The writer worked on it for more than twenty years, but never managed to finish it. Despite this, ‘The Man Without Qualities’ became one of the greatest works of German-language literature, which, without exaggeration, can be called the greatest study of the human soul. 1913. The government of the Austro-Hungarian Empire is establishing a committee that is to develop a special plan of events for the upcoming celebration of the seventieth anniversary of the reign of Emperor Franz Joseph in five years. The committee consists of industrialists, bankers, aristocrats, military officers and politicians. By chance, a young officer, engineer and mathematician Ulrich, a ‘man without qualities,’ a cynic, devoid of the meaning of life and indifferent to moral standards, also falls into its ranks.