Karl Kraus

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"Courageously translated"
Truth never dies, it just gets new teeth
Encore! Add these to your list of great minds.
Great moralist, critic, wit

Dicta and Contradicta
Karl Kraus , and Jonathan McVity
Manufacturer: University of Illinois Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Classics | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

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German | World Literature | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

Half-Truths and One-and-a-Half Truths: Selected Aphorisms
The Waste Books (New York Review Books Classics)
Karl Kraus: Apocalyptic Satirist, Volume 2: The Postwar Crisis and the Rise of the Swastika
Geist and Zeitgeist: The Spirit in an Unspiritual Age
Anti-Freud: Karl Kraus's Criticism of Psychoanalysis and Psychiatry

ASIN: 0252026489

Book Description

"A woman is more than just her exterior. The lingerie is also important."

"The mission of the press is to spread culture while destroying the attention span."

"Art serves to rinse out our eyes."

Uniquely combining humor with profundity and venom with compassion, Dicta and Contradicta is a bonanza of scandalous wit from Vienna's answer to Oscar Wilde.

From the decadent turn of the century to the Third Reich, the acerbic satirist Karl Kraus was one of the most famous-and feared-intellectuals in Europe. Through the polemical and satirical magazine Die Fackel (The torch), which he founded in 1899, Kraus launched wicked but unrelentingly witty attacks on literary and media corruption, sexual repression and militarism, and the social hypocrisy of fin-de-siècle Vienna.

Kraus's barbed aphorisms were an essential part of his running commentary on Viennese culture. These miniature gems, as sharp as diamonds, demonstrate Kraus's highly cultivated wit and his unerring eye for human weakness, flaccidity, and hypocrisy. Kraus shies away from nothing; the salient issues of the day are lined up side by side, as before a firing squad, with such perennial concerns as sexuality, religion, politics, art, war, and literature. By turns antagonistic, pacifistic, realistic, and maddeningly misogynistic, Kraus's aphorisms provide the sting that precedes healing.

For Dicta and Contradicta, originally published in 1909 (with the title Spruche und Widerspruche) and revised in 1923, Kraus selected nearly 1,000 of the scathing aphorisms that had appeared in Die Fackel. In this new translation, Jonathan McVity masterfully renders Kraus's multilayered meanings, preserving the clever wordplay of the German in readable colloquial English. He also provides an introductory essay on Kraus's life and milieu and annotations that clarify many of Kraus's literary and sociohistorical allusions.

Customer Reviews:

"Courageously translated".......2006-03-09

It takes a whole lot of courage to translate the works of Karl Kraus. By just about anybody's standards, he is a bigot and a misogynist, but his bile is not without purpose. He reserves most of his barbed comments for women, criticizing their deceptively weak and ultimately treacherous nature, but also praising them for being strong-willed and defiant. Kraus is a vivisectionist, peeling away our comforting hypocrisies and revealing the ugly truths of life. Nothing escapes his knife, not even religion or education. In the pitch darkness of society's lies, Karl Kraus is a light of truth and wisdom. His words may wound tender egos, but they'll become stronger for it.

Truth never dies, it just gets new teeth.......2004-04-28

Chicken soup for the spleen!

Damn. And I thought I had a bleak perspective and a cutting cacpcity for quick critical insight- Karl leaves me and everyone else in the dirt. A comedian could quite possibly mine an entire erudite, Dennis Miller-esque routine from this book. Kraus' witticisms are as spot-on today as they were when he edited Die Fackel (The Torch), in Vienna about a century ago.

My only beef- it's a lot of dough for not a lot of tree-gut. I mean 918 aphorisms? these aren't sprawling, long-winded Nietzschian aphorisms. They're quick. And this is a page turner... Ah well, it still gets the 5 for being so damn right!

Hey- if you think people (by and large) are lying, manipulative, weak, dishonest scum- this is a book for you. Great essay by the translator too!

Encore! Add these to your list of great minds........2002-12-12

This book heralds the emergence of two great minds.
Karl Kraus, who because of his fearless critique of the media, politics, religion, and the other humbugs of the world Hitler & Co. was trying to shove down the world's throat...and Mr. McVity, who not only translates the difficult work of Kraus brilliantly, but provides, in his concluding essay, a history and examination of Kraus and his world, and great insights into those troubling times, whose wake we are still witnessing... but also rises, in his own writing, to such heights and depths as to be truly humbling. And yet I am excited that such a mind might surface in such a time as this...where content nor form offer much to chew on, beyond the official story and the infantile rant.

