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Karl Kraus, widely regarded as one of the greatest satirists of the twentieth century, was primarily a prose writer who produced thousands of critical essays and aphorisms. He also wrote a considerable amount of poetry that was collected in nine volumes between 1916 and 1930. The contents of most of Kraus's books first appeared in his journal, Die Fackel (The Torch), which was published from 1899 to 1936. Kraus, who forced the powerful and the pitiful alike to stand before the tribunal of his satire, was a legend in his lifetime, variously adored and vilified by his contemporaries. The key to his life and work is his relationship to language. As Erich Heller puts it, "Karl Kraus did not write 'in a language,' but through him the beauty, profundity, and accumulated moral experience of the German language assumed personal shape and became the crucial witness in the case this inspired prosecutor brought against his time." Kraus saw an absolute congruity between word and world, language and life; the unworthiness of his "sprachverlassenes" (language-forsaken) age was defined for him by its treatment--or abuse--of language.
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