AAL_28_Alumni AudioLab with Alys George

As a teenager, Alys George wanted to get away from the little American town where she grew up. It took her to Germany for an exchange year. This shaped her love for the German language and literature and brought her to study German studies. In the course of her dissertation research, she gave attention to Austria and especially Vienna for the first time. She has remained loyal to this city and its arts since then.

Her current work “The naked truth. Viennese Modernism and the body “ addresses the body at the turn of the century and beyond. Well-known authors such as Hermann Bahr called for a focus on mind, soul and body in arts. But Sigmund Freud with his research on mind and soul left little room for the body in cultural history. Alys George, who has already written her dissertation on Viennese Modernism, wants to fill this gap.

In addition to her research, she has been teaching for decades - currently at New York University. With a Franz Werfel scholarship from the OeAD, she is now in Vienna for her current research. In this work she deals with fictions about Austria-Hungary in the post-monarchist literature. She is studying literature by authors from the former Habsburg countries, who were located on the periphery of the former Empire. Alys George was also scholarship holder of the Richard Plaschka programme.