Share this wondrous book with your friends, but realize it may return dog-eared, pages now sea-foam green in highlighter. Sharing, after all, is a very Krausian thing to do. Karl Kraus donated much of his proceeds to homeless shelters, low-cost housing, Quakers caring for starving tubercular children, and the like. And Kraus shared ideas and art with his friends Brecht, Wittgenstein, Schoenberg, Rilke, and others whose greatness is already well-known, perhaps because of their being less a thorn in the side of the system.
As Kraus once said, "Art serves to rinse out our eyes."
But I would also suggest that his, and McVity's, art serves to rinse out our ears as well. Especially since our ears are now filled with the likes of...well...you know! But "Kraus named names." Read all about it! And then imagine random names such as Rush, O'Reilly, and others that miraculously make their way to the top of the list, forgetting perhaps that the list is boogerpasted to the wall of a sandbox. [Head shakes left then right. Repeat.]

I am pleased to give this book 5-stars, but regret that I couldn't give it more. As Lin Yutang once said: "I regard the discovery of one's favorite author as the most critical event in one's intellectual development. There is such a thing as affinity of spirits, and among authors of ancient and modern times, one must try to find an author whose spirit is akin with his own."

I eagerly await the next offerings of this protean mind among us, and urge that he not limit himself to translations, as his own writing is such a pleasure, and translations do take so dreadfully long...

Great moralist, critic, wit.......2001-11-22

Kraus is almost unknown to Americans, but he was one of the shining social critics of the 20th century. He was the first major debunker of Freudian nonsense. He wrote brilliantly on language, politics, and culture. He was, like all great critics, fearless.

This book is a mixed presentation, including many quotes that seem outdated or inscrutible. It also has the editor's odd and distorted rendering of Kraus.

Book Description

Unternehmenskrisen und die damit verbundene Notwendigkeit der Sanierung und Restrukturierung der betroffenen Firmen haben in den letzten Jahren stark zugenommen. Der erfolgreiche Umgang mit einer Unternehmenskrise erfordert die detaillierte Kenntnis, der Krisenphasen - von der strategischen Krise bis zur Insolvenz - sowie der Ansätze zur Krisenentstehung und der Instrumente zur Krisenbewältigung. Das Buch integriert diese Phasen und Ansätze in einem praxiserprobten Restrukturierungskonzept und zeigt aufbauend darauf innovative Wege zum chancenorientierten Umgang mit der Krisensituation auf. Die praktische Relevanz dieser neuen Ansätze wird mittels anonymisierter Fallstudien dargestellt.

Dieses Buch ist unverzichtbar für alle Personen, die sich in der Praxis mit der Sanierung und Restrukturierung von Unternehmen beschäftigen. Es bietet aber auch wertvolle Ideen für Wissenschaftler, die auf der Suche nach neuen Lösungen zum Umgang mit Krisensituationen sind.

Half-Truths and One-and-a-Half Truths: Selected Aphorisms

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Half-Truths and One-and-a-Half Truths: Selected Aphorisms
Karl Kraus
Manufacturer: University Of Chicago Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

German | World Literature | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

Qualifying Textbooks - Spring 2007 | Stores | Books
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Dicta and Contradicta
The Waste Books (New York Review Books Classics)
In These Great Times: A Karl Kraus Reader
Anti-Freud: Karl Kraus's Criticism of Psychoanalysis and Psychiatry
Karl Kraus: Apocalyptic Satirist, Volume 2: The Postwar Crisis and the Rise of the Swastika

ASIN: 0226452689

Book Description

"An aphorism never coincides with the truth: it is either a half-truth or one-and-a-half truths," wrote Kraus. The aphorism was "a sub-genre [Kraus] considered the height of linguistic integrity. . . . With the help of notes and introductions by Zohn, the subtlety and archness of Kraus' linguistic gifts shine through."—Peter Filkins, Bloomsbury Review

"Kraus is a superb aphorist."—D. J. Enright, New York Review of Books

Corporate Restructuring: Finance in Times of Crisis

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Corporate Restructuring: Finance in Times of Crisis

Manufacturer: Springer
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Management | Management & Leadership | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

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Mergers, Acquisitions, and Corporate Restructurings
Leading Corporate Turnaround: How Leaders Fix Troubled Companies

ASIN: 3540330747

Book Description

The number of corporate crises has increased significantly in recent years. The companies affected must be restructured, and it has become conventional wisdom that they must do more than improve operations and realign their strategies. Companies today must also focus on reorganizing their finances, as this is a fundamental part of restructuring. In order to do so, they must master the use of corporate financing tools. This book discusses the related challenges and provides ways to overcome them. In doing so, the focus is always on increasing the company's value. The book uses case studies to show how financial restructuring can be implemented in practice, thus paving the way for successful expansion. The book is written for restructuring professionals who want a detailed overview of new developments in corporate recapitalization.

