A Companion to the Works of Thomas Bernhard (Studies in German Literature, Linguistics, and Culture) (Studies in German Literature Linguistics and Culture)

Since the death of Thomas Bernhard in 1989, the literary reputation of this complex and unique writer has risen to the point that he is now regarded as a major European figure. Bernhard emerged in the 1960s as one of Austria's major writers, challenging the popularity of such established writers as Heinrich Bll and Gnter Grass on the German literary scene. His idiosyncratic prose consists of a tragic-comic blend of themes such as suicide, madness, and isolation combined with highly satirical and histrionic invectives against culture, tradition, and society. As a skillful impresario of public scandals by means of verbal assaults upon Austrian elite culture, Bernhard also earned himself the epithet of bertreibungsknstler (artist of exaggeration). In this art of cultural and political provocation Bernhard remains unmatched to the present day. This volume of essays provides contributions by well-known critics that examine the most salient aspects of Bernhard's work, offering insights into literary strategies and public themes that made Bernhard one of Europe's masters of modern prose and drama. Essays examine Bernhard's complex artistic sensibility, his impact on Austria's critical memory, his relation to the legacy of Austrian Jewish culture, his representative value as Austria's prime literary export, and his cosmopolitanism and its significance for the rapidly changing multicultural landscape of Europe. Matthias Konzett is Associate Professor of German at Yale University. He is the author of The Rhetoric of National Dissent in Thomas Bernhard, Peter Handke, and Elfriede Jelinek (Camden House, 2000). Click here to view the introduction (PDF file 97KB) New essays by leading scholars on major aspects of the most significant Austrian writer of the postwar generation.Since the death of Thomas Bernhard in 1989, the literary reputation of this complex and unique writer has risen to the point that he is now regarded as a major European figure. Bernhard emerged in the 1960s as one of Austria's major writers, challenging the popularity of such established writers as Heinrich Böll and Günter Grass on the German literary scene. His idiosyncratic prose consists of a tragic-comic blend of themes such as suicide, madness, and isolation combined with highly satirical and histrionic invectives against culture, tradition, and society. As a skillful impresario of public scandals by means of verbal assaults upon Austrian elite culture, Bernhard also earned himself the epithet of Übertreibungskünstler (artist of exaggeration). In this art of cultural and political provocation Bernhard remains unmatched to the present day. This volume of essays provides contributions by well-known critics that examine the most salient aspects of Bernhard's work, offering insights into literary strategies and public themes that made Bernhard one of Europe's masters of modern prose and drama. Essays examine Bernhard's complex artistic sensibility, his impact on Austria's critical memory, his relation to the legacy of Austrian Jewish culture, his representative value as Austria's prime literary export, and his cosmopolitanism and its significance forthe rapidly changing multicultural landscape of Europe. Matthias Konzett is Associate Professor of German at Yale University. He is the author of The Rhetoric of National Dissent in Thomas Bernhard, Peter Handke, and Elfriede Jelinek (Camden House, 2000). Click here to view the introduction (PDF file 97KB) Since the death of Thomas Bernhard in 1989, the literary reputation of this complex and unique writer has risen to the point that he is now regarded as a major European figure. Bernhard emerged in the 1960s as one of Austria's major writers, challenging the popularity of such established writers as Heinrich Böll and Günter Grass on the German literary scene. His idiosyncratic prose consists of a tragic-comic blend of themes such as suicide, madness, and isolation combined with highly satirical and histrionic invectives against culture, tradition, and society. As a skillful impresario of public scandals by means of verbal assaults upon Austrian elite culture, Bernhard also earned himself the epithet of Übertreibungskünstler (artist of exaggeration). In this art of cultural and political provocation Bernhard remains unmatched to the present day. This volume of essays provides contributions by well-known critics that examine the most salient aspects of Bernhard's work, offering insights into literary strategies and public themes that made Bernhard one of Europe's masters of modern prose and drama. Essays examine Bernhard's complex artistic sensibility, his impact on Austria's critical memory, his relation to the legacy of Austrian Jewish culture, his representative value as Austria's prime literary export, and his cosmopolitanism and its significance forthe rapidly changing multicultural landscape of Europe.

Matthias Konzett is Associate Professor of German at Yale University. He is the author of The Rhetoric of National Dissent in Thomas Bernhard, Peter Handke, and Elfriede Jelinek (Camden House, 2000).

