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Greed
From the Nobel Prize-winning author ....Greed is the story of Kurt Janisch, an ambitious but frustrated country policeman, and the lonely women he seduces. It is a thriller set amid the mountains and small towns of southern Austria, where the investigation of a dead girl’s body in a lake leads to the discovery of more than a single crime. Inher signature style, Jelinek chronicles the exploitative nature of relations between men and women, and the cruelties of everyday life.
339 pages, Kindle Edition
First published September 12, 2000
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1,247 people want to read
About the author
Elfriede Jelinek
160books1,015followersElfriede Jelinek is an Austrian playwright and novelist, best known for her novel, The Piano Teacher.
She was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2004 for her "musical flow of voices and counter-voices in novels and plays that, with extraordinary linguistic zeal, reveal the absurdity of society's clichés and their subjugating power."
She was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2004 for her "musical flow of voices and counter-voices in novels and plays that, with extraordinary linguistic zeal, reveal the absurdity of society's clichés and their subjugating power."
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October 7, 2020
A tough book to review. Let me start with the author, the winner of the 2004 Nobel Prize for Literature. You can go to the wiki page for her and read the controversies. One member of the Swedish academy resigned in protest when she won the award. Wiki also gives pro and con comments ranging from some saying she writes brilliant stuff to others saying she has a masochistic view of women and it’s degrading to them and her work is basically pornography. (The book I am reviewing, the only one of hers I have read, has some graphic sex but I don’t consider it pornography by any means. And there is some masochistic sex but it’s initiated by the man and disliked by the woman.) I note also that my GR friends who have written reviews of this book run the gamut from 2’s to 5’s. Some think it’s great; some think it’s crap.
Another interesting thing, while I was reading the book, I thought the style reminded me a lot of a book I read by another German author, Crossing the Sierra Gredos by Peter Handke. He was the 2019 Nobel Prize winner. He also was a controversial choice due to his politics (again you can see all that on Wiki). Imagine my surprise when I see that Jelinek said when she won the prize that it should have gone to Handke! She also caused controversy by not attending the ceremony when she won the prize but she sent a video acceptance speech � she’s agoraphobic.
On to the story: I’ll use the book blurb so I don’t give much away (Not that there is much more to the plot than what is here): “Greed is the story of Kurt Janisch, an ambitious but frustrated country policeman, and the lonely women he seduces. It is a thriller set amid the mountains and small towns of southern Austria, where the investigation of a dead girl's body in a lake leads to the discovery of more than a single crime. In her signature style, Jelinek chronicles the exploitative nature of relations between men and women, and the cruelties of everyday life.�
The country policeman is obsessed with two things: sex and real estate. He’s in debt and he courts older women to get them to sign their houses over to him with an annuity type of deal so they can continue to live in it but the house will become his when they die. We only get details about the latest older woman he has seduced, but apparently she is the third. He takes advantage of his police role, hitting on women when he stops them for a traffic violation or when they are involved in a traffic accident � he can see all their personal details on their driving license. By the way, he’s married with an adult son following in his footsteps. His son, also married, is waiting for his wife’s mother to die so his son and his wife can get the house.
The masochistic part of this, I think what the author has been criticized for, is the self-abasing attitude of the women who accede to the advances of the policeman. He’s tall, blond, blue-eyed. They are older, losing their good looks, and desperate for company to fight off loneliness.
They fall hard for him and imagine that they love him and that he loves them. Yet in lucid moments they know he is just after their house; he never kisses them, he never really talks with them, he treats them like crap, but he is all they have. And yet they can’t wait for him to show up � or maybe he doesn’t show up. And all acknowledge this degradation to be the case: the policeman, certainly, the women, and the narrator; the last perhaps the harshest of all in their assessment of “well that’s the way these women are.� It’s the narrator’s assessment, I think, that got this author in trouble with the critics. Had she left it to the policeman and the woman to think these things, it might be a different story.
How low can these women go? Imagine an older woman letting the policeman bring an underage girl into her home for the policeman to have sex with while she is there. That’s the girl who was killed and whose body was found in the lake. Do we have a suspect here? By the way, some blurbs describe this as a “thriller� � it’s not. The killing of the young girl is peripheral to the main story. And, while we follow some of the police procedures in their investigation, it’s definitely not a police procedural or a detective story.
The author inserts herself into the narrative. Some examples:
“Now I’ve lost the thread myself, the first set goes to you. You can have it, if you like.�
“Why do I always see the negative, I am admonished. I don’t know either.�
“All right, all right, I will stop, but not yet.�
[re: the policeman] “I hope I’ll manage it so that you too experience one of his happy moments! But I doubt it, I already don’t like him.�
[When she talks about the relatives of the missing girl:] “All the rest are dead now, I decide, and so I save myself a lot of work�.So I no longer have to describe them. Thank you very much.�
An example of what the older woman, in love with the policeman, thinks:
“My love, you can nail a mirror to the wall over there, if you like, in the middle of the furniture, which you will additionally choose with premeditation. [The policeman talks the women into renovating their houses the way he wants them.] But please don’t go! You can nail the whole house to yourself, but please don’t go! I would otherwise have to prepare myself to become lonely.�
And here’s the narrator: “There’s already a woman who’s involved in the accident, she owns her home, and she is likewise free, even if not in sexual matters. A freedom, however, which she doesn’t appreciate, she would much rather be in the custody of a man and not be responsible for it.�
Some passages that I thought represented good writing:
[on reality TV shows:] “…where people pour out their being and then don’t want to wipe it up afterwards.�
“My opinion is, it would have been better if God had put in some overtime and created something better.�
“Stealing isn’t easy, often it’s hard work, otherwise we’d all be doing it.�
[of a killer:] "…he shot his cousin, girlfriend and her mommy full in the face with a pump-action gun, but they didn’t need their faces after that anyway."
[of the policeman:] “He is what he is, no, he lacks something. He completely lacks a whole dimension, that is, the dimension that there are other people apart from himself. It’s as if you knew what time it is, but not which year, which month, which day, these are units, which even if distasteful, have our lifeterms in their hands.�
I’ll give you an example of the writing style, if you sign up to read this. This passage is when the policeman brings the underage girl into the home of the older woman:
“I don’t know, there’s something different about the girl this time, the country policeman is still thinking, as her blissful gaze at him is suddenly as if extinguished. So. Yet another veil over her pupils. Finished. The man’s peace of mind is gone. Now he has thrown the older woman, in whom he places some hopes, out of her own living room, just because of the girl. She had become quite unbearable with her constant demands for more, without even knowing everything she’s got. She doesn’t even have all her wits about her, one is always missing�.She even gives the man orders, because she’s waited so long for it. She has a right. He’ll take that from her. He has a method for that. He’s already dreading it. He knows: As soon as he opens his shop, she’s already running in, and he’s the one who supposed to be directing the traffic. He hardly has time to start his engine, and she’s already trying to throttle it. He thinks, she wants nothing else except to feel number one in his books. Can’t she hear her expiration date, even if she can’t read it? Doesn’t she hear, on the other side of the door, the moaning of an adolescent still under sweet sixteen? Well, that’s a different tune isn’t it? As fresh as a folk song, as resolute as the federal anthem, but one doesn’t know the words. All the notes the older woman has mastered, the man knew long ago. Because he reads them from her red, sweating, enraptured, blissful face, which she puts on when she sees him. And the tune she strikes up underneath him is false, he thinks it is even deliberately faked. It is a strange whimpering, which begins to turn into an almost practiced groaning, hardly has he touched her.�
We get very detailed, scientific descriptions of the lake, the mountains, the decay of the dead girl’s body. By detailed, I mean 8 or 10 pages and it’s a bit much in each case.
Nobel Prize material? I’ll give it a 4. Note that it is rated 3.4 on GR, which is pretty low.
Photo of the author from dw.com
The Styria region of Austria, the setting for the book, near Graz from winemag.com
An Austrian policeman from shutterstock.com
Another interesting thing, while I was reading the book, I thought the style reminded me a lot of a book I read by another German author, Crossing the Sierra Gredos by Peter Handke. He was the 2019 Nobel Prize winner. He also was a controversial choice due to his politics (again you can see all that on Wiki). Imagine my surprise when I see that Jelinek said when she won the prize that it should have gone to Handke! She also caused controversy by not attending the ceremony when she won the prize but she sent a video acceptance speech � she’s agoraphobic.
On to the story: I’ll use the book blurb so I don’t give much away (Not that there is much more to the plot than what is here): “Greed is the story of Kurt Janisch, an ambitious but frustrated country policeman, and the lonely women he seduces. It is a thriller set amid the mountains and small towns of southern Austria, where the investigation of a dead girl's body in a lake leads to the discovery of more than a single crime. In her signature style, Jelinek chronicles the exploitative nature of relations between men and women, and the cruelties of everyday life.�
The country policeman is obsessed with two things: sex and real estate. He’s in debt and he courts older women to get them to sign their houses over to him with an annuity type of deal so they can continue to live in it but the house will become his when they die. We only get details about the latest older woman he has seduced, but apparently she is the third. He takes advantage of his police role, hitting on women when he stops them for a traffic violation or when they are involved in a traffic accident � he can see all their personal details on their driving license. By the way, he’s married with an adult son following in his footsteps. His son, also married, is waiting for his wife’s mother to die so his son and his wife can get the house.
The masochistic part of this, I think what the author has been criticized for, is the self-abasing attitude of the women who accede to the advances of the policeman. He’s tall, blond, blue-eyed. They are older, losing their good looks, and desperate for company to fight off loneliness.
They fall hard for him and imagine that they love him and that he loves them. Yet in lucid moments they know he is just after their house; he never kisses them, he never really talks with them, he treats them like crap, but he is all they have. And yet they can’t wait for him to show up � or maybe he doesn’t show up. And all acknowledge this degradation to be the case: the policeman, certainly, the women, and the narrator; the last perhaps the harshest of all in their assessment of “well that’s the way these women are.� It’s the narrator’s assessment, I think, that got this author in trouble with the critics. Had she left it to the policeman and the woman to think these things, it might be a different story.
How low can these women go? Imagine an older woman letting the policeman bring an underage girl into her home for the policeman to have sex with while she is there. That’s the girl who was killed and whose body was found in the lake. Do we have a suspect here? By the way, some blurbs describe this as a “thriller� � it’s not. The killing of the young girl is peripheral to the main story. And, while we follow some of the police procedures in their investigation, it’s definitely not a police procedural or a detective story.
The author inserts herself into the narrative. Some examples:
“Now I’ve lost the thread myself, the first set goes to you. You can have it, if you like.�
“Why do I always see the negative, I am admonished. I don’t know either.�
“All right, all right, I will stop, but not yet.�
[re: the policeman] “I hope I’ll manage it so that you too experience one of his happy moments! But I doubt it, I already don’t like him.�
[When she talks about the relatives of the missing girl:] “All the rest are dead now, I decide, and so I save myself a lot of work�.So I no longer have to describe them. Thank you very much.�
An example of what the older woman, in love with the policeman, thinks:
“My love, you can nail a mirror to the wall over there, if you like, in the middle of the furniture, which you will additionally choose with premeditation. [The policeman talks the women into renovating their houses the way he wants them.] But please don’t go! You can nail the whole house to yourself, but please don’t go! I would otherwise have to prepare myself to become lonely.�
And here’s the narrator: “There’s already a woman who’s involved in the accident, she owns her home, and she is likewise free, even if not in sexual matters. A freedom, however, which she doesn’t appreciate, she would much rather be in the custody of a man and not be responsible for it.�
Some passages that I thought represented good writing:
[on reality TV shows:] “…where people pour out their being and then don’t want to wipe it up afterwards.�
“My opinion is, it would have been better if God had put in some overtime and created something better.�
“Stealing isn’t easy, often it’s hard work, otherwise we’d all be doing it.�
[of a killer:] "…he shot his cousin, girlfriend and her mommy full in the face with a pump-action gun, but they didn’t need their faces after that anyway."
