Overview

Examines key contemporary Austrian literary texts, films, and memorials that treat Nazism and the Holocaust for what they reveal about the country's contemporary politics of memory. 2018 CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title The process of coming to terms with its National Socialist past has been a long and difficult one in Austria. It is only over the past thirty years that the country's view of its role during the Third Reich has shifted decisively from that of victimhood to complicity, prompted by the Waldheim affair of 1986-1988. Austria's writers, filmmakers, and artists have been at the center of this process, holding upa mirror to the country's present and drawing attention to a still disturbing past. Katya Krylova's book undertakes close readings of key contemporary Austrian literary texts, films, and memorials that treat the legacy of Nazism and the Holocaust. The analysis focuses on texts by Robert Schindel, Elfriede Jelinek, and Anna Mitgutsch, documentary films by Ruth Beckermann and by Margareta Heinrich and Eduard Erne, as well as recent memorial projects inVienna, examining what these reveal about the evolving memory culture in contemporary Austria. Aimed at a broad readership, the book will be a key reference point for university teachers, undergraduates, and postgraduates engagedin scholarship on contemporary Austrian literature, film, and visual culture, and for general readers interested in confrontations with the National Socialist past in the Austrian context. KATYA KRYLOVA is Lecturer in German, Film and Visual Culture at the University of Aberdeen, UK. The Long Shadow of the Past is her second book.

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9781640140738

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Reviews

[The book's] strengths [are] attention to historical detail accompanied by careful explanations of the issues at stake that will appeal to both experts and readers unfamiliar with the particular Austrian context. . . . [O]ften succeeds at highlighting quite compelling connections between . . . disparate works. . . . [W]ill be of interest to teachers and scholars of Austria, memory studies, and memorial culture. MONATSHEFTE [Jack Davis] Krylova masterfully handles [her] subject matter . . . . On aesthetics, history, and politics after 1986, she appears to have read everything. . . . [She] devotes [her] final chapter to memorials and memorial projects . . . . A fascinating study of these memorials, and post-Waldheim artistic engagement in Austria, [this book] is also a tribute to the artists who continue to find new ways to make the past an irritation to the present. AUSTRIAN HISTORY YEARBOOK [Michael Burri] Winner of the 2018 CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title Award Informative and readable, the book is of both scholarly and general appeal. AUSTRIAN STUDIES [Andrea Capovilla] Krylova's essays are thoroughly researched, lucidly written, and should be of interest to students of cultural studies and history. GERMAN STUDIES REVIEW [Edward T. Larkin] Katya Krylova's excellent new book was completed between the [Austrian] presidential and national polls [of 2016 and 2017]. . . . Krylova's introduction gives an excellent overview of the diverse strands of activity; her five chapters offer detailed analyses of particular works. . . . Krylova is able to develop a fascinating narrative. JOURNAL OF EUROPEAN STUDIES [Joachim Whaley] [A] fascinating study . . . . [A] must read for all scholars interested in Austrian literature, film, and culture. GEGENWARTSLITERATUR [Joseph W. Moser] Timely. MODERN LANGUAGE REVIEW [Aine McMurtry] Krylova's carefully researched The Long Shadow of the Past is a must-read for Austrian memory study scholars. It captures profoundly interconnected worlds of memory, trauma, and repression of the past with politics, culture, history, and family histories; it recognizes both progress and setbacks in Austria's reckoning with its past; and it invites an open dialogue about cultural memory. JOURNAL OF AUSTRIAN STUDIES [Eva Kuttenberg] Krylova has produced a timely, informative, engaging, and well-written treatise on Austria's ongoing memory struggles. [It] would be informative and digestible reading for students in a course on the topic, and should be of interest to all scholars concerned with how Austria and other nations confront the long shadow of the past. GERMAN QUARTERLY [Sharon Weiner] Krylova's book is a timely and welcome addition to various fields of study, among them, memory studies, Holocaust studies and Austrian cultural studies. Krylova's analyses demonstrate what happens when trauma and repressed national history continue unresolved. THE INDEPENDENT SCHOLAR [Nicole Calian] This is a well-considered study of Austrian Holocaust denial and the ways in which film, literature, and memorial images have led the nation toward a complete understanding of its share of guilt in the events of WW II. . . . Highly recommended. CHOICE [E.G. Wickersham]

Krylova's excellent and well-written study illuminates an important historical, social, and cultural era in Austria for all cultural studies students and scholars, while also motivating scholars and teachers of Austrian culture to a greater engagement with Austria's post-Holocaust legacy. STUDIES IN 20TH- AND 21ST-CENTURY LITERATURE [The book's] strengths [are] attention to historical detail accompanied by careful explanations of the issues at stake that will appeal to both experts and readers unfamiliar with the particular Austrian context. . . . [O]ften succeeds at highlighting quite compelling connections between . . . disparate works. . . . [W]ill be of interest to teachers and scholars of Austria, memory studies, and memorial culture. MONATSHEFTE [Jack Davis] Krylova masterfully handles [her] subject matter . . . . On aesthetics, history, and politics after 1986, she appears to have read everything. . . . [She] devotes [her] final chapter to memorials and memorial projects . . . . A fascinating study of these memorials, and post-Waldheim artistic engagement in Austria, [this book] is also a tribute to the artists who continue to find new ways to make the past an irritation to the present. AUSTRIAN HISTORY YEARBOOK [Michael Burri] 2018 CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title Informative and readable, the book is of both scholarly and general appeal. AUSTRIAN STUDIES [Andrea Capovilla] Krylova's essays are thoroughly researched, lucidly written, and should be of interest to students of cultural studies and history. GERMAN STUDIES REVIEW [Edward T. Larkin] Katya Krylova's excellent new book was completed between the [Austrian] presidential and national polls [of 2016 and 2017]. . . . Krylova's introduction gives an excellent overview of the diverse strands of activity; her five chapters offer detailed analyses of particular works. . . . Krylova is able to develop a fascinating narrative. JOURNAL OF EUROPEAN STUDIES [Joachim Whaley] [A] fascinating study . . . . [A] must read for all scholars interested in Austrian literature, film, and culture. GEGENWARTSLITERATUR [Joseph W. Moser] Timely. MODERN LANGUAGE REVIEW [Aine McMurtry] Krylova's carefully researched The Long Shadow of the Past is a must-read for Austrian memory study scholars. It captures profoundly interconnected worlds of memory, trauma, and repression of the past with politics, culture, history, and family histories; it recognizes both progress and setbacks in Austria's reckoning with its past; and it invites an open dialogue about cultural memory. JOURNAL OF AUSTRIAN STUDIES [Eva Kuttenberg] Krylova has produced a timely, informative, engaging, and well-written treatise on Austria's ongoing memory struggles. [It] would be informative and digestible reading for students in a course on the topic, and should be of interest to all scholars concerned with how Austria and other nations confront the long shadow of the past. GERMAN QUARTERLY [Sharon Weiner] Krylova's book is a timely and welcome addition to various fields of study, among them, memory studies, Holocaust studies and Austrian cultural studies. Krylova's analyses demonstrate what happens when trauma and repressed national history continue unresolved. THE INDEPENDENT SCHOLAR [Nicole Calian] This is a well-considered study of Austrian Holocaust denial and the ways in which film, literature, and memorial images have led the nation toward a complete understanding of its share of guilt in the events of WW II. . . . Highly recommended. CHOICE [E.G. Wickersham]

Author Information

KATYA KRYLOVA is Lecturer in German, Film, and Visual Culture at the University of Aberdeen.

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