The Dual Monarchy of Austria-Hungary was formed in 1867. Its titular sovereign was His Imperial and Royal Highness Franz Joseph, Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary. Though ceptical voices had warned that this arrangement would be detrimental to the autonomy and prestige of both sides, the Dual Monarchy nevertheless fl ourished for the next four decades, until it  ollapsed in ruins at the end of the First World War. The short stories in this collection are by Austrian and Hungarian authors who were at the height of their powers during the brief, meteoric heyday of this extraordinary multi-ethnic empire.

The authors of the stories in this collection were all well known in their day, their works avidly read and commented on in the newspapers and the coffee houses. Still today these stories provide a fascinating portrait of the world their writers knew, and a running commentary on the life and assumptions of what for many was a golden age, in a time and place that have vanished beyond recall.