[of the policeman:] “He is what he is, no, he lacks something. He completely lacks a whole dimension, that is, the dimension that there are other people apart from himself. It’s as if you knew what time it is, but not which year, which month, which day, these are units, which even if distasteful, have our lifeterms in their hands.�
I’ll give you an example of the writing style, if you sign up to read this. This passage is when the policeman brings the underage girl into the home of the older woman:
“I don’t know, there’s something different about the girl this time, the country policeman is still thinking, as her blissful gaze at him is suddenly as if extinguished. So. Yet another veil over her pupils. Finished. The man’s peace of mind is gone. Now he has thrown the older woman, in whom he places some hopes, out of her own living room, just because of the girl. She had become quite unbearable with her constant demands for more, without even knowing everything she’s got. She doesn’t even have all her wits about her, one is always missing�.She even gives the man orders, because she’s waited so long for it. She has a right. He’ll take that from her. He has a method for that. He’s already dreading it. He knows: As soon as he opens his shop, she’s already running in, and he’s the one who supposed to be directing the traffic. He hardly has time to start his engine, and she’s already trying to throttle it. He thinks, she wants nothing else except to feel number one in his books. Can’t she hear her expiration date, even if she can’t read it? Doesn’t she hear, on the other side of the door, the moaning of an adolescent still under sweet sixteen? Well, that’s a different tune isn’t it? As fresh as a folk song, as resolute as the federal anthem, but one doesn’t know the words. All the notes the older woman has mastered, the man knew long ago. Because he reads them from her red, sweating, enraptured, blissful face, which she puts on when she sees him. And the tune she strikes up underneath him is false, he thinks it is even deliberately faked. It is a strange whimpering, which begins to turn into an almost practiced groaning, hardly has he touched her.�
We get very detailed, scientific descriptions of the lake, the mountains, the decay of the dead girl’s body. By detailed, I mean 8 or 10 pages and it’s a bit much in each case.
Nobel Prize material? I’ll give it a 4. Note that it is rated 3.4 on GR, which is pretty low.
Photo of the author from dw.com
The Styria region of Austria, the setting for the book, near Graz from winemag.com
An Austrian policeman from shutterstock.com
March 8, 2025
Of the ten previously unread Nobel recipients I had marked down to read this year, something told me to either get Elfriede Jelinek out the way first, or, leave until last so at least if things didn't go so well, the winners that went before made up for it. Well, although I wouldn't class this as a complete train wreak, there is little in the way of positives I can take from my collision course with Jelinek's meandering, tiresome, and weird prose, resulting in one of the most frustrating novels I have ever read. Frustrating because there is a story in there somewhere, through a dense fog, but she mostly puts the reader in a situation of being left on the sidelines, never to stand in the middle of her pitch.
I am lead to believe Elfriede Jelinek has always had a love/hate relationship with her native Austria, and that becomes apparent as the novel moves slowly through some menacing and lighter passages of writing that you feel were written with Jelinek having a laugh in the dark. I can also confirm that with Greed, she has an unhealthy obsession with genitals, with the male form being unfairly used as an aggressive weapon. She was described to me recently as writing from 'somewhere else'. That I can concur with, but being different doesn't always result in a decent book. This is a daredevil, risk-taking novel that may have a minority praising her bold and unflinching look at country life in the mountains and small towns of Austria.
Greed is written with a uniquely sneering tone, and a tireless fury for civilisation. Jelinek has seized the conventional novel by its dirty shoelaces, turned it upside down, continuously shaking and pulling, so that the reader feels nausea settling in. She can be explicit and extremely hostile when in comes to the sex included, and writes with a full-on sordidness for us humans. But there is also a chirpiness throughout the novel, where maybe things are not suppose to be taken that seriously. Some have even called her a comic writer, I wouldn't go as far as that here.
To break it down as simply as possible, there is a cop, Kurt Janisch, married, who mostly goes by the name of 'the Country Policeman', who likes to play around with the woman of his town, until a body turns up in a lake leading to a murder investigation. But all this is kept to a minimum, and Greed is in no way to be classed as a crime/mystery/thriller, if anything it's a dark sexual satire. Jelinek has no interest in plot development, instead, the novel's main function is to flesh it out with the divisions between men and women. They are on completely different wavelengths, the women are in love with the country policeman, whereas he blatantly only does what he does with property in mind. There are other aspects of greed, with that of banks, businesses, and phone companies 'hot for our voices', and also the church.
The Country Policeman was at no point a likeable character, his greed surpasses all. He has his problems financially, and prostitutes himself to every woman in the vicinity and beyond, in the hope that they will hand over their houses to him, or at least leave him something in their wills. He thinks of female genitalia in the same way, 'all these doors permanently flung open for him'. Jelinek circles round him like a wild cat, disgustedly observing his small strengths and big weaknesses. He completely lacks any sort of moral standard. What surprised me, was Jelinek is equally scathing about women, and their repellent eagerness to be loved or screwed. She doesn't exactly paint a pretty picture of her fellow Austrians, and her language used for anything sexual was like a piece of pornography done in bad taste. In fact, there were times when you feel she is trying to break away from the novel just to write some filth.
Brave, adventurous, witty, and antagonistic it may be, but ultimately this is a novel that doesn't really go anywhere. If there were answers, or a deeper meaning to her prose, I just wasn't attached enough to the novel to break it down and dissect it's internal parts. It's also well over a hundred pages too long. I could have bailed out early, and nothing would have been missed.
November 22, 2021
Autoarea a luat Premiul Nobel pentru Literatura in 2004, precum si numeroase alte premii pentru romanele "Pianista", "Exclusii" sau "Amantele". Ultimele doua le-am citit si eu, mi-au placut foarte mult si totodata m-au amuzat, scriind cu placere recenzii despre ele aici si aici.
Romanul de fata abordeaza teme similare cum ar fi politica, dragoste, sex, casnicie, justitie, frumusete, avere, religie, etc.
Cartea este la fel de amuzanta si distractiva ca celelalte, insa stilul este greoi, complicat, punand piedici cititorului in a intelege mesajul si actiunea. Este ca o padure foarte deasa si fara poteci in care ai intrat fara sa apuci sa imprastii firimituri de paine in urma ta, astfel ca nu ai cum sa gasesti calea spre iesire. Din fericire nu exista nici casa de turta dulce a vrajitoarei ori vreun Predator ascuns in copaci. :) Dar tu, cititorule, tot esti pierdut si singur si ai o migrena groaznica, deoarece autoarea nu se opreste din vorbit. Este "uber-omniscienta", iti toarna toate informatiile pe care vrei sau nu vrei sa le stii, sufocand practic romanul sarac in actiune si bogat in vorbe de duh.
Practic ai aceeasi senzatie cand duci gunoiul pe palier si la intoarcere dai nas in nas cu vecina ta, Monica Tatoiu. Ea incepe sa iti turuie tot felul de lucruri, desi tu esti in papuci de casa si neglijeu, pe sala e curent, pe usa ei iese deja fum de la mancarea arsa, iar ea tot nu se opreste.
Revenind la roman, acesta este despre Kurt Janisch, un jandarm (cred ca era mai nimerit ca traducatorul sa-l numeasca politist, nu jandarm) care pandeste femei singure ce detin case sau apartamente, facandu-le curte, culcandu-se cu ele si incercand sa le convinga sa treaca proprietatile pe numele lui. Ele sunt desigur innebunite dupa el, fiind chinuite si facand orice ca sa-i intre in voie. Trebuie sa marturisesc ca nu inteleg de ce le atrage pe femei uniforma, eu una nu mi-as dori ca barbatul meu sa fie imbracat identic cu ceilalti barbati.
Mai multe nu pot sa va spun despre roman deoarece m-am luptat cu el si cu toate ca m-a amuzat pe alocuri nu a reusit sa ma capteze in totalitate, fiind mai mereu cu mintea in alta parte. :)
In incheiere va las cu cateva citate despre lucruri interesante/de retinut (Doamne fereste!). Este important sa avem rabdare si sa le citim pe toate, pentru ca sunt foarte distractive:
- despre barbati: "Nu doar pentru mentinerea pacii mondiale le trantesc barbatii femeilor tot felul de minciuni ca sa le faca dependente de ei, pe cand ele, de fapt ar avea ceva mai bun de oferit, si anume, intreaga lor gandire si simtire, precum si multe alte lucruri din lana colorata."
- despre femei: "In principiu poti face orice cu femeile, de parca ar fi pus la cale vreo trasnaie si acum ar vrea sa fie pedepsite. Iar ceea ce nu li s-a mai facut niciodata le place cu atat mai mult. Asta ii indispune la culme pe barbati, cam ca atunci cand se aseaza la pian fara sa stie sa cante."
- despre cosmetice: "In special femeile fac foarte mult pentru exteriorul lor si se supun astfel unei industrii ale carei produse se contrazic permanent unul pe altul, altfel cum ar mai fi atat de multe?"
- despre menirea barbatului: "Trebuie sa te pricepi la femei, la asta se reduce totul, de asta depinde totul. La urma urmei si politicienii trebuie sa faca acelasi lucru, chiar daca numai prin vorbe. Ca barbati poate ca noi o sa reusim mai degraba prin fapte. Din cand in cand mai aducem cate ceva nou pe langa faptele noastre care sunt, de fapt, de ultima speta."
- despre inimile femeilor: "Adesea inimile femeilor sunt senine si incapatoare, asa incat ai si loc de intors in ele, in caz ca vrei sa pleci."
- despre femei in general: "Indiferent daca ploua sau ninge sau e soare, oricum barbatii sunt de vina, se plange cate o femeie care a fost dusa cu vorba."
- despre corpul femeilor: "... ca sa nu dispara specia umana doar de aia li s-a dat femeilor corpul, care de cele mai multe ori e colturos ca un fagure parasit definitiv de albine."
- principiul de baza al pornografiei: "... inauntru si afara, si dupa cativa centimentri te cam saturi."
Romanul de fata abordeaza teme similare cum ar fi politica, dragoste, sex, casnicie, justitie, frumusete, avere, religie, etc.
Cartea este la fel de amuzanta si distractiva ca celelalte, insa stilul este greoi, complicat, punand piedici cititorului in a intelege mesajul si actiunea. Este ca o padure foarte deasa si fara poteci in care ai intrat fara sa apuci sa imprastii firimituri de paine in urma ta, astfel ca nu ai cum sa gasesti calea spre iesire. Din fericire nu exista nici casa de turta dulce a vrajitoarei ori vreun Predator ascuns in copaci. :) Dar tu, cititorule, tot esti pierdut si singur si ai o migrena groaznica, deoarece autoarea nu se opreste din vorbit. Este "uber-omniscienta", iti toarna toate informatiile pe care vrei sau nu vrei sa le stii, sufocand practic romanul sarac in actiune si bogat in vorbe de duh.
