From: Jerry van Beers
Date: Wed Dec 21 21:23:19 2005

Your favourite book: man without qualities


Your comments:

Apparently spam is not just for email. Robots crawl the internet and add fake entries to pages like this guestbook and commercials for gambling, sex, moneydeals, you name it. I received a lot of this on this page. It is only possible to add plain text and no html so this page looked quite awfull every day with lots of html code on it. Every day I had to upload the original version of it after having checked no-one entered a real message. The page is usually around 30k but after a few days worth of fake entries it would have grown some 300k.

That is why, for the time being I am disabling the entry of text by visitors until I (and my provider who hosts the script that makes this guestbook possible) have found a solution.

If you have comments, questions, anything nice (or bad) to say about this site you can either mail me at jvbeers@xs4all.nl or visit the forum at ActiveBoards



From: pkleinlankhorst@gmail.com
Date: Sun Jul 31 21:07:51 2005

Your favourite book: 


Your comments:

e-mail adres en datum lijken overigen niet echt te kloppen... mijn e-mail adres is: pkleinlankhorst@gmail.com


From: pkleinlankhorst@gmail.com
Date: Sun Jul 31 21:06:23 2005

Your favourite book: 


Your comments:

Ooit aan gedacht om een artikel over Robert Musil op de Nederlandstalige Wikipedia te zetten? Ik weet niet of je dat als concurrentie ziet, maar met jouw kennis zal het zeker niet misstaan! Complimenten voor de mooie site.


From: amabest@37.com
Date: Thu Apr 21 12:44:16 2005

Your favourite book: the man who knows tomorrow


Your comments:

thanx for da site,is really cool


From: e75144.661@oworldnet.att.net
Date: Wed Apr 6 21:36:26 2005

Your favourite book: Man Without Qualities


Your comments:

Thank you for such a comprehensive web site. Great work!


From: jersuepfaffl@theriver.com
Date: Mon Mar 14 17:59:01 2005

Your favourite book: MWQ


Your comments:

I've been Musil fan since 1962. Is there a good biography in english?


From: edgecan@cogeco.ca
Date: Sun Feb 27 06:58:07 2005

Your favourite book: 


Your comments:

Hi there, great site about a great man.

D. Musil



From: johannzz89@yahoo.com
Date: Fri Feb 4 19:55:02 2005

Your favourite book: The man without qualities


Your comments:

Hello:

Congratulations for this web site about the great Musil, that man with all the qualities as said Coetzee (another perfect writter). I read "The Man without Qualities" in spanish and it was for me the most important descovery of a masterpiece of Literature. I get mad with the life of Ulrich.



From: r_f_mcdonald@yahoo.ca
Date: Tue Jan 11 00:46:26 2005

Your favourite book: 


Your comments:

I'd like to thank you for putting up this comprehensive site. I'd no idea about Musil, really, before I came here. I'll have to start.

I've written a blog posting referencing Musil and what seems to be his perspective on life, at <http://www.livejournal.com/users/rfmcdpei/574260.html>. In his 1990 book <i>To the Friend Who Did Not Save My Life</i>, the late French author Hervé Guibert uses the pseudonym of "Muzil" for his friend Michel Foucault.



From: ldecola@comcast.net
Date: Thu Jan 6 20:40:31 2005

Your favourite book: gravity's rainbow


Your comments:

I'm finishing vol 1 of TMWQ and may take a break. When I return to vol 2 I could use a list of characters and synopsis. I've made a sort of list myself but wondered if anyone had done anything more comprehensive.

Lee De Cola.



Your favourite book: Life


Your comments:

Very informative.I read Canetti,who loves Musil,Broch,which inpire me to create my artwork.Please take a look at www.themindofmarguerita.com lambiek.net/marguerita.htm creativeside/mikliworld/event:marguerita in www.mikli.com www.sarcastico.com.br Hope to hear from you Marguerita


From: abonho@hotmail.com
Date: Sun Oct 3 00:12:34 2004

Your favourite book: Hopscotch, by Julio Cortazar (who was a great Musilian)


Your comments:

