Thomas Antonic

Thomas Antonic is a poet, musician, filmmaker, performance artist, Beat scholar, translator, mainly living and working in Vienna, Austria, and in the small town of Point Arena at the Pacific Coast in Northern California. He holds a PhD in German Studies from the University of Vienna and has been a Postdoc Fellow at Stanford University and the University of California in Berkeley.

His most recent Beat-related publications and releases include the essay collection “ruth weiss: Beat Poetry, Jazz, Art” (De Gruyter 2021, co-edited with Estíbaliz Encarnación Pinedo), the book “Amongst Nazis: William S. Burroughs in Vienna 1936/37” (Moloko, 2020), the documentary film “One More Step West is the Sea: ruth weiss” (2021) (film website: ruth-weiss.com) which premiered at the Diagonale Festival for Austrian Film, won the New York Independent Cinema Awards in the category ”Best International Documentary Feature“ in 2021 and has been in the official selection of numerous international film festivals.

From 2017 to 2025 he conducted a research project about the transnational connections between Austrian literature and the Beat Generation. In June 2025 Antonic will start to lead a research project at the Danube University in Krems, Austria, the aim of which is to create a multi-volume critical edition of ruth weiss’ Complete Works.