Practic ai aceeasi senzatie cand duci gunoiul pe palier si la intoarcere dai nas in nas cu vecina ta, Monica Tatoiu. Ea incepe sa iti turuie tot felul de lucruri, desi tu esti in papuci de casa si neglijeu, pe sala e curent, pe usa ei iese deja fum de la mancarea arsa, iar ea tot nu se opreste.
Revenind la roman, acesta este despre Kurt Janisch, un jandarm (cred ca era mai nimerit ca traducatorul sa-l numeasca politist, nu jandarm) care pandeste femei singure ce detin case sau apartamente, facandu-le curte, culcandu-se cu ele si incercand sa le convinga sa treaca proprietatile pe numele lui. Ele sunt desigur innebunite dupa el, fiind chinuite si facand orice ca sa-i intre in voie. Trebuie sa marturisesc ca nu inteleg de ce le atrage pe femei uniforma, eu una nu mi-as dori ca barbatul meu sa fie imbracat identic cu ceilalti barbati.
Mai multe nu pot sa va spun despre roman deoarece m-am luptat cu el si cu toate ca m-a amuzat pe alocuri nu a reusit sa ma capteze in totalitate, fiind mai mereu cu mintea in alta parte. :)
In incheiere va las cu cateva citate despre lucruri interesante/de retinut (Doamne fereste!). Este important sa avem rabdare si sa le citim pe toate, pentru ca sunt foarte distractive:
- despre barbati: "Nu doar pentru mentinerea pacii mondiale le trantesc barbatii femeilor tot felul de minciuni ca sa le faca dependente de ei, pe cand ele, de fapt ar avea ceva mai bun de oferit, si anume, intreaga lor gandire si simtire, precum si multe alte lucruri din lana colorata."
- despre femei: "In principiu poti face orice cu femeile, de parca ar fi pus la cale vreo trasnaie si acum ar vrea sa fie pedepsite. Iar ceea ce nu li s-a mai facut niciodata le place cu atat mai mult. Asta ii indispune la culme pe barbati, cam ca atunci cand se aseaza la pian fara sa stie sa cante."
- despre cosmetice: "In special femeile fac foarte mult pentru exteriorul lor si se supun astfel unei industrii ale carei produse se contrazic permanent unul pe altul, altfel cum ar mai fi atat de multe?"
- despre menirea barbatului: "Trebuie sa te pricepi la femei, la asta se reduce totul, de asta depinde totul. La urma urmei si politicienii trebuie sa faca acelasi lucru, chiar daca numai prin vorbe. Ca barbati poate ca noi o sa reusim mai degraba prin fapte. Din cand in cand mai aducem cate ceva nou pe langa faptele noastre care sunt, de fapt, de ultima speta."
- despre inimile femeilor: "Adesea inimile femeilor sunt senine si incapatoare, asa incat ai si loc de intors in ele, in caz ca vrei sa pleci."
- despre femei in general: "Indiferent daca ploua sau ninge sau e soare, oricum barbatii sunt de vina, se plange cate o femeie care a fost dusa cu vorba."
- despre corpul femeilor: "... ca sa nu dispara specia umana doar de aia li s-a dat femeilor corpul, care de cele mai multe ori e colturos ca un fagure parasit definitiv de albine."
- principiul de baza al pornografiei: "... inauntru si afara, si dupa cativa centimentri te cam saturi."
January 27, 2025
Ich breche bei 50% ein Buch einer meiner Lieblingsautorinnen ab.
Es ist thematisch und stilistisch sehr nah an einer Kombination von „Kinder der Toten� und „Lust�.
Ich bin der Themen schlicht überdrüssig. Sie fügt wenig Neues hinzu. Und das lege ich dem Buch als Schwäche aus, viel zu sehr im Schatten der anderen Bücher zu wüten.
Es liest sich zudem extrem anstrengend. Sie verschärft hier ihre dekonstruktive Sprache und hebt Handlung nahezu völlig auf. Gier liest sich extrem essayistisch, was mir ebenfalls nicht unbedingt zusagt.
Natürlich hätte das Buch rein sprachlich 5 Sterne verdient. Natürlich habe ich grandiose Stellen gelesen, bei denen ich mich vor Ironie und Genialität weggelegt habe. Die langen Zähne und der Nervfaktor haben diesmal leider deutlich die Nase vorn.
Es ist thematisch und stilistisch sehr nah an einer Kombination von „Kinder der Toten� und „Lust�.
Ich bin der Themen schlicht überdrüssig. Sie fügt wenig Neues hinzu. Und das lege ich dem Buch als Schwäche aus, viel zu sehr im Schatten der anderen Bücher zu wüten.
Es liest sich zudem extrem anstrengend. Sie verschärft hier ihre dekonstruktive Sprache und hebt Handlung nahezu völlig auf. Gier liest sich extrem essayistisch, was mir ebenfalls nicht unbedingt zusagt.
Natürlich hätte das Buch rein sprachlich 5 Sterne verdient. Natürlich habe ich grandiose Stellen gelesen, bei denen ich mich vor Ironie und Genialität weggelegt habe. Die langen Zähne und der Nervfaktor haben diesmal leider deutlich die Nase vorn.
May 22, 2019
I always struggle with Jelinek. I love her sharpness and her acid humor but her way of storytelling is never quite my thing...
October 7, 2010
lmao @ all these pussies in reviews below moanin & gripin about the book being too hard, El Friede goes APESHIT on tha page and has u spitting out teeth when you go read it at 8am on way to work. i think the longest paragraph stretches across 8 pages, its nuts. hell yea its all over the place and Bless This Mess, sarcastic and sneery and just hte right amount of mess. peep:
Cell phone on, call out, horrors already prepared, packed, frozen, and discovered by two persons.
The fawn spilled out of the hind's burst stomach and lay next to it, it had to bepersonally killed by the driver with a stone, not a nice task, but what can one do in such a situation. No one, absolutely no one should suffer unneccarily, that's certain. Because it would only have suffered, the fawn, so we put it out of its misery, with one foot still almost in the hot monster that brought us to this spot and yet only wanted to gobble its gas at the next filling station, it wants to live, too, it's so nice and took so long to choose it.
Then the water can chew at the package for a bit or a bit longer, and see whether it likes the taste. It can open its jaws to draw breath, at the same time spitting out the human roll with the plastic cover, then snap at it again, or it can also keep the meat roll of course. Is it meat at all, or flesh?
While the bag of bones flies, it turns without grace a couple of times on its axis, a cumbersome comet, whose horned head, heavily burdened by the weights, points almost majestically in rapidly changing different directions, depending on the phase of the flight, and then lands on the road, the body, and is, for a moment at least, completely still. Quite unexpectedly Kurt Janisch's car was deprived of the momentum (M) which was necessary within the time (t) to lift the mass of the huge stag (m), a full-grown ten-pointer, for the killing of which the owner of the hunting ground up there had coughed up quite a sum, if the stag hadn't anyway had to cough its last, from ground level to the apex of its flight path (a), which was located behind the car as well as to propel the stag in the direction of travel.
Right now you're sitting in the mine cage at the bottom, and while up above the rubble is breaking away from the mountain and howling and raging the mud is coming to visit, you yourself are smashed to pieces down there, and no one will ever see you again. Someone should have taken care of it, the mountain, shielded it from human beings, instead it turned into a shield somewhat full of holes for them.
Cell phone on, call out, horrors already prepared, packed, frozen, and discovered by two persons.
The fawn spilled out of the hind's burst stomach and lay next to it, it had to bepersonally killed by the driver with a stone, not a nice task, but what can one do in such a situation. No one, absolutely no one should suffer unneccarily, that's certain. Because it would only have suffered, the fawn, so we put it out of its misery, with one foot still almost in the hot monster that brought us to this spot and yet only wanted to gobble its gas at the next filling station, it wants to live, too, it's so nice and took so long to choose it.
Then the water can chew at the package for a bit or a bit longer, and see whether it likes the taste. It can open its jaws to draw breath, at the same time spitting out the human roll with the plastic cover, then snap at it again, or it can also keep the meat roll of course. Is it meat at all, or flesh?
While the bag of bones flies, it turns without grace a couple of times on its axis, a cumbersome comet, whose horned head, heavily burdened by the weights, points almost majestically in rapidly changing different directions, depending on the phase of the flight, and then lands on the road, the body, and is, for a moment at least, completely still. Quite unexpectedly Kurt Janisch's car was deprived of the momentum (M) which was necessary within the time (t) to lift the mass of the huge stag (m), a full-grown ten-pointer, for the killing of which the owner of the hunting ground up there had coughed up quite a sum, if the stag hadn't anyway had to cough its last, from ground level to the apex of its flight path (a), which was located behind the car as well as to propel the stag in the direction of travel.
Right now you're sitting in the mine cage at the bottom, and while up above the rubble is breaking away from the mountain and howling and raging the mud is coming to visit, you yourself are smashed to pieces down there, and no one will ever see you again. Someone should have taken care of it, the mountain, shielded it from human beings, instead it turned into a shield somewhat full of holes for them.
August 19, 2016
Spending the summer here at my cabin in northern Michigan forces me to relax and accept waiting as an art form. For the last week I have agonized over my running out of available bandwidth, and needing my ATT monthly service to flip over so an additional 30 GB would be available to use for downloading this particular Greed book review podcast I have been wanting to hear. Greed was a very hard book to read and I wanted an intelligent perspective before setting down my own thoughts here. I have been aware of Book Fight for some some time now, but I am a plodder toward new things ever since The Beatles hit town. The popular Book Fight podcast (They won an award!!!) is hosted by writers Mike Ingram and Tom McAllister who both hail from Temple University. And when I finally did hit my iPhone play button the initial cackle amounting to several minutes of nonsense erupted until the two academics abruptly segued to trash Greed and added little good to say about anything they had read or heard about Elfriede Jelinek. And perhaps it was their age (I am sixty-two), but it was also quite obvious that neither men were significantly instructed or sufficiently aware of Austrian history, and therefore lumped pretty much all Austrian writers as haters for what they have seen in travel magazines to be a “beautiful country with pretty mountains�. From the beginning there was an enormous amount of giggling and unrelated nonsense due to their mutual dislike for the novel. There was a severe lack for any real substance they might have been prepared to talk about had they applied more brain cells into their assigned project. Later, after clicking the podcast’s web page “About Us� tab, I was provided biographical details regarding the hosts . They are described as being open to “tangents, misdirection, and general silliness.� I can attest to the authenticity of that statement. I then went on to listen to another podcast and their assessment of Thomas Bernhard’s and if I have my druthers I feel pretty swell about not listening to either of these two fellows talk about books ever again.
Greed was without a doubt the meanest and strangest book I have read this year. There may be none other like it. Jelinek does often alienate her readers in order to cull out the lightweights. And similar to Thomas Bernhard she consistently revisits and expounds on her vitriolic spurs and constantly applies them violently. The routine complaint I generally garner from reading all the serious and great contemporary Austrian literature is the embarrassing head-in-the-sand culture that denies their own involvement as sympathizers and puppets of the Nazi regime. Theirs is a terrible secret, and guilty feelings need and want to be assuaged in that country, but in this great social denial this cleansing cannot be completed. Thus the writers� repetition. Same goes for weak women and what they do to get what they want, their shameful sacrifices made for awful men and rues meant to provide them riches and social standing. Physical and sexual abuse that is tolerated and actually condoned because of their personal greed. Jelinek neither hates men nor their penises. She simply shows us our many bad apples, the kind of man who makes us all look bad. Jelinek is an equal hater. If the podcast boys at Book Fight seriously read other Jelinek novels they would know the type of business she runs. I recommend her novel as a great vehicle for witnessing her finest. The fact that Elfriede Jelinek also loves vintage clothes should tell us all enough of what we need to know about her. She simply loves what is good about us, and she honors what is beautiful in our past.
