofmann: His Life and Work (Yearbook of Comparative Criticism) (The Penn State series in German literature)

Although Richard Beer Hofmann's profound influence on Hugo von Hofmannsthal, Arnold Schnitzler, and other turn-of-the-century Viennese writers life and work has appeared in nearly fifty years. This book fills that lacuna, placing Beer-Hofmann (1866-1945), the central member of the literary ground known as 'Young Vienna,' in the context of his time and furnishing a fine critical discussion of all his major works. Beer-Hofmann's metamorphosis from a 'decadent' young dandy and aesthete' into an artist 'whose Jewishness was central to his life and thought' is described in the biographical first chapter; this growth provides the unifying thread for subsequent chapters, which focus on his prose and dramatic works. This edition is not for Germanists alone; its ample quotations followed by English translations finally make Beer-Hofmann's work accessible to readers who have little or no command of the German language.