Mehr Bild als Text. Arthur Schnitzlers Postkarten im Kontext der Briefkultur und mobilen Schreibpraxis des Jungen Wien

[More picture than text. Arthur Schnitzler’s postcards in the context of letter culture and mobile writing practice in Young Vienna]

Abstract

Unlike his literary works, Arthur Schnitzler’s correspondence has so far received comparatively little attention from philological research. This study is the first to focus on Schnitzler’s picture postcards. They form a central component of his epistolary output. The following paper seeks to trace the development of his specific postal practice through a phase model. The chronological perspective reveals how Schnitzler’s engagement with this new medium evolves gradually, from experimental use before 1900, through the confident deployment of the postcard as an instrument of self-fashioning, to its appropriation as a vehicle for personalised motifs. Throughout his life, Schnitzler consistently attributes meaning to the pictorial side of the postcard and actively incorporates it into his epistolary communication. He does so at times scenically, at times ironically, at times reflectively.