Georg Trakl (1887-1914) is commonly seen as one of the leading figures of the Austro-German expressionist movement in literature during the early part of the twentieth century. Marked by the perpetual use of nightmarish visions of disintegration, death, murder, and natural decay, his poems bear haunting witness to a world devoid of faith, meaning, and hope. Nevertheless, Trakl still captures glimpses of beauty in this wasteland, a beauty he usually equates with erotic or familial relationships, a beauty that in his view can only be seen in contrast with death and horror.
