In the summer of 1938, young Traugott von Jassilkowski embarks on a social career that he hopes will take him to the heights of the German aristocracy. A cunningly devised wardrobe, a strategic courtship, important weekends with well-placed grandees, the right lunches and boozy evenings with Berlin's smart set: Will these carry him to the top or land him nowhere? In the scintillating narrative style for which he is justly celebrated, Gregor von Rezzori offers this cautionary about Germany at the height of its most dangerous folly.

Brill's Companion to the Reception of Sophocles offers a comprehensive account of the influence, reception and appropriation of all extant Sophoclean plays, as well as the fragmentary Satyr play The Trackers, from Antiquity to Modernity, across cultures and civilizations, encompassing multiple perspectives and within a broad range of cultural trends and manifestations: literature, intellectual history, visual arts, music, opera and dance, stage and cinematography. A concerted work by an international team of specialists in the field, the volume is addressed to a wide and multidisciplinary readership of classical reception studies, from experts to non-experts. Contributors engage in a vividly and lively interactive dialogue with the Ancient and the Modern, which, while illuminating aspects of ancient drama and highlighting their ever-lasting relevance, offers a thoughtful and layered guide of the human condition.

Located on the border of present-day Romania and Ukraine, the historical region of Bukovina was the site of widespread displacement and violence as it passed from Romanian to Soviet hands and back again during World War II. This study focuses on two groups of “Bukovinians”—ethnic Germans and German-speaking Jews—as they navigated dramatically changed political and social circumstances in and after 1945. Through comparisons of the narratives and self-conceptions of these groups, Resettlers and Survivors gives a nuanced account of how they dealt with the difficult legacies of World War II, while exploring Bukovina’s significance for them as both a geographical location and a “place of memory.”

This collection is one of the most significant in The German Library. It includes portions of Ernst Junger's The First Paris Diaries and The Second Paris Diaries; a part of Mars in Aries by Alexander Lernet-Holenia; a selection from The Questionnaire by Ernst von Salomon; a portion from After Midnight by Irmgard Keun; a selection from Wolfgang Koeppen's Death in Rome; Scenes from the Life of a Faun by Arno Schmidt; and "Lowinger's Rooming House" by Gregor von Rezzori. The book is introduced and edited by Jurgen Peters, and includes biographical sketches of the authors.

A haunting novella, Death in Venice tells the story of a man who falls into foolish love, only to reap his own ruin. Gustav von Aschenbach, a dignified but lonely writer in the twilight of his life, is enjoying a Venetian vacation when he notices the taut, lean figure of a Polish boy. His name is Tadzio—and he embodies the sleek perfection of youth. Aschenbach finds himself completely and hopelessly obsessed with this ideal. Death in Venice brims with mythical imagery, exploring the themes of beauty and decay, passion and pestilence. This translation of Nobel laureate Thomas Mann’s work by Jefferson S. Chase includes an additional novella, Tonio Kröger, and the short stories “Tristan,” “Man and Dog: An Idyll,” “Hour of Hardship,” “Tobias Mindernickel,” and “The Child Prodigy.” Translated and with an Introduction by Jefferson S. Chase and an Afterword by Martin Swales

Ellis Wasson offers one of the first comprehensive studies of the European ruling class during the 19th and 20th centuries. Distilling a wealth of recent research, Wasson analyses the role of aristocracy in modern times, focusing on the tensions that exist between egalitarian values and the way elites shape society. Wasson explodes myths and jettisons stereotypes in sweeping coverage that takes the story from the Congress of Vienna to Stalingrad. The study recounts the change from the genteel world of court balls to Café Society and finally on to Eurotrash. It also contrasts the paradox of continued aristocratic social power and cultural leadership with the gradual decline in their political authority. Aristocracy and the Modern World covers key topics, such as: - The fabulous wealth of the great magnates - The relationship between servants and masters - Interaction with the middle classes - Concepts of honour - Culture, recreation and gender - Local authority and national power. Lively and authoritative, the book reviews developments in Scandinavia, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, France, Italy and Spain as well as in Britain, Germany and Russia. It is essential reading for all those with an interest in modern European history.