Click here to view the introduction (PDF file 97KB) Since the death of Thomas Bernhard in 1989, the literary reputation of this complex and unique writer has risen to the point that he is now regarded as a major European figure. Bernhard emerged in the 1960s as one of Austria's major writers, challenging the popularity of such established writers as Heinrich Böll and Günter Grass on the German literary scene. His idiosyncratic prose consists of a tragic-comic blend of themes such as suicide, madness, and isolation combined with highly satirical and histrionic invectives against culture, tradition, and society. As a skillful impresario of public scandals by means of verbal assaults upon Austrian elite culture, Bernhard also earned himself the epithet of Übertreibungskünstler (artist of exaggeration). In this art of cultural and political provocation Bernhard remains unmatched to the present day. This volume of essays provides contributions by well-known critics that examine the most salient aspects of Bernhard's work, offering insights into literary strategies and public themes that made Bernhard one of Europe's masters of modern prose and drama. Essays examine Bernhard's complex artistic sensibility, his impact on Austria's critical memory, his relation to the legacy of Austrian Jewish culture, his representative value as Austria's prime literary export, and his cosmopolitanism and its significance for the rapidly changing multicultural landscape of Europe. Matthias Konzett is Associate Professor of German at Yale University. He is the author of The Rhetoric of National Dissent in Thomas Bernhard, Peter Handke, and Elfriede Jelinek (Camden House, 2000) Machine Generated Contents Note: Bernhard In The Public -- Introduction -- National Iconoclasm: Thomas Bernhard And The Austrian Avant-garde -- Matthias Konzett 1 -- Perverted Attitudes Of Mourning In The Wake Of Thomas Bernhard's Death -- Marlene Streeruwitz 23 -- The Established Outsider: Thomas Bernhard -- Dagmar Lorenz 29 -- A Testament Betrayed: Bernhard And His Legacy -- Stephen D. Dowden 51 -- Bernhard's Poetics -- Homeland, Death, And Otherness In Thomas Bernhard's Early Lyrical Works -- Paola Bozzi 71 -- The Broken Window Handle: Thomas Bernhard's Notion Of Weltbezug -- Riidiger Girner 89 -- Thomas Bernhard's Poetics Of Comedy -- Wendelin Schmidt-dengler 105 -- Bernhard And Drama -- Fragments Of A Deluge: The Theater Of Thomas Bernhard's Prose -- Mark M. Anderson 119 -- The Stranger Inside The Word: From Thomas Bernhard's Plays To The -- Anatomical Theater Of Elfriede Jelinek -- Gitta Honegger 137 -- Costume Drama: Performance And Identity In Bernhard's Works -- Andrew Webber 149 -- Bernhard's Social Worlds -- Language Speaks. Anglo-bernhard: Thomas Bernhard In Translation -- Gitta Honegger 169 -- Ungleichzeitigkeiten: Class Relationships In Bernhard's Fiction -- Jonathan Long 187 -- Thomas Bernhard's Der Untergeher: Newtonian Realities And Deterministic Chaos -- Willy Riemer 209 -- My Latest Encounter With Bernhard -- Marlene Streeruwitz 223. Edited By Matthias Konzett. Includes Bibliographical References (p. [229]-242) And Index. CONTENTS 6 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 8 ABBREVIATIONS 10 Bernhard in the Public 12 Introduction: National Iconoclasm: Thomas Bernhard and the Austrian Avant-garde 14 Perverted Attitudes of Mourning in the Wake of Thomas Bernhard’s Death 36 The Established Outsider: Thomas Bernhard 42 A Testament Betrayed: Bernhard and His Legacy 64 Bernhard’s Poetics 82 Homeland, Death, and Otherness in Thomas Bernhard’s Early Lyrical Works 84 The Broken Window Handle: Thomas Bernhard’s Notion of Weltbezug 102 Thomas Bernhard’s Poetics of Comedy 118 Bernhard and Drama 130 Fragments of a Deluge: The Theater of Thomas Bernhard’s Prose 132 The Stranger Inside the Word: From Thomas Bernhard’s Plays to the Anatomical Theater of Elfriede Jelinek 150 Costume Drama: Performance and Identity in Bernhard’s Works 162 Bernhard’s Social Worlds 180 Language Speaks. Anglo-Bernhard: Thomas Bernhard in Translation 182 Ungleichzeitigkeiten: Class Relationships in Bernhard’s Fiction 200 Thomas Bernhard’s Der Untergeher: Newtonian Realities and Deterministic Chaos 222 My Latest Encounter with Bernhard 236 WORKS CITED 242 CONTRIBUTORS 256 INDEX 258