Alexander Lernet-Holenia (21 October 1897 – 3 July 1976) was an Austrian poet, novelist, dramaturgist and writer of screenplays and historical studies who produced a heterogeneous literary opus that included poetry, psychological novels describing the intrusion of otherworldly or unreal experiences into reality, and recreational films.

It has been called "the only Austrian resistance novel" because the plot features an ideologically troubled central character, hints at the existence of active political opposition, and because the Nazi government banned and quarantined the first edition of the book.

[1] Although Lernet-Holenia made himself a lucrative business as a popular screenplay writer during the Third Reich, he was one of the few accomplished Austrian authors who kept his distance from National Socialism, and refused to endorse the Nazi political system or to participate in its notorious blood and soil literary efforts.

However, to stay in business he had to make arrangements with the regime, which included becoming chief dramaturgist at the "Heeres-Filmstelle" (the audiovisual media center of the Wehrmacht in Berlin, charged with producing propaganda films for military cinemas) after the Polish campaign.

In 1969 he was elected president of the Austrian section of the PEN Club but resigned in 1972 in protest when the Nobel Prize was awarded to Heinrich Böll, whom Lernet-Holenia regarded as a supporter of the Red Army Faction.