In These Great Times: A Karl Kraus Reader

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In These Great Times: A Karl Kraus Reader
Karl Kraus
Manufacturer: Carcanet Press,
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Half-Truths and One-and-a-Half Truths: Selected Aphorisms
Karl Kraus: Apocalyptic Satirist, Volume 2: The Postwar Crisis and the Rise of the Swastika
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The Man Without Qualities Vol. 2: Into the Millennium, from the Posthumous Papers

ASIN: 085635516X

The Practice of External Fixation in Small Animals

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The Practice of External Fixation in Small Animals
Karl H. Kraus , James P. Toombs , and Malcolm G. Ness
Manufacturer: Blackwell Publishing Limited
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Medicine | Subjects | Books

General | Veterinary Medicine | Medicine | Subjects | Books

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An Atlas of Surgical Approaches to the Bones and Joints of the Dog and Cat

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Selected Short Writings (German Library)

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Selected Short Writings (German Library)
Elias Canetti , Hermann Broch , and Robert Walser
Manufacturer: Continuum International Publishing Group
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

The Devil Wears Prada (Widescreen Edition)

ASIN: 0826418015

Book Description

• A unique collection of German-language writers bound by a Bohemian sensibility

• Canetti is the winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature (1981)<BR><BR>The literature of the Wiener Moderne exhibits biting social satire and other related aspects, first emanating from Karl Kraus (1874-1936), a prolific writer, difficult to classify, who reminds people of Jonathan Swift. Novelists and essayists Hermann Broch (1886-1951) and Elias Canetti (1905-94), who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1981, were likewise marginalized, to a large extent as Jews. Robert Walser (1878-1956) is Swiss, and to a large extent like the other three authors in this collection, had no less a desire to upset the social applecart. Among the works included are substantive selection from Krauss’s The Last Days of Mankind and Aphorisms, Bloch’s “The Anarchist,” selections from Canetti’s Crowds and Power and Auto-da-Fe, and Walser’s Jakob von Gunten.

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The absurdity of wars by the example of WW I
Brilliant satire from a modern Cassandra

Last Days of Mankind
Karl Kraus
Manufacturer: Ungar Pub. Co.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Continental European | Drama | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0804463662

Customer Reviews:

The absurdity of wars by the example of WW I.......1999-04-24

Compiled out of quotations, newspaper articles, different folk songs and own experiences with Austria-Hungary and Germany through World War One Karl Kraus wrote this book to show the people of the time after the War their own absurd behavement. The book is written as a Drama, but without a continuous story it shows the war with examples of Journalists, Politics, Aristocrats, Workers, Soldiers. It is an important forefather of Brecht's epic drama. To understand the different quotations you should know a bit about the Austrian and German history and the Emperors of the time.

Brilliant satire from a modern Cassandra.......1997-11-14

Karl Kraus is still well known in Germany, and deserves to be better known here. THE LAST DAYS OF MANKIND, 'a play to be performed on Mars' is one of the most trenchant satires written this century. Kraus compiled the play from newspaper articles, official bulletins, and overheard conversations during World War One in Vienna. He actually performed excerpts from this damning indictment of the human race during the war. I wish that someone would translate all of this book from the German; one flaw of this edition is the note early on which states that 'since modern Americans are not familiar with minutiae of the life of the Emperor Franz Joseph, these chapters have been cut.' With all due respect, if we did not know something about the later Habsburgs we would not be reading THE LAST DAYS OF MANKIND in the first place. The lowest pit in Kraus' hell is reserved for those vultures who treated wartime reporting as popular entertainment--which makes him an uncomfortably modern writer. Please, please beg borrow or steal a copy of this book and try to get it reprinted in a full translation!

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Unterblitcher Witz
Karl Kraus
Manufacturer: Kosel
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000J0H978

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In These Great Times a Karl Kraus Reader
Karl Kraus
Manufacturer: Engendra Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000PS2CFS

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