Product Description

"Musil belongs in the company of Joyce, Proust, Kafka, and Svevo. . . . (This translation) is a literay and intellectual event of singular importance."--New Republic.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #52604 in Books
• Published on: 1996-12-09
• Released on: 1996-12-09
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 1072 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780679768029
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
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From the Inside Flap
"Musil belongs in the company of Joyce, Proust, Kafka, and Svevo. . . . (This translation) is a literay and intellectual event of singular importance."--New Republic.

Customer Reviews

Nothing less than five stars!
The last reviewer obviously does NOT appreciate Musil in any true sense. There are no "unnecessarily longwinded, only somewhat interesting, conversations" --the reader who thinks this way has definitely ignored Musil's central concept of "Essayismus," which is essential to any understanding of the book. With this "essayism" Musil strove to find the perfect balance between the antipodes of life--art and science (clearly evident in the book's style), precision and soul, intuition and logic. It is the path to Utopia.

Musil's "anti-Semitism": The last reviewer points this out as a factor which might put off some readers. This is comparable to putting an emphasis on Dostoevsky's alleged anti-Semitism--you end up missing the whole point. By the way, Musil's wife Martha was Jewish. After Hitler's rise to power, the Musils, like many other intellectuals, fled to Switzerland. I don't know where one finds any anti-Semitism in Musil.

This book is highly rewarding when given the time. Don't be turned off by the length. It is much easier to read than Joyce and Proust and can actually be a real page-turner. Anyone who gives it less than five stars is just not getting it.

A Great Novel of ideas
The Man Without Qualities is the epitome of the "novel of ideas." Though it is not without plot, and has an engaging cast of characters, the substance of this 1100+ page unfinished novel lies in the extended discussions on philosophy, sociology, and psychology.

The setting is Vienna from 1913 to mid-1914. The principal character is Ulrich (no surname given) who is the man without "qualities," a term that doesn't translate fully, but essentially means a man devoid of moral committment or a sense of calling. He is a man much like Pierre Bezuhov in War and Peace, highly educated and full of ideas but without a sense of purpose.

In Volume 1, Ulrich is called upon to participate in the "Parallel Campaign," an interdisciplinary committee effort to come up with the proper idea with which to celebrate the forthcoming 70th anniversary of the accession of the Austro-Hungarian emperor, Franz Josef, in 1918. (Of course, by 1918 Franz Josef will have died and his empire along with him, a fact Musil assumes his readers will know.) It is in the workings of the Parallel Campaign that Musil, in Volume 1 at least, sets forth many of the issues which will dominate the novel. These include nothing less than the reason for a nation's existence, the duty of a man to his country, an individual's responsibility for his actions, the importance of ideas versus action, etc.

In the second volume Ulrich meets his sister Agathe, from whom he has been separated since early childhood. The two develop an immediate rapport so intense as to create a sexual tension between the two. They realize, quite simply, that they have fallen in love with one another, and this leads to lengthy discussions on the nature of emotions, most especially of love.

In the real world does one respond to "I love you" with a 20-page essay on the definition and cultural context of romantic love? Of course not. Musil's novel is not the least realistic in that sense, even though the characters and events are at least believable. His purpose it not to tell a story, but to present a series of dialogs between a fascinating cast of archetypical characters. And while Ulrich is the hub of the action and the principal idea-holder, the author also gives us the interaction of the different types to let us see each point of view from a series of different perspectives: the socialite and the general, the national socialist and the financier, the servant and the aristocrat, etc.

As noted, The Man Without Qualities was unfinished at Musil's death. The Vintage International edition, translated by Burton Pike, includes over 600 pages of additional "posthumous papers." These include completed chapters that Musil, at the last moment, withdrew from publication, as well as various drafts, sketches and notes. I strongly recommend reading these in full. They contain some rather shocking events that Musil would probably have toned down for publication, as well as notes that substantially illuminate some of the ideas that one may not have fully grasped on first reading.

The Man Without Qualities is often mentioned alongside Joyce's Ulysses and Proust's In Search of Lost Time. I don't think there is any doubt that it is at least as great as those two works. Fortunately it is probably the easist to read of the three, being much less pretentious than Ulysses and less than half as long as In Search of Lost Time. The prose (in translation, at least) is quite easy to read, but that doesn't mean that the author's ideas are always easy to grasp.

I can't claim to have understood even the majority Musil's thoughts, nor have I done more than scratch the surface of the scope of this magnificent novel. It demands re-reading. In the meantime, in Musil's own words: "...anyone who wants to know what this book is would do best to read it himself / not rely on my judgment or that of others, but read it himself."

Just reemerged novel on the knife edge of the 19th and 20th centuries
This extraordinary novel, told in non-linear time and with many eddies and currents, captures the last of the "golden years" of the 19th century--technically the early 20th--when people in Vienna still clung to their traditions, their emperor, their rigid social order. A microscopic look at the middle European world before the abyss told through the viewpoint of a highly attractive and intellectual man, too individual for his time, a man, perhaps, of the future.