January 25, 2016
I guess the question one needs to ask is not, why Elfriede Jelinek doesn’t handle subjects other than emotional exploitation, male sexual violation and middle age loneliness, rather it should be how many writers are capable of handling these things like she does. A man made useless lake, the lake is cold, no aquatic animals live there, nothing grows apart from weeds, it gets a ripple sometimes like the times when a dead body is thrown, it can’t hold that for long either, it returns that body to its surface after a few days as a riddle to be solved. Now, this lake could be symbolic and represent women beyond certain age. Her feminism is so base and pessimistic, Ms. Jelinek would have been irrevocably labeled as misogynist if she were a man.
I had a hard time getting through this book, had to take a break every six or seven pages, many times I had to go back reading previous two lines for every single line. Sometime a block of prose, a paragraph, went on for pages. I counted one going on for thirteen pages. To put things into perspective, ’The Brothers Karamazov� I had been reading in parallel looked like a child’s play with its theological mutations and everything, so does Virginia Woolf’s stream of consciousness. This freaking thing has brought back my reading OCD to the surface again, now I have to find a way to deal with that shit.
Instead of finding faults at inadequate translation, one needs to appreciate the hard work done by Martin Chalmers in translating such an intense, poetical prose. Definitely it wouldn’t have been an easy job, like those Japanese trucks made during WWII, by reverse-engineering a Bantam Jeep. Those Japs did a good job and kept on improvising it, rest of the world started buying those 4x4s a lot as well. Elfriede Jelinek is such a market dud in English speaking countries, even a Nobel win didn’t help much. No, I am not talking about those hundred thousand copies of already translated works. ‘The Children of the Dead�, her supposedly magnum opus, doesn’t have an English version yet.
Bottomline. Definitely not an accessible Jelinek, strictly for her fans only!
I had a hard time getting through this book, had to take a break every six or seven pages, many times I had to go back reading previous two lines for every single line. Sometime a block of prose, a paragraph, went on for pages. I counted one going on for thirteen pages. To put things into perspective, ’The Brothers Karamazov� I had been reading in parallel looked like a child’s play with its theological mutations and everything, so does Virginia Woolf’s stream of consciousness. This freaking thing has brought back my reading OCD to the surface again, now I have to find a way to deal with that shit.
Instead of finding faults at inadequate translation, one needs to appreciate the hard work done by Martin Chalmers in translating such an intense, poetical prose. Definitely it wouldn’t have been an easy job, like those Japanese trucks made during WWII, by reverse-engineering a Bantam Jeep. Those Japs did a good job and kept on improvising it, rest of the world started buying those 4x4s a lot as well. Elfriede Jelinek is such a market dud in English speaking countries, even a Nobel win didn’t help much. No, I am not talking about those hundred thousand copies of already translated works. ‘The Children of the Dead�, her supposedly magnum opus, doesn’t have an English version yet.
Bottomline. Definitely not an accessible Jelinek, strictly for her fans only!
November 23, 2012
When I was reading this, I got the impression that the narrator(s) was stuck in her living room on an overcast day, bitter, lonely and twitching the curtains, so it was interesting to learn that Jelinek is severely agoraphobic. The writing draws you in like that.
She's a clever cynic, and I'm not sure there's enough about. Read this book and you fall straight into her fussy, angry prose, but it never feels off-putting, only honest. Everything is anxious, taut and paranoid.
Um... not sure what more I want to say. Just that I thought this was great and it was a hugely surprising new favourite book of mine. If all novels were like this, not a lot of reading would get done, but every once in a while, what an amazing thing to pick up.
She's a clever cynic, and I'm not sure there's enough about. Read this book and you fall straight into her fussy, angry prose, but it never feels off-putting, only honest. Everything is anxious, taut and paranoid.
Um... not sure what more I want to say. Just that I thought this was great and it was a hugely surprising new favourite book of mine. If all novels were like this, not a lot of reading would get done, but every once in a while, what an amazing thing to pick up.
Shelved as 'hammer-time'
January 30, 2017In an attempt to read GREED, I discovered that I was not nearly gluttonous enough for this kind of punishment.
November 6, 2024
Sintiéndolo mucho, y aunque no creo que sea un libro malo, como mucho una mala novela, pero no es para mí. En esta obra Jelinek opta por una escritura más difusa, con mucha digresión, de foco muy oblicuo, sería casi como una pintura abstracta. Pero a mí me ha sentado como un marasmo, te sumerges en una lectura dónde apenas destacan acontecimientos que despierten tu interés, sientes que el tiempo no avanza y aunque lleves doscientas páginas apenas sientes que haya diferencia respecto al inicio.
Es lo que se dice una novela de voz, en la que la figura central es un policía altamente corrupto, en el cual se reflejan el autoritarismo, el machismo y otras tendencias asociadas a una sociedad patriarcal. Es un policía que ya es abuelo, un hombre casado, cosas que no le impiden abordar mujeres para saciar su otra obsesión, que es la ostentación de inmuebles. El problema es que una vez ya has captado su punto de vista y su tono, sientes que cualquier asunto que toque, de esa forma dispersa, adoptará un rumbo muy determinado, todo será una visión burlona y altiva, y dado que tampoco ocurren muchas cosas, entonces al final es como caminar por una inmensa meseta enfangada: un ejercicio anodino y pesado. Se hace muy fatigosa. Hasta la papiroflexia me resulta un pasatiempo mucho más intenso y vibrante que cualquiera de estas páginas.
Supongo que otro tipo de lectores le encontrarán encanto a esta escritura tan sintética y exploratoria, que sin duda arriesga, a mí me sumergió en el tedio. Si alguien me preguntara de qué van las últimas páginas no sabría qué contestar. Si alguien tiene interés en leer algo de Jelinek, no le recomiendo ó por nada del mundo.
Es lo que se dice una novela de voz, en la que la figura central es un policía altamente corrupto, en el cual se reflejan el autoritarismo, el machismo y otras tendencias asociadas a una sociedad patriarcal. Es un policía que ya es abuelo, un hombre casado, cosas que no le impiden abordar mujeres para saciar su otra obsesión, que es la ostentación de inmuebles. El problema es que una vez ya has captado su punto de vista y su tono, sientes que cualquier asunto que toque, de esa forma dispersa, adoptará un rumbo muy determinado, todo será una visión burlona y altiva, y dado que tampoco ocurren muchas cosas, entonces al final es como caminar por una inmensa meseta enfangada: un ejercicio anodino y pesado. Se hace muy fatigosa. Hasta la papiroflexia me resulta un pasatiempo mucho más intenso y vibrante que cualquiera de estas páginas.
Supongo que otro tipo de lectores le encontrarán encanto a esta escritura tan sintética y exploratoria, que sin duda arriesga, a mí me sumergió en el tedio. Si alguien me preguntara de qué van las últimas páginas no sabría qué contestar. Si alguien tiene interés en leer algo de Jelinek, no le recomiendo ó por nada del mundo.
August 29, 2014
This book is like white noise. I don't honestly know how I got through it. It's a good book to read if you want to appear to be doing something but are in fact thinking deeply about what you're going to have for dinner.
June 9, 2024
Too important to write a decent review so close to finishing.
A week passes � a little temporal distance to try and assess what it is that I have just read. An attempt to write a pertinent review.
How often have you read a book that shocks you so much that you have to leave off reading the book � that physically makes you if not sick but afraid, core-shocked as in ‘how-can-anyone-do-that?� It’s rare that an author can reach that pitch to throw the reader out of their normal orbit into something that changes one’s calm and perspective. And what is it about national character that leavens a writing so much that the style becomes identified with nationality? These are the questions which I ask after finishing only my second book by the Austrian writer . The first, to which I could only offer a rather cursory review, was . It made a deep impression on me which I see I have totally failed to convey in my review. When something hits you that hard you take account of it, and though it’s taken me a while, Greed seemed like a decent choice to reacquaint myself with her work.
Elfriede Jelinek
There is always this dialectic when you start a meaningful book; between the book, its contents and concepts and the author and their life/lives. And you cannot get away from this with Jelinek precisely because she IS controversial. Much is made of this in German-speaking Europe. But outside of that she appears to be little known or appraised even by the chattering classes that might be considered the clientele for her books. And this is even the case after being awarded the Nobel Laureate for Literature in 2004. A cursory look at her Wiki entry makes you begin to throw up the hands in a ‘Whoaa!� moment. Dominant pushy mother (shades of The Piano Teacher there), severe anxiety overcome through writing, political involvement and awareness, committed feminist.
So what about ? Whether this is irony on the part of the author or the publishing company but the blurb on the back leads the casual buyer to believe that they are about to purchase a murder mystery set in the Austrian Alps. In a way that is precisely what they are getting but it is quite unlike anything the casual holiday reader would have ever picked up before and would never finish to be left lying lonely on the sun lounger (let’s face it � we all need that kind of mind opiate from time to time). The mere physical character of the writing will eradicate the majority of readers on the starting blocks � short (sometimes much longer), punchy paragraphs often seemingly unrelated to where the narrative (as such) has got to so far, such that each paragraph seems only related by association with an idea for which there are many asides and investigations of byways along the path. And then there are the increasing numbers of direct interjections from the writer to the reader. Do we take these as Jelinek’s direct appeals to us � as statements of her personal beliefs and intents, or are they more the thoughts of a writer writing about and in place of ‘a writer� � someone outside the novel commentating. It is almost as if we are following the line of thought of an author exploring the very IDEA of a meaningless happenstance murder by a country policeman in the Styrian Alps (Jelinek’s childhood home) - branching, riffing, moving from one line to another, all connected in some way to a central thesis, yet separately stranded like a hemp rope that’s fraying. Everything stands for something else.
It is not an easy read. In fact it is closer to being a painful read � shocking, creeping up on you, slapping you in the face. Relentless. But it is brilliant in its form and composition � Joyce-ian, Beckett-like � real, true, modern fiction � a hyper-narrative. There is a real tenseness and brooding consciousness to the prose. It always feels that something is lurking behind the front, the tension building and building, as was the case with The Piano Teacher , till an explosive climax is reached. Even the environment feels threatening, hostile and unhealthy. The lake is dead. The mountain is hollow. Is she not out to just shock one awake? Does she have the right to inflict this pure anger upon us? Every paragraph seems like an exposition for you to examine, for you to cast your eye over, to make you engage in a considered moment with the text so that you are armed and ready for what is coming up in the following pages. All these crimes and misdemeanours. Are these people worthy of our respect as upright citizen defenders of a moral code which they can barely identify with in any case or about which they feel free enough to play around with the boundaries. Suggesting. Implying. STRONGLY suggesting. Here word stands for more than meaning, but also for its suggestion and alliteration, for its metonym, where praxis and poeisis meet. The pun always lurks there, playing with words, of one word leading to another suggesting another association which is taken up and run with till it takes us past the goal line and we catch up with ourselves going forward from the previous starting point; only now we have picked up a whole body of nuances suggested by but not inherent in the text itself.
