Abstract
This chapter discusses the complex nuances of Mahler's socio-cultural and national allegiances in the context of the German/Czech-Bohemian axis of the late nineteenth century. It calls upon a recently discovered, politically charged text on the composer written by Viennese exile Alfred Rosenzweig in the 1940s. This text, which has also been translated, critically annotated, and published by the present author, proposes the placement of Mahler's music within a specifically Austrian as opposed to German symphonic lineage; posits the view of Mahler as anti-Wagnerian rather than Wagner epigone; and emphasises Mahler's profound spiritual and musical affiliation with the distinct, non-German culture of Central-Eastern Europe.