The Loser by Thomas Bernhard - 1983- translated from German 1991 by Jack Dawson

German Literature Month. Links to Reviews

Read so far during 

German Literature Month Eight 

1. Once a Jailbird by Hans Fallada - 1947

Thomas  Bernhard

Born 1931 in The Netherlands 

Died 1989 in Austria by assisted suicide,

The Loser: A Novel by Thomas Bernhard - 1991

Wittgenstein’s Nephew was my first encounter with the work of a man many consider Austria’s greatest post World War Two novelist, Thomas Bernhard took place during German Literature Month in November of 2014.  Since then I read, in this order, Woodcutters, Gargoyles, Concrete, and Extinction.  After adding Loser to my read list, there remain two novels translated into English and available as Kindles I have not read, Frost and Lime.  I decided to read Loser this year as I found it a while ago on sale for $1.95. (It is now back up to $11.95.

All of his novels are long monologues, very long, mostly of a man, never a woman, thinking about events, people, whole countries, especially Austria, his family, old acquaintances, all of which he holds in near total contempt.  

As is common in his works, the narrator of The Loser has a significant inheritance, of course he has no gratitude for this.  There are two prominent off-stage persons in the monologue, the Canadian piano virtuoso Glenn Gould and an acquaintance of the narrator.  Both the narrator and his friend aspired to be concert pianists until they heard Glenn Gould play.  They knew they could never approximate his work.  The narrator never really found any direction in his life, his friend became a piano teacher.  The Loser is a refracted reflection on genius, on music, suicide, and a number of other random topics.

The long monologue is interesting, you can slowly recover the actual events of their lives if you read carefully.

I enjoyed The Loser.

Thomas Bernhard is not for everyone.  His narrators may bore some.

I will, I hope, eventually read the remaining two of his books still on my list.

Woodcutters by Thomas Bernhard (1984)

This is my fifth venture into the dark world of Thomas Bernhard.  In normal Bernardian fashion, the story is told by a Viennese man who thinks everyone but himself is a complete idiot.  It is one long paragraph.  It is an attack on the values of bourgeois Vienna, the art, the literature and the people.  The narrator hates everyone.

The story is set an "artistic party" hosted by a married couple the narrator was friends with thirty years ago.  The occasion is the observation of the death by suicide, unfortunately he ran into the couple while on a stroll in the park and they invited him to the party.  

Bernhard is not for everyone.  I am quite fond of his work.  It is fun to try to reconstruct what really is going on through the narration of the often unbalanced but always very cultured and intelligent narrators.

I hope to eventually read all of his work available as a Kindle

Please share your experience with Thomas Bernhard with us.

NovelsEdit

• Frost (1963), translated by Michael Hofmann (2006)
• Gargoyles (Verstörung, 1967), translated by Richard and Clara Winston (1970). *
• The Lime Works (Das Kalkwerk, 1970), translated by Sophie Wilkins (1973)
• Correction (Korrektur, 1975), translated by Sophie Wilkins (1979). *
• Yes (Ja, 1978), translated by Ewald Osers (1991)
• The Cheap-Eaters (Die Billigesser, 1980), translated by Ewald Osers (1990)
• Concrete (Beton, 1982), translated by David McLintock (1984). *
• Wittgenstein's Nephew (Wittgensteins Neffe, 1982), translated by David McLintock (1988) *
• The Loser (Der Untergeher, 1983), translated by Jack Dawson (1991)
• Woodcutters (Holzfällen: Eine Erregung, 1984), translated by Ewald Osers (1985) and as Woodcutters, by David McLintock (1988). *
• Old Masters: A Comedy (Alte Meister. Komödie, 1985), translated by Ewald Osers (1989)
• Extinction (Auslöschung, 1986), translated by David McLintock (1995). *
• On the Mountain (In der Höhe, written 1959, published 1989), translated by Russell Stockman (1991)

(I have read and posted on the items marked with a *)

Mel u

Gargoyles by Thomas Bernhard (1967, translated by Richard and Clara Winston)

Our great thanks to Max u for the gift card that made it possible to read this book.

