Fritz Mauthner conceived, developed and composed these three volumes over a period of about 30 years. He is said to have been influenced by Friedrich Nietzsche's text fragment "Wahrheit und Lüge im außermoralischen Sinne". The volumes were published at a time of a general "language crisis" (see also: Arthur Schnitzler's Leutnant Gustl and Rainer Maria Rilke's Die Aufzeichnungen des Malte Laurids Brigge, among others). Mauthner is considered to be one of those authors who are often quoted and mentioned but whose works are rarely read. These editions are in the original German and need extensive editing. It should be noted that, after the poet Samuel Becket had radically thinned out his library, this three-volume work by Mauthner was one of the few remaining. His writing also influenced James Joyce.