The unlikely eventual existence of WG Sebald's four novels presupposes the writing of this book. But that's saying it all backwards, isn't it? The fact is Handke wrote first, and Sebald took what he started to its illogical conclusion with a magically sustained prose. Handke can be a bit dull and dour, his prose a bit labored, and his revelations a bit forced. But that is a given. He's also intensely and seriously sincere, to the point of humorlessness. But that's also something I have a love/hate relationship with. I admire his guts: to write so humorlessly requires true fearlessness. But what he achieves is a rhythm that is the beginning of enticement, if only he had more charm. Parts of this book were amazing!In the first section, the narrator recounts his family past, Rinkenberg, the Austrian village he comes from, and all his mixed emotions having to do with that. This was the most convincing section, because he was not trying to convince me of anything. The paralysis of prose would practically sing at times when an image came out of the clauses (closet?) so unexpectedly and so senselessly, but gleamed bright in the sun with significance. Some of his descriptions transcended description because they were always more than surface descriptions. That's what I mean by significance. Everything means so much to this narrator. When you see the blind window the way he sees it, it bowls you over.In the second section, the narrator is on foot and in trains in search of his older brother who he's never met but has heard countless stories about. He is in Slovenia, and you realize why that first section was necessary. Knowing where he was from makes this section so much more powerful, since much of what he sees holds its power precisely because of its difference. You rejoice with him at being finally away from home, where he can truly feel at home with the Slovenes who had no real home. (Then there's the other part about how his whole family was likely Slovene, and one of their ancestors may have been a leader in a revolt). Much of this section deals with language and history, and two little books that his brother left behind: a copybook filled with school notes, and a Slovenian-German dictionary with check marks next to the words his brother had a fondness for. Random story: I was having a nice lunch at the bar when a lady sat down next to me. She had a French accent and we started talking about books and travel. Somehow the topic veered towards Barcelona, a city I've stayed in and loved. Then, out of nowhere she says: "I love Barcelona, but I hate that they speak Catalan. It's just so annoying, it's like if all of America spoke English except one city, and I understand about their heritage, but it's not even a beautiful language," I almost choked on my food. So unexpected was this outburst, so utterly shocked was I at this proposition, that I had no way of responding. Would she have rather the whole city change their language for her convenience? Did she think there was no cultural, artistic, or historic value in a language's preservation, no matter her personal aesthetic judgements on its 'beauty'?The end of the second section of Repetition dealt with exactly this: the beauty of a language, the pure abstract thing that a language is, an experience conjurer, that it must be appreciated purely for its own existence and not just for any practical usage. I want to show that lady this section of the book, but she would likely not have understood. To her, a language is purely functional. But Filip Kobal, our narrator, is (like me) a sad-sack dreamer, a hopelessly impractical wanderer, and a storyteller.In the last section, our narrator reaches the Karst, a region of stunning beauty and wondrous natural formations. Caves abound. But his meditations, until this point quite moving, have perhaps a quality of over-reaching. He is trying to say something a bit too much, something about storytelling, and about finding his brother who he never finds, and the significance of it all was too much for me. It felt forced, like a coming of age story that happens all in his head. Or like trying to recount a dream's emotions without any of the dream imagery.Whereas earlier versions of this worked for me, like the blind window image, they worked even without logic, despite logic. I could understand the pure emotion of something that strikes one for myriad unexplainable reasons, not unlike Proust's madeleines, and guides one back to one's home where a scene unfolds almost as in a dream. A revelation out of nowhere. A something in real life that feels separated out in your memory, as if someone else had lived it. But here at the end of the book, the stretching for revelation was not accompanied by any specific image, or with anything really. The ending, with its hifalutin harping on storytelling seemed more like Handke putting his agenda down, rather than the narrator's own organic musing.
This book probably deserves more than three stars. The language is beautiful, and there are so many great sentences and descriptions. I had no idea what was going on though, I think it might be ignorance on my part about Austria and Slovenia, so much of the book was connected with the physical locations and place and their relationship between places and homelessness from one place that I had to make up in my head what I thought was being said, but my made up ideas didn't carry the weight Handke intended. The novel itself seemed out of place, there was something very 'modern' about it, taking place in the 1960's but the entire book also felt like it came from an earlier time, and that people don't necessarily write books like this anymore. What do I mean? I don't know, there was something about the book that straddled (ohhhhh, I see a link in the book now) over the two world wars with one foot on the literature of the of an earlier time and one in the 1960's. Reading the book was a very pleasant experience, and now that I'm thinking harder about the book as a whole I'm starting to appreciate it even more. I wouldn't recommend it to most people though, it's a bit too much of what gets called a 'writers book', which usually means a book where not much happens but which is written in an interesting and technically beautiful way.
What do You think about Repetition (1989)?
»Erzählung, wiederhole, das heißt, erneuere; immer neu hinausschiebend eine Entscheidung, welche nicht sein darf.« (S. 333)Peter Handkes Roman als Reise durch Slowenien als die Suche eines Verschollenen und Begegnung mit Verlust, mit dem Tod. Die Wiederholung enthält die Beobachtungen der Hauptfigur Filip Kobal, der die Natur, der Auswirkungen der Geschichte des Landes, die Natur der eigenen Familie, als sprachlich gewandte, bildhafte Erzählung wiedergibt.Kein Sich-Wiederholen, vielmehr ein »Sich-Wieder-Holen«, meint der Surkamp Verlag.Handkes Erzählung schildert lebhaft mehrdimensional die Landschaft Sloweniens, welche mir aus den Urlaubsreisen meiner Kindheit mit meiner Familie keineswegs ein fremdes war.In den wortbeflissenen, fließenden Schilderungen fängt der Autor diese Landschaft in einer Weise so gelungen ein, dass auch mir während der Lektüre ein »Sich-Wieder-Holen« möglich gemacht wurde. »Es lebe die Erzählung. Die Erzählung muss weitergehen.« (S. 333)
—Tobias
Definitely read this in 1997 when reading everything Handke had written up to then (a collection of essays with the word "Jukebox" in the title came out when I was deeply into him). As with "Across" and a few other titles, zero memory, zilch, nada. No review or summary reminds me. Should probably read again before 2017. "The Weight of the World" and "A Moment of True Feeling" distinguished themselves (ie, I remember them), as well as "Goalie's Anxiety At the Penalty Kick." Otherwise, I have the novels on my shelf but no images in my cerebral hard drive.
—Lee