Hi: your page is one of the coolest and most agreeable places I have found in the net; a real pleasure to find this kind of websites: it makes the internet look like a nice café full of interesting people. I found you casually, on a Saturday night, after finishing the translation into Spanish of a lucid article on Musil by the British author V.S Pritchett. I read "Törless" when I was 17 years old, and it really marked my life. Though I was fascinated by the book, I stopped being a regular Musil reader: but I liked the reflection of Musil in the work of many writers in Spanish language: Julio Cortazar, Mario Vargas Llosa (whose "The City and the Dogs" is the Peruvian version of Törless), Bryce Echenique, Goytisolo and many others - Musil soiled rich seeds in my native language). Well - really thanks for your very nice and friendly site... there should have to be more people like you on this world. My name is Ramón; I`m a Spanish translator living in Luxembourg. I`ll come back often on your site. All my support to your very good work.


From: teukhenri@hotmail.com
Date: Mon Sep 13 18:27:43 2004

Your favourite book: M. Teste/Dagboek van de verleider/Iemand, niemand.../Ferdydurke...


Your comments:

Aan alle liefhebbers van Musil kan ik jullie aanraden eens te beginnen aan Witold Gombrowisz 'Ferdydurke'. In Brussel in de Slechte te koop voor 4.50 euro. 'Het menselijk wezen uit zich niet direkt en in overeenstemming met zijn natuur, maar steeds in een bepaalde vorm, en die vorm, die stijl, die zienswijze komt niet alleen voort uit onszelf maar wordt ons van buitenaf opgedrongen - en daarom kan dezelfde persoon naar buiten toe nu eens verstandig, dan weer dom lijken, nu eens bloeddortsig, dan weer engelachtig, nu eens rijp, dan weer onrijp, afhankelijk van de stijl die hem toevallig aanwaait en van zijn beïnvloeding door anderen'. p84. Graag gedaan.TH


From: valky@hotmail.com
Date: Fri Sep 10 01:38:13 2004

Your favourite book: In Search of Lost Time


Your comments:

Musil has been the great overlooked one for many years. No one gets a decent education in literature without knowing something of Joyce, Proust, Faulkner, but even those conversant with Mann and other 20th century Germany writers have often never heard of Robert Musil. I came across his work on my own rather than through any introduction to his work in college courses. Thanks for the site. Your taste in music also parallels my own.


From: henrymgbada@yahoo.fr
Date: Thu Sep 9 15:30:29 2004

Your favourite book: hardly chase


Your comments:

it is fun to see the wonderful work of musil so to all who care musil has alot of stuff mgbada...


From: ohwhitefieldsofnegro@noemailc.om
Date: Thu Aug 19 03:05:15 2004

Your favourite book: a sentimental journey, laurence sterne


Your comments:

wonderful sir. i have read nothing of musil and this site has been great to read. i should try and get the man without qualities soon. that would be the right thing to do.


From: deakinsimon@hotmail.com
Date: Sun Aug 1 01:58:56 2004

Your favourite book: 'Monsieur Teste', Paul Valery


Your comments:

This is a superb site, has anyone done an interdisciplinary study of Musil? I read The man without qualities only after having become aware of him through the conceptual artist Joseph Kosuth's exhibition at Villa Merkel in Esslingen in 1992.


From: morcada@hotmail.com
Date: Sun Jul 25 18:02:57 2004

Your favourite book: The Man Without Qualities


Your comments:

If I love this book, what else might I like that's new (as opposed to the old classics like the Brothers K.)? Any suggestions?


From: Rupert_T_Brand@yahoo.com
Date: Sat Jul 3 20:49:21 2004

Your favourite book: Doctor Faustus by Thomas Mann


Your comments:

I read Robert Musil's masterpiece in the summer of 1982 when I was doing an independent study in German Literature at UNH. Clearly, this is one of the most intellectually exciting and challenging novels of the 20th century. I also recommend the fine book of his essays called Precision of the Soul, published by the University of Chicago in 1990. Our host is to be commended for creating a website which shall introduce this extraordinary thinker to a generation of readers who are unfamiliar with him. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Thomas Mann are not the only peaks in German Literature!


