In Depth

History

The Austrians: A Thousand-Year Odyssey (Carroll & Graf), Gordon Brook-Shepherd: Historian Brook-Shepherd looks at Austria's long history to explain its people: who they are, how they got there, and where they're going.

Fin-de-Siecle Vienna: Politics and Culture (Vintage), Carl E. Schorske: This landmark book takes you into the political and social world of Vienna during the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

A Nervous Splendor: Vienna 1888-1889 (Viking Penguin), Frederic Morton: Morton uses the mysterious deaths of Archduke Rudolf and Baroness Marie Vetsera at Mayerling as a point of departure to capture in detail the life of Imperial Vienna at its glorious height.

The Hapsburgs: Embodying Empire (Viking Penguin), Andrew Wheatcroft: Here is the full sweep of the Hapsburg dynasty, from the Middle Ages to the end of World War I, focusing on such remarkable personalities as Rudolph I, Charles V, Maria Theresia, and Franz Josef I.

Art, Architecture & Music

J. B. Fischer von Erlach (Harvard University Press), Hans Aurenhammer: This entertaining volume illuminates the life, times, and aesthetic vision of the court-appointed architect who transformed the face of 18th-century Vienna and Salzburg.

Vienna 1900: Art, Architecture, and Design (New York Museum of Modern Art), Kirk Varnedoe: During the late 19th century, Vienna's artistic genius reached dazzling heights of modernity. These movements are explored in this appealing primer.

On Mozart (Ticknor & Fields), Anthony Burgess: Set in heaven, amid a reunion of the greatest composers of all time, this controversial book creates debates about music that never occurred but should have. Condemned by some critics as gibberish and praised by others as brilliant and poetic, Burgess's work is highly recommended for musical sophisticates with a sense of humor.

Music and Musicians in Vienna. (Hienemann), Richard Rickett: Few countries in Europe pride themselves as thoroughly as Austria does for its music. This brief, wisely created volume offers a broad overview of the country's musical heritage. It makes a good introduction to the subject.

Biography

Freud: A Life for Our Times (Norton), Peter Gay: Gay's biography is a good introduction to the life of one of the seminal figures of the 20th century. Freud, of course, was a Viennese until he fled from the Nazis in 1938, settling with his sofa in London.

Haydn: A Creative Life in Music (University of California), Karl and Irene Geiringer: This is the best biography of composer Franz Josef Haydn, friend of Mozart, teacher of Beethoven, and court composer of the Esterházys.

Mozart: A Cultural Biography (Harvest), Robert W. Gutman: Music historian Gutman places Mozart squarely in the cultural world of 18th-century Europe.

Empress Maria Theresia (Harper & Row), Robert Pic: The life and times of the greatest, most colorful Hapsburg monarch is richly treated in this engrossing biography.