Alma Mahler-Werfel was one of the most fascinating and ambivalent of twentieth-century women. Her book "Gustav Mahler: Memories and Letters" (1940) includes 159 of Mahler's letters, yet only 37 of these were published in their original, unedited form. Alma's omissions, abridgements and alterations were all part of the legend, and reveal that it was her intention to present herself in as flattering a light as possible. This new edition restores the original texts, and includes a further 188 letters as well as other, hitherto unpublished documents. The letters are supplemented by commentaries, which provide background information about the people and events mentioned in them, and help place the letters in their cultural and historical context. These documents depict a close and sometimes explosive relationship between two people of widely differing background, character and temperament. The Mahler that emerges from these authentic, unabridged sources is warmer and more touchingly human than the figure as presented by Alma in her expurgated selection of Memories and Letters.

This is the third volume of de La Grange's monumental study of the life and music of Gustav Mahler, one of the most influential composers of the 20th century. Forty years of research and a vast array of documentary material are here co-ordinated into the definitive study of this supremely gifted musician. This volume, covering the years 1904-1907, shows Mahler in his final years at the Hofoper coping with the rival demands on his energy and creative powers of the Opera on the one hand and his continuing struggle for recognition as composer in his own right. It describes the tragic events of 1907, Mahlers last year in Vienna: the death of his daughter Putzi, the crisis which led him to leave the Opera, and the alarming medical diagnosis which made him cut down on much loved physical activities, at least for a time.

In an age of artistic accomplishment, Gustav Mahler stood out as one of the supremely gifted musicians of his generation. As a composer, he won acclaim for his startling originality. As a conductor, his relentless pursuit of perfection was sometimes seen as tyrannical by the singers and musicians who came under his baton. And always, even with his greatest triumphs, he provoked controversy among the critics. Now Henry-Louis de La Grange, Mahler's celebrated biographer, offers new insight into Mahler's life and work with his latest look at the career of this musical genius.

In Mahler in Vienna, La Grange follows the great musician to the intellectual and artistic capital of turn-of-the-century Europe. From Mahler's spectacular debut as director of the Vienna Court Opera to his triumphant tour of the continent, we see him at the height of his powers. La Grange vividly portrays the marvelous spectacle, including the extraordinary range of artists who worked with Mahler--the composers Dvorak, Gustave Charpentier, Richard Strauss, Zemlinsky, and Schoenberg; the painters, architects, and decorators of the Secession (led by Klimt); and the writers Hauptmann, Dehmel, Hofmannsthal, and Schnitzler. In Vienna, the conductor worked a revolution in standards of performance and (along with Secession painter Alfred Roller) scenic illustration. It was also during this period that he wrote some of his best-loved symphonies--including his Fourth and Fifth--and his three orchestral song-cycles and collections, the Wunderhorn-, Ruckert-, and Kindertotenlieder. For each of these works La Grange provides full notes and analytic descriptions. And the author does not neglect Mahler's temptestuous personal life, for during these years he met Alma Schindler--"the most beautiful woman in Vienna." La Grange deftly captures the story of their engagement and marriage in 1902.

Mahler remains one of the greatest figures in the history f music, a man whose work provokes strong reactions today as in his own time. This account is just one part of the definitive four-volume biography Gustav Mahler, the result of a thirty-year research project; the author has personally translated it from his original French into English. Scrupulously researched and insightfully written, this volume is a brilliant account of a critical epoch in Mahler's life.