From: Rupert_T_Brand@yahoo.com
Date: Fri Jul 2 08:54:34 2004

Your favourite book: Doctor Faustus by Thomas Mann


Your comments:

It is heartening to find this website. I read Musil's great masterpiece in the summer of 1982 when I was doing an independent study in German Literature at UNH. There is no doubt that this is one of the most intellectually challenging works of the 20th century. I recommend it to those who wish to question the core values of their lives. It is clearly a book which can be read many times. I would also recommend the fine collection of Musil's essays entitled Precision and Soul, published by the University of Chicago in 1990. I thank our host for his trouble in creating this site. May you all enjoy the discovery of Musil and the adventure of The Man Without Qualities in the near future!


From: laurenthermans@hotmail.com
Date: Tue Jun 22 17:05:21 2004

Your favourite book: Der Mann ohne Eigenschaften


Your comments:

Het beste wat ik ooit gelezen heb. Meedogenloos;liefdevol;persoonlijk;cultuurkritisch;analyserend en vragen oproepend.ik lees hem al twintig jaar en telkens sta ik weer verbaasd...

From: antisolipsism@yahoo.com
Date: Wed Jun 16 12:39:44 2004

Your favourite book: The Brothers Karmazov

Your comments:

Howdy Partner,

I am writing because I have just finished the first volume of The Man Without Qualities (I am learning German, but am definitely not at a level where I can tackle Musil)and am beginning to formulate some ideas i will turn into an essay (to give you an idea about me, this essay would not be for school but for my own interest...yeah i know, real exciting.)

two questions:

1.) are you aware whether musil was interested in Wittgenstein? Given his background in philosophy and being Austrian, it would seem probable. There are some ideas in the book that seem to me very "wittgensteinian"

2.) what is the best english biography available? is there one? i am relatively poor,so i can't afford to buy several books on musil, but am interested in some particular things about his background. i am especially interested in learning if musil himself struggled at any point with psychosis or the like, even in a diminished form, because his descriptions of both moosbrugger and clarisse show an understanding of schizo-psychology that is a bit before its time. it seems that musil conceived of insanity in much the same way as lacan or antonin artaud.

regards,

benjamin e white


From: tomekrakowiak@yahoo.com
Date: Tue Apr 27 18:24:10 2004

Your favourite book: 'Kosmos' by Witold Gombrowicz

Your comments:

i was looking for a truth here.
rom: gh.jensen@12move.nl
Date: Sun Apr 4 10:10:26 2004

Your favourite book: 100 jaar eenzaamheid - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Your comments:

Mooie site, ik heb er in ieder geval weer van geleerd. enne... de man zonder eigenschappen is hard op weg om mijn favoriete boek te worden (ben pas op blz 400).



From: av8r@eircom.net
Date: Thu Mar 18 17:43:08 2004

Your favourite book: The Man Without Qualities

Your comments:

Great site, spread the word.



From: petcul454@hotmail.com
Date: Sat Feb 14 13:47:13 2004

Your favourite book: A la recherche du temps perdu, by Marcel Proust as translated into english byC K Scott Moncrieff

Your comments:

Dear Web Master

I have been enjoying your site so far. Thanks for going to the trouble of putting it up. So far I have particularly liked the photograph of child Musil in uniform I would love to be included in the list of those who have helped to improve it. Here is my attempt.

Here is a cut and paste quote from the site, from Qualities; Poetics; The Man Without Qualities.

The novel is divided into two separate parts. The first deals with Kakanien, the Austrian-Hungarian empire and kingdom in decline, and takes place in the year 1913. Rumour has it that Germany is preparing a celebration in honour of forty years of reign of Wilhelm II. That same year The Austrian Emperor will be the ruler of his country for seventy years. This of course has to be celebrated more abundant, more profound than the anniversary in Germany. Austrian nobel's realize this and attempt to organize a celebration that will capture the peoples minds forever, show the greatness of Austria and its emperor. Everybody that becomes a part of the organizing committee has to think of something that is the most important feature of life, of Austria, of its emporer. But of course everybody thinks of something else as being the most important feature. The irony of all this, in retrospect, is that in the year the celebration has to take place Austria ceases to be an empire, and becomes a republic. The celebration does not develop beyond its preperatory fase. My translation (unfortunately I can only read English), Eithne Wilkins and Ernst Kaiser, Book Two, Chapter 21 Paragraph one says

‘………………’make the most of the full weight of a reign of seventy years rich in blessings and sorrows as against one of a mere thirty years’,……’ The the discrepancy is forty as opposed to thirty years.

