As a first compilation of its kind on jazz in Germanlanguageliterature, the present volume contains 16articles that broaden the current discussion aboutjazz in German, Austrian, and Swiss literature. Scholarsfrom diverse backgrounds trace the influence ofNorth American jazz on Western and Central Europethrough readings of novels, novellas, poems, radioplays, and essays about jazz, written or published inGerman from the mid-1920s through the twenty-firstcentury. At the core of modernity and urban sociohistoricalculture, jazz maintains its relevance forGerman-speaking cultures as a vehicle for addressingissues of social class, gender, race and ethnicity, aswell as regional, national, and transnational identity.