Through these punchy paragraphs comes the themes that dominate Jelinek’s writing as a thinker, feminist and Austrian writer in the modern world. Women are at risk to all male violence. The heterosexual act is an act of aggression. We are all commodities bound into a world where commoditisation is dominant everywhere and in everything. Meaningless almost compulsive and subconscious acts of masochistic stupidity and inhumanity which become part and parcel of the human psyche through endless repetition and regurgitation. Death. Living Death. Mindless Living Death. The lust after external trappings which BECOME the persona. Objectification. And if you don’t pick up on any of these through the paragraphs the author lays out as ‘text� then the author is there to speak directly to us with mini polemics which are her own counterblasts against modern life, her fellow Austrians and the dereliction of morality. She acutely observes the world around her and gives us rants against the petit bourgeois-ification of humanity as we befoul and devour everything everywhere. At times it becomes a pavane for dead nature and dead humanity by faceless characterless people which here are played by the country policeman and the people of Austria. Forget the murder of the teenager. This is desecration by a species of everything that the species has ever evolved into. People have given up looking because of so many past disappointments and this has led them to give up thinking. This is MISANTHROPE beyond anything you might think you can find in Balzac or Zola. This is misanthrope for the end of the world. She is outside the shower curtain slashing with the knife whilst we stand naked and defenceless. Its a rant and rail against everything but particularly about male brutality and female passivity. To have called it a counterblast is over-edging it really. It is water torture hammering away at you drip by drip - can you take it any more? Can you piece it all together? Who says its not a thriller or not about a murder? Of course it is, but 'not as we know it, Jim'. It DEMANDS engagement. It SCREAMS OUT for the intelligent and pursuant reader who is not taken in by spoon-fed plot and narrative. This is writing beyond writing. A smack in the face, when I say 'cunt', I mean 'cunt' kind of writing. A rebellion against the mundane.
A depressing read then? Actually�. Quite the opposite. I could not put it down but I had to take the time to read each paragraph and digest the thoughts within these obtuse (at times) words strung together to make thoughts. It was if I was in direct communication with the author. It is a rare and special book that does this. And as an author � as a THINKING author meaning, wanting to change the world not just write about it, she has the perfect right to do this.
I begin to despair at the quality of READERSHIP�. not the quality of writing when I read some of the reviews of this book. It seems in the present day that it is not authors we lack that take the novel and literature to new places, new dimensions, beyond what has already been written, but we have instead a readership which wants just an opiate to dull their senses and fill a section of time with little more than quanta of mind pap; something that neither challenges the reader nor makes them think and explore concepts or to ask questions of their beliefs and attitudes and illuminate their behaviours. That anyone might consider giving this book less than five stars is quite beyond me and I do not consider myself a book snob. Proust bores me too.
A far more erudite and full review by Nicholas Spice can be found in the pages of The London Review of Books (but I'm afraid it might be beyond a paywall.
A week passes � a little temporal distance to try and assess what it is that I have just read. An attempt to write a pertinent review.
How often have you read a book that shocks you so much that you have to leave off reading the book � that physically makes you if not sick but afraid, core-shocked as in ‘how-can-anyone-do-that?� It’s rare that an author can reach that pitch to throw the reader out of their normal orbit into something that changes one’s calm and perspective. And what is it about national character that leavens a writing so much that the style becomes identified with nationality? These are the questions which I ask after finishing only my second book by the Austrian writer . The first, to which I could only offer a rather cursory review, was . It made a deep impression on me which I see I have totally failed to convey in my review. When something hits you that hard you take account of it, and though it’s taken me a while, Greed seemed like a decent choice to reacquaint myself with her work.
Elfriede Jelinek
There is always this dialectic when you start a meaningful book; between the book, its contents and concepts and the author and their life/lives. And you cannot get away from this with Jelinek precisely because she IS controversial. Much is made of this in German-speaking Europe. But outside of that she appears to be little known or appraised even by the chattering classes that might be considered the clientele for her books. And this is even the case after being awarded the Nobel Laureate for Literature in 2004. A cursory look at her Wiki entry makes you begin to throw up the hands in a ‘Whoaa!� moment. Dominant pushy mother (shades of The Piano Teacher there), severe anxiety overcome through writing, political involvement and awareness, committed feminist.
So what about ? Whether this is irony on the part of the author or the publishing company but the blurb on the back leads the casual buyer to believe that they are about to purchase a murder mystery set in the Austrian Alps. In a way that is precisely what they are getting but it is quite unlike anything the casual holiday reader would have ever picked up before and would never finish to be left lying lonely on the sun lounger (let’s face it � we all need that kind of mind opiate from time to time). The mere physical character of the writing will eradicate the majority of readers on the starting blocks � short (sometimes much longer), punchy paragraphs often seemingly unrelated to where the narrative (as such) has got to so far, such that each paragraph seems only related by association with an idea for which there are many asides and investigations of byways along the path. And then there are the increasing numbers of direct interjections from the writer to the reader. Do we take these as Jelinek’s direct appeals to us � as statements of her personal beliefs and intents, or are they more the thoughts of a writer writing about and in place of ‘a writer� � someone outside the novel commentating. It is almost as if we are following the line of thought of an author exploring the very IDEA of a meaningless happenstance murder by a country policeman in the Styrian Alps (Jelinek’s childhood home) - branching, riffing, moving from one line to another, all connected in some way to a central thesis, yet separately stranded like a hemp rope that’s fraying. Everything stands for something else.
It is not an easy read. In fact it is closer to being a painful read � shocking, creeping up on you, slapping you in the face. Relentless. But it is brilliant in its form and composition � Joyce-ian, Beckett-like � real, true, modern fiction � a hyper-narrative. There is a real tenseness and brooding consciousness to the prose. It always feels that something is lurking behind the front, the tension building and building, as was the case with The Piano Teacher , till an explosive climax is reached. Even the environment feels threatening, hostile and unhealthy. The lake is dead. The mountain is hollow. Is she not out to just shock one awake? Does she have the right to inflict this pure anger upon us? Every paragraph seems like an exposition for you to examine, for you to cast your eye over, to make you engage in a considered moment with the text so that you are armed and ready for what is coming up in the following pages. All these crimes and misdemeanours. Are these people worthy of our respect as upright citizen defenders of a moral code which they can barely identify with in any case or about which they feel free enough to play around with the boundaries. Suggesting. Implying. STRONGLY suggesting. Here word stands for more than meaning, but also for its suggestion and alliteration, for its metonym, where praxis and poeisis meet. The pun always lurks there, playing with words, of one word leading to another suggesting another association which is taken up and run with till it takes us past the goal line and we catch up with ourselves going forward from the previous starting point; only now we have picked up a whole body of nuances suggested by but not inherent in the text itself.
Through these punchy paragraphs comes the themes that dominate Jelinek’s writing as a thinker, feminist and Austrian writer in the modern world. Women are at risk to all male violence. The heterosexual act is an act of aggression. We are all commodities bound into a world where commoditisation is dominant everywhere and in everything. Meaningless almost compulsive and subconscious acts of masochistic stupidity and inhumanity which become part and parcel of the human psyche through endless repetition and regurgitation. Death. Living Death. Mindless Living Death. The lust after external trappings which BECOME the persona. Objectification. And if you don’t pick up on any of these through the paragraphs the author lays out as ‘text� then the author is there to speak directly to us with mini polemics which are her own counterblasts against modern life, her fellow Austrians and the dereliction of morality. She acutely observes the world around her and gives us rants against the petit bourgeois-ification of humanity as we befoul and devour everything everywhere. At times it becomes a pavane for dead nature and dead humanity by faceless characterless people which here are played by the country policeman and the people of Austria. Forget the murder of the teenager. This is desecration by a species of everything that the species has ever evolved into. People have given up looking because of so many past disappointments and this has led them to give up thinking. This is MISANTHROPE beyond anything you might think you can find in Balzac or Zola. This is misanthrope for the end of the world. She is outside the shower curtain slashing with the knife whilst we stand naked and defenceless. Its a rant and rail against everything but particularly about male brutality and female passivity. To have called it a counterblast is over-edging it really. It is water torture hammering away at you drip by drip - can you take it any more? Can you piece it all together? Who says its not a thriller or not about a murder? Of course it is, but 'not as we know it, Jim'. It DEMANDS engagement. It SCREAMS OUT for the intelligent and pursuant reader who is not taken in by spoon-fed plot and narrative. This is writing beyond writing. A smack in the face, when I say 'cunt', I mean 'cunt' kind of writing. A rebellion against the mundane.
A depressing read then? Actually�. Quite the opposite. I could not put it down but I had to take the time to read each paragraph and digest the thoughts within these obtuse (at times) words strung together to make thoughts. It was if I was in direct communication with the author. It is a rare and special book that does this. And as an author � as a THINKING author meaning, wanting to change the world not just write about it, she has the perfect right to do this.
I begin to despair at the quality of READERSHIP�. not the quality of writing when I read some of the reviews of this book. It seems in the present day that it is not authors we lack that take the novel and literature to new places, new dimensions, beyond what has already been written, but we have instead a readership which wants just an opiate to dull their senses and fill a section of time with little more than quanta of mind pap; something that neither challenges the reader nor makes them think and explore concepts or to ask questions of their beliefs and attitudes and illuminate their behaviours. That anyone might consider giving this book less than five stars is quite beyond me and I do not consider myself a book snob. Proust bores me too.
A far more erudite and full review by Nicholas Spice can be found in the pages of The London Review of Books (but I'm afraid it might be beyond a paywall.
July 28, 2011
Astonishing novel, though not at all an easy read. In terms of what the author self-mockingly calls "narrative debris" relatively little (definitely) happens, though quite a few more things besides might have happened - - - only we're not sure because the author doesn't quite make that clear! In fact she goes off at tangents more or less all of the time: the fact that people drive too fast, treat one another with contempt, pollute the environment, undermine mountains with mining activities causing them to fall down, create pathetic "beauty spots" with man-made lakes that no tourist would ever go near, and which are only fit for hiding corpses in, although not very succesfully. The author butts in to tell us what she read in the newspaper that day, and how novels bore her anyway, and the book has no direct speech at all. At some time. Randomly adding sentences here and there. But that is for later on. Let's add three seemingly superfluous sentences here, then insert a few libellous references to leading Austrian politicians.
... you get the idea. I will re-read this some time for sure.
... you get the idea. I will re-read this some time for sure.
April 23, 2016
I tried to read Elfriede Jelinek's The Piano Teacher a few years ago but found it to be written in a cold, unforgiving style that I wasn't in the mood for at the time. I had considered trying it again for but saw a copy of Greed in my local library and thought I'd give that a go instead.
Greed centres around a country policeman, Kurt Janisch and the various women with whom he's having affairs with. The story as such is simple and the main details are disclosed early in the novel. Kurt Janisch has a permanent erection and he targets women with property with the aim of relieving them of their houses. He's not opposed to having sex with the women's daughters as well if the situation arises. Kurt is married and has a grown-up son, Ernst, who is also married. Ernst lives in his wife's elderly mother's house where they're waiting for her to die so they can inherit the property. Kurt's and Ernst's approach is described in the following quotes:
There are further discussions of Kurt's methods together with his casual liking of sex and violence. There are some vague descriptions of a woman's body found in the lake and descriptions of a man wrapping it in a tarpaulin and dumping it in the lake. Although it's difficult to pinpoint at what point in the novel it becomes clear that Kurt is the murderer, it is quite early on. Despite the blurb on the back of the book this is not a murder mystery; the disclosure of the killer does not affect the reading of the book. Kurt is portrayed right from the beginning of the novel as a totally amoral character so he's the first person you suspect.