Cheers Peter Cullen Adelaide, Australia




From: FMasingill@aol.com http://hometown.aol.com/fmasingill/myhomepage/index.html
Date: Sat Jan 24 02:24:47 2004

Your favourite book: Eric Voegelin, Collected Works, Volume 12

Your comments:

Is it possible for me to print the biography of Musil in both the English and the German version? My printer just yields a lot of blank papers for the German version. I make use of your site.



From: leonhard@nyc.com http://www.leonart.tomaatnet.nl/pages/kunst_fotografie.htm
Date: Sun Dec 7 22:00:32 2003

Your favourite book: van Musil: Der Mann ohne eigenschaften , en Lolita van Nabokov

Your comments:

SUPERmooie site.

Ik ben hier heel blij mee. Hij zit technisch knap in elkaar. ik vind dat rood niet zo mooi en de kleuren zijn soms wat hard en vloekend. Maar ik vind de compositie van de site erg gaaf. Erg leuk. Ik heb deze pp. meteen bewaard. Ik hoop hier een korte inleiding in de man zonder eigenschappen te vinden. Ik zit nu op blz. 301 Maar ik wil een beschouwing op het boek lezen.




From: eziotarantino@tiscali.it http://blogsenzaqualita.clarence.com
Date: Mon Nov 17 17:16:43 2003

Your favourite book: Der Mann Ohhe Eigenschaften

Your comments:




From: eerstezaanse@freeler.nl
Date: Fri Nov 7 21:56:50 2003

Your favourite book: mze

Your comments:

op z'n minst leuk dat je deze site gemaakt hebt. petje af.

cr vd linde




From: cedric_hedin@yahoo.fr
Date: Mon Oct 27 13:07:07 2003

Your favourite book: l'insoutenable légèreté de l'être

Your comments:

J'ai découvert Musil ("l'Homme sans qualités") grâce à Kundera et son "Art du roman". J'ai été frappé par l'influence que le premier a exercé sur le second, tant sur le plan formel que philosophique. Si ce parallélisme vous a frappé, je serais ravi d'en discuter !

Bravo pour ce site.




From: emailsab@yahoo.de
Date: Fri Aug 15 16:51:55 2003

Your favourite book: drei frauen

Your comments:

pouvez vous rentrer en contact avec moi si vous avez déjà étudier ce livre.Très vite s'il vous plait. Merci d'avance.Je trouve votre site très intéressant.

From: FMasingill@aol.com
Date: Aug 8 17:19:58 2003

Your comments:

I can only say I am grateful for this site. I only took a semester introductory course in German so cannot read it yet but then I'm only eighty-three years of age and trying to learn everything (Philosophy means LOVE of (not possession of) wisdom and my most important mentor in life happened to be Eric Voegelin who I encountered at LSU in 1948-53 (I have Order and History and most of the Collected Works) and who seems to have repeatedly cited such people as Musil and Doderer. I SWEAR that in the next few days I'm GOING to finish reading _The Man Without Qualities_. You are evidently still working on this Musil site and I'm glad. It's been bookmarked for quite a while.Frank

From: liemb046@planet.nl
Date: Tue Jul 8 15:35:55 2003

Your favourite book: hmm...te moeilijk!

Your comments:

Ik zocht naar informatie over een boek van Robert Musil (De man zonder eigenschappen), vandaar dat ik hier terecht kwam. Het lijkt veelbelovend.

Groeten, R


From: mrbas_26@hotmail.com http://roepstem.tripod.com
Date: Tue May 20 15:53:27 2003

Your favourite book: Kultuurgeskiedenis van die Afrikaner

Your comments:

Hoe bijzonder dat er een Nederlandse webstek gewijd is aan deze boeiende Klagenfurter! Ik heb zeer vaak klagenfurt bezocht en ben daar bij het geboorthuis van Musil geïnteresseerd geraakt in deze letterkundige.

Ik zal de webstek grondig doorlezen.

Groeten van een liefhebber van Europa's schone culturen en Karinthië.

