"Against the dry rational politics of liberalism, the powerful leaders of these movements developed what became known as the "the sharper key", a mode of political behavior at once more abrasive, more creative, and more satisfying to the life of feeling than the deliberative style of liberals." Schorske, Fin-de Siecle Vienna: Politics and Culture (New York: Vintage Books,  1981), 119

"At the same time that tensions were developing between states in this turn-of-the-century world, fundamental conflicts were surfacing in virtually all areas of human endeavor and behavior: in the arts, in fashion, in sexual mores, between generations, in politics. The whole motif of liberation, which has become so central to our century--be it the emancipation of women, homosexuals, proletariat, youth, appetites, peoples--comes into view at the turn of the century." Eksteins, Modris. Rites of Spring: The Great War and the Birth of the Modern Age. (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1989), xiii-xvi.