This is quite a challenging book to read and it's the author's style that I feel would put most readers off finishing it - it almost made me abandon it. It's told in the third person, but it's unclear exactly who the narrator is, or if it is the same narrator throughout the book. Everything is clouded in mystery and many sentences are quite cryptic, we get the narrator's views on a variety of subjects, some relevant to the novel, whilst some are not. At times the narrative style reminded me of Louis-Ferdinand Céline, in that the narrator struggles to tell the story coherently as they get distracted by other thoughts, then circle around several times only slowly revealing the main narrative that we, the reader, is eager to hear. Céline does it brilliantly, but I'm not sure about Jelinek.
The other thing that might put off potential readers is that the characters are repellent, Kurt especially, as he's portrayed as this greedy, amoral monster who is only interested in fucking and killing. For example it is revealed that through his job he gets access to pictures of car-crash victims and masturbates over them. The female characters aren't much better; they're vacant and just passively accept their fates and they're all besotted with Kurt, or men similar to Kurt.
I initially gave this two stars but on re-reading parts I felt that was a bit harsh. It had a certain kind of grim appeal to it, so three stars.
Greed centres around a country policeman, Kurt Janisch and the various women with whom he's having affairs with. The story as such is simple and the main details are disclosed early in the novel. Kurt Janisch has a permanent erection and he targets women with property with the aim of relieving them of their houses. He's not opposed to having sex with the women's daughters as well if the situation arises. Kurt is married and has a grown-up son, Ernst, who is also married. Ernst lives in his wife's elderly mother's house where they're waiting for her to die so they can inherit the property. Kurt's and Ernst's approach is described in the following quotes:
They pay court to women. Both of them actually. But mainly Janisch senior, the country policeman. That's so easily said, but he has already made so many people in this town and in this part of the country unhappy. Well, would you have guessed it? Preferably women who own houses or apartments in the nearby small town.
It's a good thing if one gets around in one's job and the hours are a bit flexible, so that one can go for a wee drive in between. The husbands of these wives should be deceased if possible or never have existed in the first place. There should never have been children present either.
He does have dreams, the man, they are, however, nailed to one or more houses or owner-occupied apartments and so not at all times freely disposable. Well, one house, a little house, he already has, his wife brought it into the marriage, that's also why he keeps the wife who belongs to it, despite the cost.
There are further discussions of Kurt's methods together with his casual liking of sex and violence. There are some vague descriptions of a woman's body found in the lake and descriptions of a man wrapping it in a tarpaulin and dumping it in the lake. Although it's difficult to pinpoint at what point in the novel it becomes clear that Kurt is the murderer, it is quite early on. Despite the blurb on the back of the book this is not a murder mystery; the disclosure of the killer does not affect the reading of the book. Kurt is portrayed right from the beginning of the novel as a totally amoral character so he's the first person you suspect.
This is quite a challenging book to read and it's the author's style that I feel would put most readers off finishing it - it almost made me abandon it. It's told in the third person, but it's unclear exactly who the narrator is, or if it is the same narrator throughout the book. Everything is clouded in mystery and many sentences are quite cryptic, we get the narrator's views on a variety of subjects, some relevant to the novel, whilst some are not. At times the narrative style reminded me of Louis-Ferdinand Céline, in that the narrator struggles to tell the story coherently as they get distracted by other thoughts, then circle around several times only slowly revealing the main narrative that we, the reader, is eager to hear. Céline does it brilliantly, but I'm not sure about Jelinek.
The other thing that might put off potential readers is that the characters are repellent, Kurt especially, as he's portrayed as this greedy, amoral monster who is only interested in fucking and killing. For example it is revealed that through his job he gets access to pictures of car-crash victims and masturbates over them. The female characters aren't much better; they're vacant and just passively accept their fates and they're all besotted with Kurt, or men similar to Kurt.
Women don't know how dangerous he really is, and if they did know, they would only steer all the more impetuously towards his powerful, somewhat thickset body cliffs, throw themselves forward, until their little boat breaks against a resistance they haven't seen, because it was buried down below under the women's foam.
Basically everything can be done with women, it's as if they had done something wrong and wanted to be punished. And whatever has never been done with them, that's what they want to do more than anything else.So, I'm not really sure if I like this novel or not. Although it was relatively easy to read, it was difficult to comprehend and for large parts of it I was just wondering just what the point was in reading it. However, it's been a few days since I finished it and it has started to 'settle down' and maybe it's one of those books that seem to improve after it's finished and after a second reading...maybe.
I initially gave this two stars but on re-reading parts I felt that was a bit harsh. It had a certain kind of grim appeal to it, so three stars.
June 29, 2024
Bueno, bueno, bueno. ¿Por qué he tardado tanto en leer a Jelinek? Menuda voladura de cabeza. TODO. Su escritura, la historia, sus reflexiones... Será el primero de muchos <3
October 12, 2013
I decided rereading Greed, after being scandalized in a recent conversation by the comparison someone dared make between Jelinek and Herta Mueller. I read Jelinek years ago, and only in German, and I would be ready to give in this much: the English translation doesn’t do her justice (I remember as my one personal literary ambition starting to translate Die Liebhaberinnen into Romanian in 2005, only to be detoured from my project and immensely disappointed by the translation published only months after I started - I don’t think Jelinek’s reputation amongst the Romanian public will soon recover, same for the English translation of Greed) but even so, there’s no comparison between the two.
I love her prose-poetry writing, the depths she can go into the darkest corners of her characters� psyche, her lucidity and her gift of playing with the language, the dry tones. Arguably, she is hard to swallow, and no one pudic should touch her novels, as psychological realism is repulsive to most, and truth is vulgar. What I think Jelinek masters, for those who can go past the derangement, is manoeuvreing this repulsion, and bringing the reader to a point from which they can witness the horror with a dispassionate eye.
In Greed (and most of her novels alike), one feels that the masterplan is bringing everything abominable up front while no perspective is given (the novel is written in the present tense, and I think this is another strategy to allow the reader to feel equidistant from all characters and their actions).
The narrative voice goes from the edge of sharp, dry coherence to the obscure, bubbling language of an old lady’s voice drifting into madness (for the horrors she's telling), with constant shifts of tone and register, that are admittedly making the reading more difficult, and adding to the alleged incoherence of the writing (also the interference of the narrator speaking about herself, as in “notes to self�, like � that doesn't work, it is a repetition�, � I can’t keep up with my characters� etc., it sort of breaks the epic line, like in a comedian's show, one can picture Eddie Izzard impersonating the note taker, but I guess one can feel for the tormenting labors of giving birth to characters, especially that in Greed, as in The Piano Teacher, Jelinek identifies with the needy piano teacher, then ridicules her - and women's in general - repellent eagerness to be loved and finally destroys her). But to dismiss Greed for its apparent disorder would be to misunderstand it, as the incoherence is merely a technique not to exhaust the reader with the horror and ugliness of its characters and to honor depth without compromising to the analgesic effect of realism).
Greed is a remarkable read.
I love her prose-poetry writing, the depths she can go into the darkest corners of her characters� psyche, her lucidity and her gift of playing with the language, the dry tones. Arguably, she is hard to swallow, and no one pudic should touch her novels, as psychological realism is repulsive to most, and truth is vulgar. What I think Jelinek masters, for those who can go past the derangement, is manoeuvreing this repulsion, and bringing the reader to a point from which they can witness the horror with a dispassionate eye.
In Greed (and most of her novels alike), one feels that the masterplan is bringing everything abominable up front while no perspective is given (the novel is written in the present tense, and I think this is another strategy to allow the reader to feel equidistant from all characters and their actions).
The narrative voice goes from the edge of sharp, dry coherence to the obscure, bubbling language of an old lady’s voice drifting into madness (for the horrors she's telling), with constant shifts of tone and register, that are admittedly making the reading more difficult, and adding to the alleged incoherence of the writing (also the interference of the narrator speaking about herself, as in “notes to self�, like � that doesn't work, it is a repetition�, � I can’t keep up with my characters� etc., it sort of breaks the epic line, like in a comedian's show, one can picture Eddie Izzard impersonating the note taker, but I guess one can feel for the tormenting labors of giving birth to characters, especially that in Greed, as in The Piano Teacher, Jelinek identifies with the needy piano teacher, then ridicules her - and women's in general - repellent eagerness to be loved and finally destroys her). But to dismiss Greed for its apparent disorder would be to misunderstand it, as the incoherence is merely a technique not to exhaust the reader with the horror and ugliness of its characters and to honor depth without compromising to the analgesic effect of realism).
Greed is a remarkable read.
September 11, 2020
When a complex narrative voice relates a story through multifaceted metaphors, there is a density to the work that will daunt many readers. While it is the case that sometimes readers have to do more work than usual, it is also true that to write prose that is (admittedly) innovative and experimental, should not entail the sacrifice of accessibility � which is what has happened here. This novel, to be blunt, grinds down to just plain tedium. While I could have persisted beyond the mid-way, I have chosen not to finish “Greed� because I don’t think it is worth the effort or my time. Many other readers with a similar reaction have given the work a �2�, and I will follow their lead.
February 9, 2011
this book fuckin hurt me.
December 21, 2011
Elfriede Jelinek won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2004, but I had never read her work before. One of her previous novels, The Piano Teacher, was apparently made into a film that won several prizes in Cannes in 2001, but I have never seen it. So I had little to prepare me for Greed, her latest work to be translated into English. But I did have some preparation: last year, as a bet, I read James Joyce’s Ulysses. There are many similarities. If you like complex, stream-of-consciousness literature, you’ll love this book.
Greed is a kind of modernist crime novel. A number of crimes are committed, probably (nothing in this novel is clear) by an ambitious, frustrated country policeman amid the mountains and small towns of southern Austria. We are told quite early on that the country policeman, Kurt Janisch is 'completely dominated by a kind of greed'. This greed, we discover, is for property; specifically, the property of lonely middle-aged women on whom he preys. And Janisch’s story is related by one of these women who decides on page 4: I’d better take over the telling of the story myself now. Don’t interrupt!
It is often quite difficult to understand exactly what is going on, but the gist of the story is that the country policeman uses his position of male authority to satisfy his greed. Meanwhile, a number of young women have gone missing, often tourists or hitchhikers or other vulnerable single women. It is not clear whether Janisch murdered them, although the implication is that he has. But his main preoccupation is acquiring property, something he does by seducing widows and other single older women. Women don't know how dangerous he really is, says the narrator. Then, at a key point in the book, it appears the country policeman murders the daughter of one of his victims (the murder itself is described in a typically complex and tangential way, until the narrator herself has to admit: Now I've lost the thread myself, the first set goes to you). Janisch dumps the victim's body in the lake, tidied up, wrapped up and removed from the earth and dispatched to the water.
One of the reasons I found Greed such a difficult read is the degree of authorial intrusion into the narrative. Pages and pages of diatribe against man-made pollution, modern Austria, banks and financial institutions and the ownership of property, God and religion, shallow women and despicable men. This really is a novel about the difference between men and women, in which men are painted as beasts ruled by their penises who are ruining the planet, and women are portrayed as pretty damned stupid for allowing it all to happen. Jelinek (or at least, her narrator) has a low opinion of humankind. It was for this reason, I suspect, that whenever I put the book down I often found it hard to pick up again.
