Literature, Film, and Culture Industry in Contemporary Austria

Contents: Margarete Lamb-Faffelberger/Franz-Peter Griesmaier: Introduction - Herbert Hofreither: Austria: Small Country with Grand Culture? Cultural Industry, Cultural Policy, Art Funding in the Information Age - Walter Grond: Isn't It Rather Easy to Think Positively? - Jürgen Koppensteiner: "I Would Have Liked to Be Peter Handke's First Publisher": A Conversation with Maximilian Droschl - Alfred Pfabigan: "Staatskünstler". The Debate about the Austrian System of Subsidy for Art and Artists - Bernhard Doppler: Hermann Nitsch's Festivals. Observations from the Prinzendorfer Six-Day-Play in 1998 - Franz-Peter Griesmaier: Representationality and Realism: A New Look at Austrian Experimental Poetry - Carlotta von Maltzan: Voyeurism and Film in Elfriede Jelinek's The Piano Teacher - Gerlinde Ulm Sanford: Alois Brandstetter and the Culture Industry in Austria - Pamela S. Saur: Market Forces and the Dramas of Karl Schönherr - Edward R. McDonald: Fritz Hochwälder's Problematic Marriage of Medium and Message in The Holy Experiment and The Raspberry Picker - Robert Acker: Josef Haslinger's Opernball : From Best Seller to Film Thriller - Mary Wauchope: Sissi Revisited - Ioan Lazarescu: Landeskunde in Film: The Didactic Documentary as Facilitator of Austria-Clichés.

The Editor: Margarete Lamb-Faffelberger is Associate Professor of German at Lafayette College. She is the author of numerous articles on contemporary Austrian literature and film as well as three books: Valie Export und Elfriede Jelinek im Spiegel der Presse. Zur Rezeption der feministischen Avantgarde Österreichs (Lang, 1992), Out from the Shadows: A Collection of Articles on Austrian Literature and Film by Women since 1945 (1997), and Postwar Austrian Theatre: Text and Performance (co-edited with Linda C. DeMeritt; 2002).

"This book differs from other anthologies of criticism on Austrian literature, film, and culture by bridging the gap between serious art and the economic, political, and social conditions of its production and distribution. Film, the visual arts, fiction, drama, documentary, and popular culture are all represented. Nearly all of the contributors address how market forces and policy decisions affect the creation and consumption of such artifacts. Any serious student of Austria and its culture should be familiar with the empirical information presented here on funding, the culture industry, tourism, and the media. At the same time, studies of individual artists, writers, and texts show in detail how policy, commercial promotion, criticism, and competition with mass media determine how art is made and consumed. Several essays examine commentary on the culture industry from the creative artists themselves. This collection is an important contribution to understanding a small country with a big culture." (Geoffrey C. Howes, Bowling Green State University Co-Editor, Modern Austrian Literature)
"Dr. Lamb-Faffelberger's informative and eminently readable book contains first-rate literary and cultural analyses and critical essays by leading scholars. This fine collection of articles celebrates a new phase in Austrian Studies in the United States, marked by the founding of MALCA (Modern Austrian Literature and Culture Association). The authors address a wide spectrum of issues and concerns: Austrian cultural politics and policies; Austrian stereotypes; and the conditions under which the truly remarkable contribution to Western culture by Austrian writers, filmmakers, essayists and dramatists is produced and disseminated. Major contemporary writers and artists and their works are highlighted - Jelinek, Haneke, Brandstetter, Haslinger, and Handke. What a fascinating panorama of ideas and viewpoints on an often underestimated German-speaking society in the heart of Europe!"