'Die leere Mitte': Narrative Desire and Loss in Moos auf den Steinen and its Filmic Adaptation

Fritsch’s first novel, Moos auf den Steinen, has frequently harvested criticism for its perceived adherence to a mythologized image of Austria’s Habsburg legacy. Using psychoanalytic conceptions of narrative desire to approach the novel and its filmic adaptation, this article reevaluates the status of the Habsburg Myth in both works and uses the film adaptation to question the assumed traditionalism of the novel.