Thomas Hartl was born in 1965 smack in the center of Salzburg, Austria. Tortured early A.M. by assorted bus tourists chanting Papageno's Song (from Mozart's Magic Flute) on their way to the city's places of interest (he still abhors Mozart's balls -- no pun where none intended). Grandfather no. 1 a Nazi, Grandfather no. 2 a Communist. Mostly playing truant (and bass guitar) in senior classes while reading Dostoevsky, cultivating a strong adolescent identification with Dostoevsky's idiot. Barely managing school leaving exam with the objective of enrolling in English and American Studies at the local university. Seriously infected by postmodernism and the F(ederman) virus (still no cure known). Master's thesis on the real fictitious discourses of French-American "postmodern" author Raymond Federman (published in 1995 by The Edwin Mellen Press, New York). Study visit at the State University of New York at Buffalo including a guest performance at the San Diego State University, where he meets up with eminent scholar and critic Larry McCaffery to start work on a "recyclopedia" of Federman's work. As a Professor, he held graduate classes on Whitman, the American road novel and Paul Auster, and later worked as a translator and cultural journalist in Vienna. Also published on American Studies and Peace as well as on waterway management. To be continued ...