As promised, I wanted to post a bit about the first evening of the "Contemporary Austrian Literature Marathon" at the Austrian Cultural Forum. Here is the line-up:
- Christoph Ransmayr
- Martin Pollack
- Peter Henisch
- Barbara Frischmuth
- Elisabeth Reichert
- Anna Mitgutsch
- Frederic Morton
- Thomas Glavinic
- Erich Hackl
- Daniel Kehlmann
Both Frederic Morton and Daniel Kehlmann were on hand to read from their work. Morton read excerpts from A Nervous Splendor and A Thunder at Twilight -- both of which are paradigm examples of history writing for a popular audience. Morton was a shear pleasure to hear; at 83 he's still sharp as a tack, and his asides -- particularly on the parallels between the twilit empire of the Hapsburgs during the fin-de-siecle and the overextended Bush-league empire in which I type these lines -- were wryly witty and perfectly delivered.
The surprise of the night for me, however, was Kehlmann. I've yet to read his latest smash success, Die Vermessung der Welt (Measuring the World), but the excerpt he read, a set-piece in which a young Gauss is examined by the ruler of the German state of Brunswick in order to assess Gauss's suitability for a stipend to pursue his mathematical studies, was sparklingly erudite and dryly humorous.
Kehlmann seems to be something of a literary Wunderkind, having written 6 novels before the age of 30 -- including 3 before the age of 25. One would love to be able to find fault with Kehlmann's literary qualities, given such a prodigious output (I'm mindful of Dorothy Parker's comment, "That's not writing, it's typing"), but -- if the excerpt that he read is any indication -- Kehlmann seems to be the real deal.
Kehlmann's manner was not that of a literary prima donna, but of a consummate craftsperson. His father, the noted Austrian director Michael Kehlmann, was a fixture in the the Viennese politically-charged, satirically sophisticated kabarett scene of the early 1950's, and Daniel Kehlmann grew up surrounded by some of the most creative and linguistically fertile members of the scene, including Helmut Qualtinger, Gerhard Bronner, and Georg Kreisler. One hears echoes of this milieu in the younger Kehlmann's discussion of his own work, and it's utterly winning. Read his work.
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