Customer Reviews (1)

As good as Musil but unknown!
Heimito von Doderer is one of the greatest Austrian writers ever, and yet his books are all virtually unknown, or impossible to find. I waited YEARS to get a decent copy of Demons, and am a proud owner of several collector's items published not son long ago, but in what appears to be a very limited edition. This book is a journey through life itself, a book of historic value with true fiction and true facts. Yes, both are possible, for Doderer does not believe in a single form of reality, but at least two. Two or more opinions persevere today: one that focuses on his adherence to Nazism and the other who underscores his abandonment of Hitler before his triumph and the Anschluss. It does not and it should not matter to the reader, for this book does not directly deal with Hitler.
In any case, buy this book, take a month of reading other books and dig in! Or, as with Musil's Man w/o qualities, read a short paragraph here, a chapter there and savor the marvel of this world. ... Read more

Product Description
In his eminence, his iconic status, and his masterful command of enormous fictional realms in several huge novels, Heimito von Doderer (1896-1966) still enjoys legendary status close to forty years after his death. The daunting scope of his novels - his magnum opus is over 1300 pages long - has tended to obscure his achievement as a writer of shorter fiction, even in the German-speaking world. Doderer came to esteem his brief stories and tales quite highly, and he took special pride in condensing whole plots and conflicts into one-sentence fictions. By turns playful and poignant, grotesque and idyllic, the short fiction merits a wider audience. ... Read more

Product Description
Essays on Heimito von Doderer. ... Read more

Product Description
A biographical and interpretive study of Heimito von Doderer (1896-1966) who remains one ofthe most acclaimed Austrian novelist of the post-World War II era. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Doderer in Vienna
Seminal on Doderer in English. The expansions by the translator Vincent Kling areadmirable, provocative, necessary, ingenious.

Modesty Makes for Clarity
I'm not quite the author, and I'm not quite not the author! This book originally appeared in German, in 1983, in Vienna; I have translated it into English, added almost all the footnotes and the bibliography, and have written a new chapter, "From District to Empire."

Aside from my lifelong love of Austrian literature and my fascination with Heimito von Doderer, I was drawn to Pfeiffer's book by its practicality, its clarity, and its modesty. It makes none of the hugely overexalted claims many academic books feel they have to make, opting instead to present itself as part guidebook to the neighborhoods of Vienna which Doderer used in his novels, part biography of Doderer, and part interpretation of his two most significant works of fiction. But trust me, this is not "interpretation lite." Pfeiffer--a retired psychotherapist--offers a number of facts about Doderer's life and artistic process that won't be found elsewhere, and he presents trenchant, simple, and often highly original insights into the novels. His expert knowledge comes from his long friendship with Doderer's widow and other associates and from his position as curator of the Doderer memorial rooms at the Alsergrund District Museum in Vienna.

Pfeiffer is especially good at showing how broad background influences and "raw" topographical items and places become transmuted into the elements of imaginative writing; time after time, he traces the adjustments Doderer made to create out of his everyday surroundings genuine symbol-bearing places in his novels.

Pfeiffer is the "utility guy"--and I mean this in the very best sense--among the Doderer experts. Never holding an academic appointment, the very model of the private scholar, working for so many years on Doderer out of sheer love, he strips away the inessentials and shows the whole dynamic of Doderer's life, environment, and artistry working together. For that reason, he's also the "go to" guy, the man all the eminent scholars and professors turn to when they need clear information and cogent interpretation.

If you can't read German (would you be looking at this review otherwise?), I recommend you first read Michael Bachem's excellent book on Doderer (Twayne, 1982), then turn to Pfeiffer. His is a deceptively simple book you can't do without, and I think the experts will soon be saying the same.

Let's just hope now that some enterprising publisher will bring out Doderer's other great novel, The Strudlhof Steps, in English. It's already half finished by yours truly.

Read this helpful handbook, meantime, and if you get to Vienna, look up Pfeiffer at the museum, Währinger Stra�e 43, on any Wednesday from 10 AM to noon. He would love to see you! ... Read more