The narrative is undoubtedly difficult to follow. The length of the very long and rambling, multi-clause sentences and complex paragraphs that run for pages without stopping for breath can be rather off-putting. For the reader, the best approach would appear to be to read Greed in the way I was advised to read Joyce� Ulysses: that is, to not attempt to make sense of every word but to just 'go with the flow' and enjoy the ride. There is a story buried away in there somewhere, in the same way as the murder victims are hidden in the woods around the country policeman's village. And between the polemic there is quite a lot of pornographic sex. There is also a surprising amount of humour in this novel, too. When I did bring myself to return to the book after another much-needed break, I usually enjoyed reading it. But only for so long at a time.
Greed is a kind of modernist crime novel. A number of crimes are committed, probably (nothing in this novel is clear) by an ambitious, frustrated country policeman amid the mountains and small towns of southern Austria. We are told quite early on that the country policeman, Kurt Janisch is 'completely dominated by a kind of greed'. This greed, we discover, is for property; specifically, the property of lonely middle-aged women on whom he preys. And Janisch’s story is related by one of these women who decides on page 4: I’d better take over the telling of the story myself now. Don’t interrupt!
It is often quite difficult to understand exactly what is going on, but the gist of the story is that the country policeman uses his position of male authority to satisfy his greed. Meanwhile, a number of young women have gone missing, often tourists or hitchhikers or other vulnerable single women. It is not clear whether Janisch murdered them, although the implication is that he has. But his main preoccupation is acquiring property, something he does by seducing widows and other single older women. Women don't know how dangerous he really is, says the narrator. Then, at a key point in the book, it appears the country policeman murders the daughter of one of his victims (the murder itself is described in a typically complex and tangential way, until the narrator herself has to admit: Now I've lost the thread myself, the first set goes to you). Janisch dumps the victim's body in the lake, tidied up, wrapped up and removed from the earth and dispatched to the water.
One of the reasons I found Greed such a difficult read is the degree of authorial intrusion into the narrative. Pages and pages of diatribe against man-made pollution, modern Austria, banks and financial institutions and the ownership of property, God and religion, shallow women and despicable men. This really is a novel about the difference between men and women, in which men are painted as beasts ruled by their penises who are ruining the planet, and women are portrayed as pretty damned stupid for allowing it all to happen. Jelinek (or at least, her narrator) has a low opinion of humankind. It was for this reason, I suspect, that whenever I put the book down I often found it hard to pick up again.
The narrative is undoubtedly difficult to follow. The length of the very long and rambling, multi-clause sentences and complex paragraphs that run for pages without stopping for breath can be rather off-putting. For the reader, the best approach would appear to be to read Greed in the way I was advised to read Joyce� Ulysses: that is, to not attempt to make sense of every word but to just 'go with the flow' and enjoy the ride. There is a story buried away in there somewhere, in the same way as the murder victims are hidden in the woods around the country policeman's village. And between the polemic there is quite a lot of pornographic sex. There is also a surprising amount of humour in this novel, too. When I did bring myself to return to the book after another much-needed break, I usually enjoyed reading it. But only for so long at a time.
May 19, 2019
Was war denn das, was ich hier las?
Immerhin das Buch einer Nobelpreisträgerin, das ich in Originalsprache lesen konnte! Eine Übersetzung ist mir schwer vorstelbar. Das Buch lebt von der Sprache, die besonders außergewöhnlich ist. Ich kann mich an nichts vergleichbares erinnern. Die meiste Zeit wird der Leser von der Autorin direkt angesprochen, mitunter werden Leser und Autorin zu einem "wir" oder "man", nur in zwei kurzen Passagen sind Figuren des Buchs die Ich-Erzähler. Die erzählende Autorin hat ein extremes Mitteilungsbedürfnis, wir können jedem Gedankengang folgen. Sie nutzt dabei vor allem die Doppeldeutigkeit von Worten oder Redewendungen. Das führt zu einem ganz besonderen Wortwitz, den ich auf den ersten 30 Seiten absolut genial fand, der mir aber nach weiteren 30 Seiten auf die Nerven ging. Danach wechselte es zwischen diesen beiden Extremen. Innerhalb eines Satzes wechselte der Gedanke oft komplett seine Richtung, sie kam vom Hölzchen aufs Stöckchen und schrieb dann selbst, dass sie dies gar nicht sagen wollte.
Die Handlung des Buches war klischeebeladen, zog sich ewig hin und schien mir nur als Rahmen für den Wortwitz zu dienen, aber auch für allerlei sarkastische Bemerkungen über Österreich und Politik. Teilweise handelten die Personen völlig unlogisch. Warum ließ sich der Besitz liebende und Frauen verachtende Protagonist mit einem besitzlosen jungen Mädchen ein? Was sollte der halbe Kriminalfall in dem Buch? Ich fürchte, ich habe es nicht verstanden. Es gab reichlich detaillert und vulgär geschilderte Sexszenen, denen eine furchbares Frauenbild zugrunde lag. Hier bemerkte ich den Sarkasmus hinter der klischeehaften Beziehung, aber es machte die ganze Handlung noch absurder.
Dagegen fand ich die vielen Beschreibungen des Wassers in allen Facetten, aber auch der Berge streckenweise sehr gelungen, wenn auch viel zu ausführlich. Ich fand, dass es 200 Seiten weniger auch getan hätten. Es hätten nur die Wiederholungen weggelassen werden müssen sowie einige mir unnütz erscheinende Abschweifungen.
Hier mal ein kleiner Einblick in das Wasserthema und den Schreibstil: "Sonst kommt man früher oder später in den Sumpf, den aber auch das Wasser geschaffen hat, als es nichts Sinnvolles zu tun hatte. Jetzt leben dort so flinke, angenehme Tiere auf diesem baumlosen Gelände, angenehm!, weil sie so klein sind und man sie meist nicht sehen muss, allein die Pflanzen, Süßgraser, Schilf, Seggen (was ist denn das? Bitte schreiben Sie mir unverzüglich, falls Sie es wissen!), Binsen und Rohrkolben zum Abnagen, ich sage Ihnen: ein Paradies!"
Und noch ein Zitat zur Doppeldeutigkeit: "Die Zeit geht jetzt auch vorbei, schon wieder, na sowas, wir hätten sie auch diesmal fast nicht erkannt. so wie die heute ausschaut."
Teilweise habe ich diesen Stil genossen und bin froh, mal ein Buch der Autorin gelesen zu haben, aber ein zweites Mal werde ich es vermutlich nicht ausprobieren.
Immerhin das Buch einer Nobelpreisträgerin, das ich in Originalsprache lesen konnte! Eine Übersetzung ist mir schwer vorstelbar. Das Buch lebt von der Sprache, die besonders außergewöhnlich ist. Ich kann mich an nichts vergleichbares erinnern. Die meiste Zeit wird der Leser von der Autorin direkt angesprochen, mitunter werden Leser und Autorin zu einem "wir" oder "man", nur in zwei kurzen Passagen sind Figuren des Buchs die Ich-Erzähler. Die erzählende Autorin hat ein extremes Mitteilungsbedürfnis, wir können jedem Gedankengang folgen. Sie nutzt dabei vor allem die Doppeldeutigkeit von Worten oder Redewendungen. Das führt zu einem ganz besonderen Wortwitz, den ich auf den ersten 30 Seiten absolut genial fand, der mir aber nach weiteren 30 Seiten auf die Nerven ging. Danach wechselte es zwischen diesen beiden Extremen. Innerhalb eines Satzes wechselte der Gedanke oft komplett seine Richtung, sie kam vom Hölzchen aufs Stöckchen und schrieb dann selbst, dass sie dies gar nicht sagen wollte.
Die Handlung des Buches war klischeebeladen, zog sich ewig hin und schien mir nur als Rahmen für den Wortwitz zu dienen, aber auch für allerlei sarkastische Bemerkungen über Österreich und Politik. Teilweise handelten die Personen völlig unlogisch. Warum ließ sich der Besitz liebende und Frauen verachtende Protagonist mit einem besitzlosen jungen Mädchen ein? Was sollte der halbe Kriminalfall in dem Buch? Ich fürchte, ich habe es nicht verstanden. Es gab reichlich detaillert und vulgär geschilderte Sexszenen, denen eine furchbares Frauenbild zugrunde lag. Hier bemerkte ich den Sarkasmus hinter der klischeehaften Beziehung, aber es machte die ganze Handlung noch absurder.
Dagegen fand ich die vielen Beschreibungen des Wassers in allen Facetten, aber auch der Berge streckenweise sehr gelungen, wenn auch viel zu ausführlich. Ich fand, dass es 200 Seiten weniger auch getan hätten. Es hätten nur die Wiederholungen weggelassen werden müssen sowie einige mir unnütz erscheinende Abschweifungen.
Hier mal ein kleiner Einblick in das Wasserthema und den Schreibstil: "Sonst kommt man früher oder später in den Sumpf, den aber auch das Wasser geschaffen hat, als es nichts Sinnvolles zu tun hatte. Jetzt leben dort so flinke, angenehme Tiere auf diesem baumlosen Gelände, angenehm!, weil sie so klein sind und man sie meist nicht sehen muss, allein die Pflanzen, Süßgraser, Schilf, Seggen (was ist denn das? Bitte schreiben Sie mir unverzüglich, falls Sie es wissen!), Binsen und Rohrkolben zum Abnagen, ich sage Ihnen: ein Paradies!"
Und noch ein Zitat zur Doppeldeutigkeit: "Die Zeit geht jetzt auch vorbei, schon wieder, na sowas, wir hätten sie auch diesmal fast nicht erkannt. so wie die heute ausschaut."
Teilweise habe ich diesen Stil genossen und bin froh, mal ein Buch der Autorin gelesen zu haben, aber ein zweites Mal werde ich es vermutlich nicht ausprobieren.
May 20, 2008
outstanding novel, story and language are fascinating and it has a great ending.
October 24, 2012
Powerful, grim, beautiful, chilling novel-length prose poem. Jelinek has a lot to say, on a lot of subjects, and she goes about saying it in a striking and original style. Sui generis.
July 5, 2016
Da kann die Sprache noch so interessant sein (dazu später ausführlich mehr), „Gier� interessiert den Leser nicht im geringsten: aufgrund von Jelineks Erzählstil schaffen es die 462 Seiten nicht, mehr als 5 oder 6 Ereignisse im Gesamten zu erzählen. Warum? Jelinek entscheidet sich in diesem Buch für einen sehr ausufernden, fortschwemmenden (um an das Hauptmotiv des Wassers anzuknüpfen, mit der Geschwindigkeit von 20 Knoten, haha!) � das Bezugsthema schwimmt fort, und das Bezugsobjekt auch � Erzählstil, bei dem jeglicher Inhalt im Boden des Lebens versickert. So oder so ähnlich würde sie es wohl ausdrücken. Dieser Art von Stil zieht sich durch das gesamte Buch.
Nur als Beispiel: In folgender Szene geht es darum, dass Polizisten wegen der verschwundenen Gabi eine Hausbefragung im Dorf durchführen. Stattdessen hangelt sich Jelinek hier von einem Gedanken zum anderen über das Thema Gott hindurch. Im Folgenden eine lange Passage. Wer mag, kann gerne weiterspringen (S. 413f):
An diesem großen Auszug sieht man schon die typischen Schreibvarianten:
Die Erzählerin stellt extrem häufig einen Ich-Bezug her.
Die Sprache gerät stellenweise ins Mundartliche.
