Broch, Hermann (hĕr`män brôkh), 1886–1951, Austrian novelist. Broch is one of the masters of European modernism. Influenced by Immanuel Kant and Ludwig Wittgenstein, Karl Kraus, and the Vienna Circle, his trilogy Die Schlafwandler (1931–32; tr. The Sleepwalkers, 1932) describes the disintegration of social values and of organic coherence in the modern world. Der Tod des Virgil (1945; tr. The Death of Virgil, 1945) is a lyrical, stream-of-consciousness novel stylistically evoking James Joyce. His Hugo von Hofmannstahl and His Time (1964, tr. 1984) is one of the great accounts of fin-de-siècle Vienna. Also a mathematician and businessman, Broch lived in the United States after 1938.

Bibliography

See biography by P. M. Lützeler (1987); studies by T. Ziolkowski (1964) and E. Schlant (1971; tr. 1987).

Broch, Hermann

(born Nov. 1, 1886, Vienna—died May 30, 1951, New Haven, Conn., U.S.) Austrian writer. A student of physics, mathematics, and philosophy, Broch published his first major work, The Sleepwalkers (1931–32), when he was in his 40s. A trilogy tracing the disintegration of European society between 1888 and 1918, it exemplifies his innovative multidimensional novels in its use of many different narrative forms to present a wide range of experiences. His other novels include The Death of Virgil (1945), which presents the last 18 hours of Virgil's life, and The Spell (1953), a portrayal of a Hitlerian stranger's domination of a village. He also wrote essays, letters, and reviews.