Vienna: Empire, Dynasty and Dream, BBC4 Dec 8

[kernelbogey]

Two books which have helped me get a better picture of Austria in WWI:

The White War: Life and Death on the Italian front 1915 - 1919, Mark Thompson, Faber 2008 (pb 2009).
Focuses on the battles on the Isonzo and in the Dolomites. Very readable, with lots of biographical and other background information on the players and the life of the ordinary people.

A Mad Catastrophe: The outbreak of World War I and the Collapse of the Habsburg Empire, Geoffrey Wawro, Basic Books 2014 (pb 2015)
Pretty hardcore military history for the most part, but also illuminating about the relationship between the Imperial Family and the military command.

I hadn't realised before reading these that the 'k und k' conceals, as it were, that the Kingdom of Hungary was politically separate from the Empire and I think it is Wawro who shows how the Hungarians helped undermine the Habsburgs. The Habsburgs come off rather badly as weak and disinterested - particularly Franz Josef. Austro-Hungary suffered two million casualties.

[vinteuil]

The White War: Life and Death on the Italian front 1915 - 1919, Mark Thompson, Faber 2008 (pb 2009).
Focuses on the battles on the Isonzo and in the Dolomites. Very readable, with lots of biographical and other background information on the players and the life of the ordinary people.

... thanks for this. The battles between Italy and Austria were among the worst in the Great War, certainly comparable in awfulness to the trench warfare of Northern Europe. And yet it hardly features in most people's awareness.

Interestingly Kipling wrote five impressive pieces on this arena of the War - previously hard to obtain but now available here -

http://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk/rg_mountains_intro.htm

[Historian]

I'd like to second the recommendation of Thompson's 'The White War' which covers much more than the title might suggest. My understanding of Italian history benefited greatly.

I have a personal interest in this theatre of war as my grandfather was sent to Italy in 1917 with the Durham Light Infantry.

May I also put in a word for 'The Prohaska Novels' by John Biggins? This four-volume series covers the life and adventures of a fictional Austro-Hungarian naval officer from around 1890 until the break-up of the 'K. und K.' regime in 1918. They are full of insights into life in this vanished empire, such as the relations between the various nationalities. Many of the more outlandish details, such as the naval captain who spent his holidays in the trenches during the First World War, are based on historical examples. I also found them very funny.

[vinteuil]

.


... and on matters Austrian - I like the word (all fifty one letters of it) they have chosen as "Word of 2016" -

"Bundespräsidentenstichwahlwiederholungsverschiebu ng"

[ardcarp]

In general I have problems when music is added as a background layer to speech. It isn't that I can't understand the speech but rather that my attention is constantly switching between the music and the speaker. As a result I find it difficult to concentrate on what is being said. IMO speech over music is fine if you want to wallow mindlessly but is not at all helpful if you are actively interested in the subject being discussed.

In this otherwise beautifully produced programme the background music was taken to a new level. It was almost continuous and rather than complementing and supporting the speech, the music continually fought against the narrator for attention. I found it so irritating and tiring to listen to that I gave up half way through, switched the sound off and relied on subtitles for the rest of the programme.

Am I the only person who has this problem with speech over music?

Clearly you are not, and I agree entirely! There seems to be an 'off-the-shelf' loop of pseudo-minimalist boring arpeggiated chords that gets incorporated into everything from wild-life, history, architecture, travel...well, everything. It's a sort of virtual coffee-table if you know what I mean. There was the merest snatch of Mozart in last night's programme (as if to word-paint his name). What a lost opportunity for a major series about a the city that was for a time Europe's Art Music Capital. Ought some producer to meet the same fate as several Habsburg Princes?

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

.


... and on matters Austrian - I like the word (all fifty one letters of it) they have chosen as "Word of 2016" -

"Bundespräsidentenstichwahlwiederholungsverschiebu ng"

I demand a recount!

[Richard Tarleton]

I'm conscious SSM has probably had enough of a kicking already on this thread, but a general point - presenters need to beware of hats. In general. They're a bad idea, best avoided. Hats can be deconstructed in all sorts of ways - sartorially, socially. At best they're a distraction, at worst they look silly. If you are follically challenged, and need to take the shine off, then think about camera angles, light and shade, make-up. Attenborough in the savannah under the heat of the sun doesn't wear a hat. He may well wear one between takes. Kenneth Clark didn't. I'm not quite sure what SSM's jaunty Panama (is it a Panama?) says about him - it does, IMV, have an air of raffish de haut en bas about it.

[ardcarp]

Bundespräsidentenstichwahlwiederholungsverschieb
Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerichwyrbdrobllllantisiliog ogogoch

Wales has it. (If I've spelt it right.)

But back to the Vienna programme. Presentation aside (and it wasn't that bad cf some others) I enjoyed it. Some stunning shots and for me, a brush-up on shaky European history.

[Petrushka]

I think I must have a different view of presenters (including those on R3) to most people on here. To me they are little more than relayers of the message and if the message is ok then I am largely indifferent to the dress sense or vocal mannerisms or whatever of the presenter. Taking this view, SSM was no more than an intermediary, an important one in one sense but vastly unimportant in another. SSM's hat was duly noted but it can get extremely hot in Vienna in the summer and I'd have worn one myself in the circumstances.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Bundespräsidentenstichwahlwiederholungsverschieb
Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerichwyrbdrobllllantisiliog ogogoch

Wales has it. (If I've spelt it right.)

You've missed a "w" before the "quadruple" L

[ardcarp]

You've missed a "w" before the "quadruple" L

Mae'n ddrwg

[Richard Tarleton]

To me they are little more than relayers of the message and if the message is ok then I am largely indifferent to the dress sense or vocal mannerisms or whatever of the presenter. Taking this view, SSM was no more than an intermediary, an important one in one sense but vastly unimportant in another. SSM's hat was duly noted but it can get extremely hot in Vienna in the summer and I'd have worn one myself in the circumstances.

Up to a point, Lord Copper - but the logical conclusion of that is an offscreen narrator. Once the presenter appears on screen (isn't he also the author in this case?)....well, as the great AA Gill (currently undergoing treatment for cancer, my very best wishes to him) has said, more than once, television is a very lookist medium. We're invited to have an opinion. How he or she (I'm making a general point here) looks and sounds is pretty crucial. It has been ever thus - remember those eccentric science presenters of the past..... With R3, of course, as often as not the presenter is merely an announcer - and you can't see them, on the radio.

[antongould]

... someone like me who has never been to Vienna.

Vints I am shocked ....