"From the decadent turn of the century to the Third Reich, the acerbic satirist Karl Kraus was one of the most famous and feared intellectuals in Europe. Uniquely combining humor with profundity and venom with compassion, Dicta and Contradicta is a bonanza of scandalous wit from Vienna's answer to Oscar Wilde.". "Through the polemical and satirical magazine Die Fackel (the torch), which he founded in 1899, Kraus launched wicked but unrelentingly witty attacks on literary and media corruption, sexual repression, militarism, and the social hypocrisy of fin-de-siecle Vienna. His barbed aphorisms were an essential part of his running commentary on Viennese culture."--BOOK JACKET.