Red October shadowed arts and literature in Austria 1918-1938

The revolutionary transformations of 1917 in Russia and the subsequent foundation of the Soviet Union had an enormous political and social impact on contemporary political and social life generating effective cultural and artstic impulses, which encountered wide response during the First Austrian Republic up from its early days. Not only voices close to Red Vienna or leftist authors belonging in part to the communist movement expressed their interest in the eurasian empire of the unlimited possibilities (J. Sternberg), but also the middle class cultural institutions showed themselves interested in soviet-russian experiments and fenomenas. The here presented volume, formed by contributors from Austria, Germany and Russia, focusses on reception-processes and intersections in the field of arts, everyday-life culture and particularly in theatre and literature. As for that, attention will be given to guest performances of russian (emigrant and not) theater ensembles in Vienna (Blaue Vogel, Habima, Tairov), to Joseph Gregors extensive study Das russische Theater/Russian Theatre of 1927, to René Fülöp-Millers monografical volume Geist und Gesicht des Bolschewismus/The Mind and Face of Bolshevism (1926/27), a study that determined the perception of of the Soviet Union up to the Cold War-Time. In addition we had an intensive reciprocal exchange in music, documented by the collaboration between the Viennese Universal Edition and russian partner institutions and there is to be remembered the case of Max Brand. His opera Maschinist Hopkins is as well influenced by russian avantgarde composers as from popular american jazz-dance and viennese Schönberg-School. Brands work to this extent is amalgamating the increased interest in both the new worlds: the USA and the USRR during the Austrian Interwar Period . In this respect we also recommend the essay of Robert Müller Bolschewik und Gentleman (1920), Arthur Rundt with his wide known US-travelogues and his Russia Book or Ernst Fischers analysis of contemporary american and russian writers like Dos Passos and Gladkow. A focus of this upcoming publication is constituted by studies based on research in contemporary magazines and newspapers of the 1920th and 1930th. A considerable number of textes of more (Heimitto von Doderer, Joseph Roth, Lili Körber, Ernst Fischer) and less known authors (Ann Tizia Leitich, Alja Rachmanova, Julius Haydu, Otto Heller ecc.) yet not well explored will be presented and discussed. Insofar even experiences sharing fenomenas with Weimar Republic debates but moreover outstanding and specifically Austrian perspectives regarding contemporary Russia- discourses will intrigue the readers attention, partially in contrast to existing still reductive cultural and literary profiles of the Austrian Interwar Periode.