There is no one more clear-eyed than Peter Rosei when it comes to depicting the fate of the individual in a globalised, hyper-commercial world.
The threads of Peter Rosei’s new novel weave through Tokyo and Vienna, Chicago and Fiji, Utah and Cairo. In writing as precise as it is sophisticated, with a keen eye for the darker sides of human nature and the financial world, Rosei traces the rise and fall of Robert Perwald. At first, the brilliant economist seems to be a rising star, but when he moves to Tokyo to be with his Japanese wife Yoko, the first cracks begin to appear. Perwald loses his way, falling in with other people whose lives have somehow got off track, until finally he returns to Vienna, where he slips back into depending on his mother. Sharp-eyed and relentless, Rosei explores just how unpredictable life can sometimes be—and traces what ultimately leads Perwald to murder.
Book details
208 pages
format:125 x 205
ISBN: 9783701718184
Release date: 09.03.2026
When it was first published in 1974, Peter Rosei’s extraordinary piece of travel writing was celebrated as a unique ‘mausoleum for humanity at the end of its history’ (DIE ZEIT). In the book, a kind of Kaspar Hauser figure sets off through a world without people, trying to learn more about it. Does this world only exist in his mind, or is it real? Rosei sketches out the topography of a landscape devoid of human beings, a world as meticulously detailed as a hallucination. We see it all through the eyes of one solitary wanderer: plains, mountains, snow and ice, always moving towards the next horizon. An audacious journey to the edges of perception, now released in a new edition—this is a rediscovery of disturbing contemporary relevance.
Book details
New edition
120 pages
format:125 x 205
ISBN: 9783701718191
Release date: 09.03.2026
Together with H. C. Artmann Peter Rosei goes on numerous motorcycle tours starting from Salzburg. They just go with the flow, one time even until Venice. The novel “From here to there” is born out of this spirit of restlessness and desire for freedom. Published in 1978, it sketches the story of a young man, exploring Europe on a motorcycle. The atmosphere of the novel is characterized by a state of consciousness between reality and dream. Descriptions of a fleeting and intense moments of happiness are highlighted within this story in which constant movement is the leitmotif. The new edition reuses the emblematic cover design of Walter Pichler and allows a broad public to enjoy Peter Rosei’s novel which is often considered his best!
Can a poet tell the truth? Peter Rosei attempts exactly this – radical, self-critical and with the firm belief that life is wonderful.
“Wonderful life” is not simply Peter Rosei’s autobiography. It is the attempt to achieve literary truthfulness and tell at the same time the story of a writer who has lived many lives. His motto could be: Life is wonderful, even if it is dreadful at some points. After a humble upbringing, the young man quickly makes good money as the private secretary of the painter Ernst Fuchs. However, he decides to leave everything behind, in order to follow his vocation as poet. Years of deep crises are followed by an adventurous bohemian life side by side with artists and writers of the seventies and eighties, among them his closest and long-standing friend H. C. Artmann. And then there is the big turning point – but read yourself: truth and poetry complement each other in this text.
Book details
224 pages
format:140 x 215
ISBN: 9783701717668
Release date: 11.04.2023
First published in 1977, “Wer war Edgar Allan?” marked Peter Rosei’s literary breakthrough. An enigmatic game of deception, it is also a rapturous homage to a deeply autumnal Venice and to Poe, the master of cryptic storytelling. Sympathetically adapted into film by Michael Haneke in 1984, the novel combines hallucinatory delirium with precise societal diagnosis. A drug-addicted student roams through Venice, a shady Contessa falls from the roof garden of her palazzo, a drug syndicate quietly rules behind the scenes, and a mysterious gentleman by the name of Edgar Allan seems to be pulling many dark strings. This new edition features Walter Pichler’s cult cover and makes the post-war classic available to a wide readership once more.
Book details
144 pages
format:125 x 205
ISBN: 9783701717422
Release date: 16.03.2021
With no illusions but plenty of empathy, Peter Rosei explores the hardships of searching for happiness in the current times.
Lena from the Styrian village, Andràs from the Hungarian tower block and Eva Bartuska from the Czech town of Brno have all come to Vienna seeking happiness and fulfilment. They drift through the city propelled by the promise of social and economic betterment and the dream of true love. But what is this prized happiness? Sometimes it's a branch manager position, sometimes a wild night out, and often a flimsy illusion that shatters on the rocks of everyday hostility. Yet in this novel on the myth of happiness, Rosei strikes an uncharacteristically conciliatory tone. “And so, those who come eye to eye with the degradations of life and abandon all hope, ultimately still have a right to the happiness they long for.”
Book details
176 pages
format:125 x 205
ISBN: 9783701717415
Release date: 16.03.2021
A wonderful book that takes the reader on new journeys across time and place.
Peter Rosei has always been on the move, led by an unfailing curiosity for landscapes and cities, people and their stories. 'The Great Road' for the first time brings together the chronicles of his travels across five decades and three continents. We get to know Peter Rosei as an acutely observant and knowledgeable traveller, who is open to impressions and images, scents and sounds. He steadily approaches the unknown and brings it close, without diminishing its fascination. This wonderfully labyrinthine book takes us from Peking to Los Alamos, from Seoul to Moscow, from Paris to Texas via Bratislava and Istanbul, brimming with the author's appreciation for the vibrancy of the world and the diversity of human life and survival.
Book details
256 pages
format:140 x 220
ISBN: 9783701717170
Release date: 24.09.2019
Peter Rosei's great Vienna novel, finally available again!
"Whatever you need, you take" Vienna in a gold rush: World War two is over, the black markets are booming, and shady characters are on their way to a new life. The brilliant first part of Rosei's cycle "Wiener Dateien" (Vienna files) span the period from corruption in postwar Vienna to the fancy homes of affluent business people in the 1980s.
With artistic ease, he creates an intricate web entangling the lives of parvenus and bon vivants, professors and politicians, perfect wives and superwomen. At the center of it all are Alfred and Georg, two very different friends: One is an anarchist, the other a baby boomer. Rosei's novel is intense, enthusiastically written prose portraying a city where everything has its price and nothing is sacred…
Book details
284 pages
format:125 x 205
ISBN: 9783701716647
Release date: 26.04.2016
Mitteleuropäisches Panorama und präziser gesellschaftlicher Befund: Peter Rosei schreibt pointiert und unerbittlich über unsere orientierungslose Zeit.
Jana, the ambitious daughter of a tired-out hotel owner in the Slovakian Tatras, only has her beauty to help her realise her dreams of a better and more exciting life in the wealthy West. She encounters the profiteer Gstettner, who conducts his murky dealings from Vienna. No matter whether it’s fake designer goods or desperate refugees, Gstettner will trade with anything. Tone Kral, a farmer’s son from the Slovenian Karst region who ekes out a living as a waiter and gigolo, and the aged Viennese theatre critic Kalman complete the quartet. Eager for life, the four characters try to make their way in the grey zone between the old and new political order.
Book details
176 pages
format:125 x 205
ISBN: 9783701716906
Release date: 16.01.2018