This is a post by Ambrosia Boussweau, European Correspondent of The Reading Life

Gargoyles is the fourth novel by Thomas Bernhard(1931 to 1989) we have so far read.  First there was his Wittgenstein's Nephew, then  Concrete, and after that Extinction.  I, as does Mel u, find his works compelling in an odd sort of way I cannot really articulate.  I know eventually I will be driven to read all nine of his novels.  (The Reading Life was very kindly given an advance review copy of the first bilingual edition of his early poetry and I hope to read and post  on that in November for German Literature Month.)

Gargoyles is set in Austria.  As the story opens, it is in part narrated by the son of the doctor, a doctor and his son are out on calls to his various patients.  They range from a musical prodigy locked in a cage, a woman on the verge of death and other macabre characters, hence the title Gargoyles.  It was very disturbing, especially since it rang so true, to listen to the doctor tell his son how horrible life was for the women in their area.  One thing we can expect, at least so far we have been so treated, is a long rant by  a mentally unbalanced a bit paranoid but at times supremely brilliant and erudite figure and Gargoyles has a great one.

Thomas Bernhard's work is very dark, quite over all contemptuous of humanity.  It is brilliant and a painful pleasure to enter his world but don't expect anything uplifting!  

Please share your experiences with Bernhard with us.

Ambrosia Boussweau, European Correspondent

The Reading Life

 

 

Concrete by Thomas Bernhard (1982)

There are still ten days left in German Literature Month IV.  Lots of time left to participate. There are already over a hundred posts, reading through them will give you lots of great reading ideas.

German Literature Month November 2014 Year IV

The schedule and guidelines for participation are on the event webpage.  Just reading the  posts of all the other participants is tremendously informative. There is an interesting contest or two and some prizes to be won.  One of the tasks participants are charged with is reading a work first published in 2014 and this collection qualifies.  

I am very happy to be once again participating in German Literature Month, hosted by Caroline of Beauty is a Sleeping Cat and Lizzy of Lizzy's Literary Life.   Events like this are one of the great things about being part of the international book blog community.  I know there is a lot of work that goes into a month long event and I offer my thanks to Lizzy and Caroline

Works I have so far read for German Literature Month 2014

1.   Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse

2.   Gertrude by Hermann Hesse 

3.  "Diary of a School Boy" by Robert Walser (no post)

4.  Steppenwolf by Herman Hesse

5.  Burning Secret by Stefan Zweig 1925

6.  Life Goes On by Hans Keilson

7.  Comedy in a Minor Key by Hans Keilson

8.  "The Wall" by Jurek Becker

9.  "Romeo" by Jurek Becker

10.   "The Invisible City" by Jurek Becker.

11.  Wittgenstein's Nephew by Thomas Bernhard

12. "Dostoevsky's Idiot" by Robert Walser

13.  "French Newspapers" by Robert Wasler 

14.  Jakob the Lier by Jurek Becker

15.  The Trial by Franz Kafka 1915,

16.  "The Seamstress" by Rainer Maria Rilke  1894

17.  "The Experiement or the Victory of Children" by Unica Zürn 1950

18.  "The Star Above the Forest" by Stefan Zweig. 1924

19.  "Saint Cecilia or the Power of Music" by Heinrich von Kleist 1810

20.  Amok by Stefan Zweig 1923

21.  Concrete 1982

Concrete is my second novel by the highly regarded German novelist, Thomas Bernhard (1931 to 1989).  My first was Wittgenstein's Nephew, which I liked enough to expand by reading of Bernhard.  A bit of research indicated that perhaps his highest regarded novel is Concrete so I decided to read it next.  I liked both novels a lot, with no clear preference emerging.  

Both novels are a long, one paragraph monolgue/rant by a highly cultured, very intelligent slightly unbalanced and a bit paranoid wealthy  man living in Vienna.  Concrete starts out with his plans to write a book about a composer he greatly admires. He talks about all of the research he has done.  Then he begins one of numerous diatribes about how his sister is totally undermining his ability to work.  After a while we begin to see the narrator through the sister's eyes.  He keeps coming back to how the sister is ruining his work.  She is a wealthy real estate investor and he despises her world of money while living off his inheritance. The persona screams out Steppenwolf  to me.  His only love in life is classical music.  

