Robert Musil and the Tradition of the German Novelle By Kathleen O'Connor

This book explores Musil's Novellen to determine the significance of their roots in a generic tradition and to elucidate the ways in which they defined possibilities and marked limits of the genre. Musil's Novellen share the conventional narrative purpose of the tradition— mediation of an unusual occurrence to a common understanding — and its dominant characteristics — tension between objectivity and subjectivity and the claim to convey "truth." Yet they participate in the modernist search for new modes of knowledge and expression.
"The virtues of O'Connor's study are its clarity, intellectual firmness, and interpretive imagination.” Choice