Overview

Sissi’s World offers a transdisciplinary approach to the study of the Habsburg Empress Elisabeth of Austria. It investigates the myths, legends, and representations across literature, art, film, and other media of one of the most popular, revered, and misunderstood female figures in European cultural history. Sissi’s World explores the cultural foundations for the endurance of the Sissi legends and the continuing fascination with the beautiful empress: a Bavarian duchess born in 1837, the longest-serving Austrian empress, and the queen of Hungary who died in 1898 at the hands of a crazed anarchist. Despite the continuing fascination with “the beloved Sissi,"" the Habsburg empress, her impact, and legacy have received scant attention from scholars. This collection will go beyond the popular biographical accounts, recountings of her mythic beauty, and scattered studies of her well-known eccentricities to offer transdisciplinary cultural perspectives across art, film, fashion, history, literature, and media.

Full Product Details

Author:   Dr. Maura E. Hametz (Old Dominion University, USA) ,  Heidi Schlipphacke (University of Illinois at Chicago, USA)
Publisher:   Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Imprint:   Bloomsbury Academic USA
Weight:   0.621kg
ISBN:  

9781501313448

ISBN 10:   1501313444
Pages:   408
Publication Date:   12 July 2018
Audience:   College/higher education ,  Tertiary & Higher Education
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Manufactured on demand  
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Table of Contents

"List of Illustrations Acknowledgments 1. Introduction: ""Sissi"": The Convergence of Memory and Myth Maura E. Hametz (Old Dominion University, USA) and Heidi Schlipphacke (University of Illinois Chicago, USA) I. Memory 2. Encounters: Ulrike Truger, Elisabeth – Zwang – Flucht – Freiheit, 1998/99 Christiane Hertel (Bryn Mawr College, USA) 3. The Remains of the Stay: The Corporeal Archive of Empress Elisabeth in the Hofburg Beth Ann Muellner (College of Wooster, USA) 4. Sisi Redux: The Empress Elisabeth and Her Cult in Post-Communist Hungary Judith Szapor (McGill University, Canada) and András Lénárt (National Széchényi Library, Hungary) 5. A Place for Sissi in Trieste Maura E. Hametz (Old Dominion University, USA) and Borut Klabjan (European University Institute in Florence, Italy) 6. Empress Elisabeth and the Painting of Modern Life Olivia Gruber Florek (Delaware County Community College, USA) 7. Karl Lagerfeld and the Elisabeth Myth Carolin Maikler (Independent Scholar, Switzerland); Translated by Marieanne Gilliat-Smith 8. Sissi, the Chinese Princess: A Timely and Versatile Post-Mao Icon Fei-Hsien Wang and Ke-chin Hsia (Indiana University Bloomington, USA) II. Myth 9. Melancholy Empress: Queering Empire in Ernst Marischka's Sissi Films Heidi Schlipphacke (University of Illinois at Chicago, USA) 10. Sisi: A Double Reflection on a “Queer Icon"" Susanne Hochreiter (University of Vienna, Austria) 11. Imagining Austria: Myths of “Sisi” and National Identity in Lilian Faschinger’s Wiener Passion Anita McChesney (Texas Tech University, USA) 12. Cocteau’s Queen: Sissi between Legend, Spectacle, and History in L’Aigle à deux têtes Elizabeth Black (Old Dominion University, USA) 13. Fat, Thin, Sad - Victoria, Sissi, Diana and the Fate of Wax Queens Kate Thomas (Bryn Mawr College, USA) 14. Sisi in the Museum: Exhibits in Vienna and the US Susanne Kelley (Kennesaw State University, USA) Notes on Contributors Index"

Reviews

Empress Elisabeth of Austria embodied the contradictions of monarchical rule in life and death. Revered yet deeply unhappy; a figure of national imagination yet profoundly rootless; bathed in splendor yet bodily starved. Despite or perhaps because of that incongruity, she remains a projection screen of imperial longing, reminding us of inextricable links between history, memory, and nostalgia in the realm of the former Habsburg Monarchy. Sissi's World grapples in novel ways with the complex tensions reflected in the figure of Empress Elisabeth. * Matti Bunzl, Director, Museen der Stadt Wien, Austria *

Author Information

Maura E. Hametz is Professor of History at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, USA. Her research explores the history of Trieste and the northeastern Adriatic regions since the late 19th century with emphasis on the intersections of politics, culture, economy, law, religion, gender, and ethnicity and nationalism. Her major works include In the Name of Italy (2012) and Making Trieste Italian, 1918-1954 (2005), and she co-edited Jewish Intellectual Women in Central Europe, 1860-2000 (2012). Heidi Schlipphacke is Associate Professor of Germanic Studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago, USA. Her research focuses on the German Enlightenment and its critique, kinship and family structures, post-war German and Austrian literature and film, and queer and gender studies. She is the author of Nostalgia After Nazism: History, Home and Affect in German and Austrian Literature and Film (2010).

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