He then kind of raves on about all the things he hates about Vienna followed by an account of why he cannot really move.  He is heavily medicated and we learn the minutiae of his daily routine. 

I liked this book a lot though I am not quite sure why.   The narrator reminds me of brilliant old friend from long ago who always would rant on about how everyone around him was either and idiot or a crook.

I did some more research and his other books sound similar.  I think I will next read his Gargoyles and then take it from there.

Mel von ü

Wittgenstein's Nephew by Thomas Bernhard (1982)

"If a lion could speak, we would not understand him."  -  Ludwig Wittgenstein 

German Literature Month November 2014 Year IV

The schedule and guidelines for participation are on the event webpage.  Just reading the  posts of all the other participants is tremendously informative. There is an interesting contest or two and some prizes to be won.  One of the tasks participants are charged with is reading a work first published in 2014 and this collection qualifies.  

I am very happy to be once again participating in German Literature Month, hosted by Caroline of Beauty is a Sleeping Cat and Lizzy of Lizzy's Literary Life.   Events like this are one of the great things about being part of the international book blog community.  I know there is a lot of work that goes into a month long event and I offer my thanks to Lizzy and Caroline

Works I have so far read for German Literature Month 2014

1.   Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse

2.   Gertrude by Hermann Hesse 

3.  "Diary of a School Boy" by Robert Walser (no post)

4.  Steppenwolf by Herman Hesse

5.  Burning Secret by Stefan Zweig

6.  Life Goes On by Hans Keilson

7.  Comedy in a Minor Key by Hans Keilson

8.  "The Wall" by Jurek Becker

9.  "Romeo" by Jurek Becker

10.   "The Invisible City" by Jurek Becker.

11.  Wittgenstein's Nephew by Thomas Bernhard

I have wanted to read Thomas Bernhard (1931 to 1989) for a while.  I decided to start with his Wittgenstein's Nephew for two reasons.  The first was simply that it is short at only 114 pages. I prefer to start new to me writers with a not terribly long work.  Secondly, in the long ago I read several times the major works of Ludwig Wittgenstein.  I also have read books that deal with  the pathology and background  of ultra wealthy Wittgenstein family.

Wittgenstein's Nephew is a one paragraph monologue told in the persona of the author about his friendship with a nephew of Ludwig Wittgenstein.  My post read research inducates it is considered a partially autobiographical novel.  Paul Wittgenstein is the son of Ludwig's brother, also named Paul.   Paul and the author were friends for many years.   When the story opens both are in a large hospital in Vienna, Thomas for his lungs and Paul was confined to the mental ward.  Paul, as did Ludwig, felt a contempt and hatred for the sources of his family money, arms dealing.  He had a great loathing for what he saw as the hypocrisy and ignorance of Viennese society. He had a tremendous passion for and love of opera, especially that of Wagner and Mozart.  I loved the account of how opera informed Paul's life.  Bernhard lets us feel Paul's emotions on experiencing Dering des Nibelugen.

For 114 pages this is a really rich book.  A brilliant picture of the life of Paul and the narrator emerges, we see the roots and growth of their friendship.  Thinking back to Hermann Hesse, I think both men might have at times seen themselves as s Steppenwolf, living among and from the "bourgeois" and having contempt for their ignorance but still always living among them.  In a great scene, the narrator is  being given a highly pretigious award.  Many cultural officials and much of Viennese literary and artistic society is at the presentation.  The narrator knows few have read his work even though they praise him as a genius and a credit to Austria.  During his acceptance speech he  offends the minister of culture who stands up in the audience and condemns him and walks out followed by almost all the audience.  It was just a hilarious scene.  Paul is a deeply fascinating character.  The depictions of the cafés in Vienna made me long to be there.

I think Thomas Bernhard will soon be added to my "read all I can list".  I need to read one more book first. I am seeking suggestions as to my next Bernhard.

There is an excellant webpage devoted to Thomas Bernhard here

http://www.thomasbernhard.org/

Mel u