The Man Without Qualities Vol. 1: A Sort of Introduction and Pseudo Reality Prevails by Robert Musil(1996-12-09)
Categories: Books, Literature & Fiction, World Literature



Dimensions: 5.17 x 1.25 x 7.94 inches
ISBN-13: 978-0679767879
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0679767878
Publisher: Vintage
Print length: 752 pages
Publication date: December 9, 1996
subtitle: Paperback – December 9, 1996
author: Visit Amazon's Robert Musil Page search results Robert Musil Sophie Wilkins Burton Pike
review: Editorial Reviews Amazon.com Review This intriguing landmark of modernism from Austrian writer Robert Musil has been newly translated from the German by Sophie Wilkins and re-edited in a textual overhaul. This new edition includes portions of the author's original manuscripts that have never been published before. Though an imposing edifice of writing, devotees of literary modernism and anyone interested in the decline of the Austrian empire must read this sweeping, comic take on life in pre-Great War Vienna. The story of Ulrich, the man without qualities himself, is continued in a second volume, The Man Without Qualities: Into the Millenium,From the Posthumous Papers . From Publishers Weekly This edition of Musil's classic modernist novel features the complete text in a new translation, as well as extensive supplementary material. Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. From the Inside Flap Set in Vienna on the eve of World War I, this great novel of ideas tells the story of Ulrich, ex-soldier and scientist, seducer and skeptic, who finds himself drafted into the grandiose plans for the 70th jubilee of the Emperor Franz Josef. This new translation--published in two elegant volumes--is the first to present Musil's complete text, including material that remained unpublished during his lifetime. About the Author Robert Musil was born in 1880 in Austria and studied at the military college in Vienna and undertook an engineering degree in Brno, Czechoslovakia, before turning to psychology and philosophy doctoral studies in Berlin, where he began to write. He married Martha Marcovaldi in 1911. He fought in World War I, where he befriended Franz Kafka in Prague. Following the war, Musil returned to a literary career in Vienna and Berlin, during which time he was nominated for the Nobel Prize. He was the author of Five Women, The Posthumous Papers of a Living Author, and The Confusions of Young Torless . His works were banned by the Nazis, and he and his Jewish wife went into exile during World War II. He died of a stroke in 1942. Musil's works began to reappear in the 1950s, and his unfinished The Man Without Qualities is generally considered to be one of the most important modernist novels. Read more