Marcel Bas, Voorschoten.


From: crispailos@yahoo.com.ar
Date: Sun Apr 27 03:15:32 2003

Your favourite book: many books ...many authors

Your comments:

Thank you very much for your excellent page which I will visit very often from now onwards.

I apologize for my "many books...many authors" but it is not arrogance, it is not a kind of showing off, it is the truth. I am from Argentina and I must admit that I read many Latin American writers but I love American literature from Washington Irving to Ambrose Bierce or Faulkner or Arthur Miller or...Manhattan Murder by Woody Allen - I love English literature from the old Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, the Arthurian sagas to Virgina Woolf, Beckett or Frayn but Musil was always present as a reference in many essays on literature and I do not know why I left it with a sense of curiosity and attraction that now , at this moment I start to understand why: it is too much close to my own position towards my spoilt country and a world without qualities

Cristina

From: weronika12000@yahoo.com
Date: Thu Apr 10 09:56:40 2003

Your favourite book: Man without qualities

Your comments:


From: crpkeating@ameritech.net no longer have one
Date: Sat Mar 1 13:55:58 2003

Your favourite book: Celine, Doiestoiveski, Gogol, Nietzsche works & Sylvia Plath's Ariel

Your comments:

I did not know anyone in USA was interested in Musil--I am age 60 and never met anyone who even knew who he was.

From: awg.reid@btopenworld.com
Date: Wed Jan 20 14:08:59 2003

Your favourite book: 

Your comments:

Hi,
Appreciate the work you have put into Musil.blogspot

I am not an expert on him or anything, just a person - like those who you mention in the site who have it on their shelves but have never read it - who bought a two set paperback of MWQ in 1975, when a student, because I was in my existentialist reading phase. Although, I remember, whenever I told anyone that I was reading about existentialism, most people wrinkled their noses. I had read about TMWQ in Colin Wilson's "The Outsider", so knew RM was "important".

In the mid 80's, I found by chance, in a dusty second-hand bookshop, a hardback copy of Robert Musil: An Introduction to his work by Burton Pike [1961, pp 214, index and bibliography which includes references to criticism in English, criticism in German (including about 20 articles and dissertations)]. You may have come across it. If not try it.

A naughty previous owner of my copy has underlined and annotated the whole book in pencil and some red ink: a disgraceful abomination, even on a paperback - surely the sign of a bit of a show off, confident to spout half understood opinions in the margins for any Tom, Dick and Harry, such as myself, to read.

Pike has only one b&w picture [frontis] of RM in his study in Vienna,1937.

I started re-reading vol 1,TMWQ, a month ago, and again came to a grinding halt after about 50 pages. If the mood disappears so does the desire to read it. I have never got to Moosbrugger, although I read all about him in Colin Wilson's "The Outsider" in the 70's. When I first tried to read TMWQ I had just finished "The Magic Mountain" and wanted something as important to get my teeth into.

I recently heard a BBC radio version of TMM, which took me right back, in every detail, to the time I read it - as if I were nibbling Proust's madeleine.

Pike is full of good stuff. If you haven't read it, I recommend it, though I doubt you will find it anywhere but a university library. As I am a man of leisure, I plan to abstract some of the best bits, though I am not exactly sure how much you can use without infringing copyright. Maybe I could post them on a blogspot.

I will leave you with a little quote from the book:

Musil's protagonists call to mind Rilke's lines:

Und mit kleinen Schritten gehen die Uhren
Neben unserm eigentlichen Tag

[And with little steps the clocks walk beside our real day]


From: tbastow@earthlink.net
Date: Wed Jan 22 17:13:24 2003

Your favourite book: 

Your comments:

It's a wonderul website for those of us who have just discovered Musil. Thank you.

From: bluebell@redwall.net don't got none. :(
Date: Wed Jan 15 04:49:48 2003

Your favourite book: hmmmm... not sure.

Your comments:

I haven't actually read any of Musil's works yet, aside from a short story called "Das Fliegenpapier" for my Modern German Lit. class... I ran across this site looking for information for a presentation on the author for that class, and have been intrigued enough by what I've learned to consider reading more of his work. Your site is very useful- informative, and easy to find what I'm looking for. Thanks!