David G. Richards Knihy

Although it was never completed, Georg Büchner's drama fragment Woyzeck occupies a pivotal place in the development of modern its stature and influence have been recognized by representatives of naturalism, expressionism, epic theater, the theater of the absurd, and the documentary theater. It provided the libretto for one of the century's greatest operas, Alban Berg's Wozzeck , has been made into a film, and is frequently performed inmany countries. The history of the criticism of Woyzeck is fascinating not only for the diversity of critical approaches but also for the dependence of criticism and interpretation on editors' constructions of a playable text from Büchner's three drafts or complexes of scenes. The debate about an authoritative text is ongoing, and this contributes greatly to the liveliness of the continuing critical dialogue about Büchner's work. This is the first extensive survey and analysis of the criticism of Woyzeck from the nineteenth century to the present.David G. Richards is professor emeritus at SUNY Buffalo and has written extensively about German literature.Table of ContentsIntroductionCriticism to 1945Post-War 1946-1962Construction of a Reading and Acting TextInternational 1966-1979Recent 1980 to 1999Conclusion The Manuscript of WoyzeckWorks by Georg BüchnerWorks CitedIndex

A survey of the critical literature analyzing Hesse's Steppenwolf , a work which has fallen and risen and fallen again in the critics' and public's imagination. Richards (Germany, State U. of New York) traces the history of this critical writing from the German dissertations of the 1950s, through the boom years of the 1960s and 1970s, and into the waning consolidation and comparative work of the present. In the course of the study, Hesse's work is illuminated by the close psychoanalytical, biographical, and new critical criticism which embraced the author's careful craftmanship, use of symbols, archetypes, and dedication to self-discovery. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.