Die Sätze sind irre lang; dabei werden eine Apposition und ein Relativsatz an die andere gereiht. Sie werden häufig sogar ineinander verschoben, sodass der eigentliche Hauptsatz quasi verschwindet. Jelinek kommt wortwörtlich einfach nicht auf den Punkt, stattdessen setzt man lieber einfach noch ein Komma mehr.
Positiv fallen jedoch die Wortspiele und Metaphern auf � dies erstaunt mich umso mehr, da ich doch dachte, dass das Inventar an möglichen Wortspielen im Deutschen reichlich beschränkt sei. „Gier� belehrt mich darin aber eines Besseren � leider zu oft des Guten! Anstatt die Technik zur Zier zu krönen, wird die Zier zum Hauptelement. Wann immer ein Umweg möglich ist, wird dieser auch gemacht. In den besten Fällen entstehen damit dichte Passagen wie diese (man beachte die Wortfelder „Grund�, „tief� und „fremd� / S. 311):
Oder die folgende Passage zum Thema Gefäße (S. 447):
Der Durchschnittsleser nennt dies aber sicherlich eher „das blöde Ösigeschwurbel�. Der Brite dagegen „stream of consciousness�. Oder wie der Schwede sagen würde: „Literatur-Nobelpreis 2004�.
Isoliert betrachtet erscheint dies genial; 460 Seiten davon sind allerdings deutlich zu viel. Und dabei ist die Sprache noch lange nicht gut genug, um all die fehlenden Punkte zu überdecken, die echte wertvolle Literatur ausmachen: packende Charaktere; wahre Aussagen und Beobachtungen über die menschliche Situation; eine interessante Handlung; ergreifende Momente; und und und.
Nur als Beispiel: In folgender Szene geht es darum, dass Polizisten wegen der verschwundenen Gabi eine Hausbefragung im Dorf durchführen. Stattdessen hangelt sich Jelinek hier von einem Gedanken zum anderen über das Thema Gott hindurch. Im Folgenden eine lange Passage. Wer mag, kann gerne weiterspringen (S. 413f):
Es ist alles gesagt, vielleicht hat einer zuviel gesagt und hält sich jetzt erschrocken die Hand vor den Mund, aber Gott ist sein Sohn ja auch ständig im Weg, der ist einfach jünger und fescher als er, er hat einen Haufen Jünger um sich geschart, auf die er scharf ist, und Gott bereut schon, ihn wieder zu sich zurückgeholt und in sich aufgenommen zu haben. Dadurch wurde er zwar selber jünger, zumindest sieht er so aus, aber es macht auch mehr Mühe, mit der Jugend mitzuhalten, bis man 47 ist. Jesus will Sport machen, Jesus will sich Arbeit machen und Seelen holen, Jesus zerrt ununterbrochen Irrtümer herbei und bastelt ewige Wahrheiten daraus zusammen, der Heimwerker, na, sehr geschickt geht er dabei nicht vor. Und die Gendarmen gehen derzeit unermüdlich von Haus zu Haus und machen Befragungen, das müssen sie auch selber machen, das nimmt ihnen keiner ab. Erzählungsgeröll prasselt auf sie herab, manchmal abgelöst von verstocktem, hartnäckigem Schweigen, wie der Steinschlag beim launischen Neuberger Felsen, von dem es auch manchmal tagelang heruntergedonnert kommt und dann tagelang wieder nicht, und Autodächer mit Dellen verziert, da hat der Herr Gott aber schönere Verzierungen, ganze Strahlenkränze, die er sich abbrechen könnte, wenn er sich in unsere Leben zu sehr einmischt. Er tut es eh nicht. Hier ist das Büro der Firma, in der die Gabi beschäftigt gewesen ist, und auch hier hängt er schon, der Gekreuzigte, im Chefbüro, nicht am Sand, aber im Eck hängt er. Ein modern ausgeführtes schlichtes Kreuz, das in einem Kunstgewerbeladen gekauft worden ist und vor Stolz über seinen stolzen Preis fast aus den Schrauben platzt, mit denen das prominente Opfer an seinem Gerät befestigt ist, das, glaube ich, inzwischen unsterblicher ist als der Sportler drauf, den könnten wir glatt weglassen; ja, Sie sehen richtig: darunter eine Kerze und eine Vase in Herzesform, in der ein Puschel Strohblumen steckt, so gefällt es der Chefsekretärin, die sich von allen anderen Frauen in der Firma unterscheidet und diesen Unterschied in ihrer Erscheinung gern betont, so hat sie z. B. ihre Frisur mit Haarlack betoniert.
An diesem großen Auszug sieht man schon die typischen Schreibvarianten:
Die Erzählerin stellt extrem häufig einen Ich-Bezug her.
Die Sprache gerät stellenweise ins Mundartliche.
Die Sätze sind irre lang; dabei werden eine Apposition und ein Relativsatz an die andere gereiht. Sie werden häufig sogar ineinander verschoben, sodass der eigentliche Hauptsatz quasi verschwindet. Jelinek kommt wortwörtlich einfach nicht auf den Punkt, stattdessen setzt man lieber einfach noch ein Komma mehr.
Positiv fallen jedoch die Wortspiele und Metaphern auf � dies erstaunt mich umso mehr, da ich doch dachte, dass das Inventar an möglichen Wortspielen im Deutschen reichlich beschränkt sei. „Gier� belehrt mich darin aber eines Besseren � leider zu oft des Guten! Anstatt die Technik zur Zier zu krönen, wird die Zier zum Hauptelement. Wann immer ein Umweg möglich ist, wird dieser auch gemacht. In den besten Fällen entstehen damit dichte Passagen wie diese (man beachte die Wortfelder „Grund�, „tief� und „fremd� / S. 311):
Sie wissen im Grunde nichts. Sie wissen nicht, daß Gabi auf dem Grunde des Sees ruht, was nicht sehr tief ist. Ja, die Gedanken sind manchmal tief, aber die Gründe, die einen zur Tat schreiten lassen, sinds oft nicht. Der Gendarm ist etwas wie ein Fremdenführer, nur daß er als einziger niemals einen Fremden führen würde, wenn nichts für ihn dabei herausspringt.
Oder die folgende Passage zum Thema Gefäße (S. 447):
Wie diese leere Schale, die sie ohne ihn ist, die Frau, diese trübe Tasse, die mit nichts als sich selbst gefüllt ist und sich nicht einmal selbst bis auf den Grund sehen kann, warum sie sowas macht. Sie sieht ihren Boden nicht mehr. Sie hat sich ausgeschüttet, aber niemand hat sie aufgewischt. Vielleicht ist das alles eine Form von Wahnsinn, na, eher ein Förmchen, in das die Kinder ihren Sand pressen, um ihn dem Nachbarn aufs Auge zu drücken.
Der Durchschnittsleser nennt dies aber sicherlich eher „das blöde Ösigeschwurbel�. Der Brite dagegen „stream of consciousness�. Oder wie der Schwede sagen würde: „Literatur-Nobelpreis 2004�.
Isoliert betrachtet erscheint dies genial; 460 Seiten davon sind allerdings deutlich zu viel. Und dabei ist die Sprache noch lange nicht gut genug, um all die fehlenden Punkte zu überdecken, die echte wertvolle Literatur ausmachen: packende Charaktere; wahre Aussagen und Beobachtungen über die menschliche Situation; eine interessante Handlung; ergreifende Momente; und und und.
June 26, 2024
Absolute Beauty!
Joyce and Bernhard combined and elevated to a new level. It is the Molly Bloom chapter, but with more inner anxiety and care towards the world.
“Here I have to agree with Hegel’s critics, all the pain, all the suffering, all the hardship, all the everything, all the death in itself, none of it will result in even one less innocent dumb sheep writhing on the slaughtering block of history. �
Joyce and Bernhard combined and elevated to a new level. It is the Molly Bloom chapter, but with more inner anxiety and care towards the world.
“Here I have to agree with Hegel’s critics, all the pain, all the suffering, all the hardship, all the everything, all the death in itself, none of it will result in even one less innocent dumb sheep writhing on the slaughtering block of history. �
December 17, 2017
Život je na takéto knihy krátky, Elfriede.
April 23, 2024
I’ll forward this with, I don’t see very many people being able to casually read this book. This is a shame, because, with just a little bit of patience and an openness to a different style of storytelling, I think most people would agree that this book is badass. The problem is that it’s a story that’s either told by an unreliable narrator or a scatterbrained old woman who unabashedly keeps no truths secret or is making up new ones, it’s hard to say, either Jelinek is making us question the precedence of whether we should believe women or admit that they’re as equally full of shit as men. But I was just along for the ride because Jelinek is a wildcard when it comes to writing and I love all the freaky shit she writes about.
The book is told by way of a stream of consciousness like rambling, from a woman named Gerti, who is the mistress of Kurt Janisch, a country policeman. His appetite is all-consuming. That is, he is completely empty inside, which makes him a danger, because he longs to fill that void with consumption. Whether it be alcohol, women, wealth, or violence. His greed knows no limit. Women like Gerti know this, she sees the warning signs, but her human nature can’t resist that high-risk D. She ain’t even trying to fix him, just to keep him around.
This book is part mystery because Kurt has another side chick named, Gabby. Who he may or may not have strangled to death during some lewd mouth exercises. But you don’t know what happened because the person telling you about it, Gerti, wasn’t there. She’ll tell you exactly what happened, but she doesn’t have a clue, however, you can’t help but believe her because she’s already told you so much about the country policeman, and that sort of behavior lines up with him, but that could all be something that made up too. See how confusing it gets. This is a book about the war of the bodies. There is an x rating for the sex acts and violence in this book.
It’s a novel about so many things, as they are controlled by greed. The need for more property, wealth, sex, new sex, materialism, religion, social status, and the desire for death. It all adds up to a toxic relationship for those who suffer from it. Jelinek is all about the exploitive nature of the sexes and devouring one for the pleasure of the other, it’s all she’s ever written about. But this book also has a larger point, which is the need to understand the opposite sex, something men struggle with, but to try is a true act of love, one that would help a lot more than presupposing that the atmosphere of using one another like just another product is somehow natural. Because most products break after enough abuse.
The book is told by way of a stream of consciousness like rambling, from a woman named Gerti, who is the mistress of Kurt Janisch, a country policeman. His appetite is all-consuming. That is, he is completely empty inside, which makes him a danger, because he longs to fill that void with consumption. Whether it be alcohol, women, wealth, or violence. His greed knows no limit. Women like Gerti know this, she sees the warning signs, but her human nature can’t resist that high-risk D. She ain’t even trying to fix him, just to keep him around.
This book is part mystery because Kurt has another side chick named, Gabby. Who he may or may not have strangled to death during some lewd mouth exercises. But you don’t know what happened because the person telling you about it, Gerti, wasn’t there. She’ll tell you exactly what happened, but she doesn’t have a clue, however, you can’t help but believe her because she’s already told you so much about the country policeman, and that sort of behavior lines up with him, but that could all be something that made up too. See how confusing it gets. This is a book about the war of the bodies. There is an x rating for the sex acts and violence in this book.
It’s a novel about so many things, as they are controlled by greed. The need for more property, wealth, sex, new sex, materialism, religion, social status, and the desire for death. It all adds up to a toxic relationship for those who suffer from it. Jelinek is all about the exploitive nature of the sexes and devouring one for the pleasure of the other, it’s all she’s ever written about. But this book also has a larger point, which is the need to understand the opposite sex, something men struggle with, but to try is a true act of love, one that would help a lot more than presupposing that the atmosphere of using one another like just another product is somehow natural. Because most products break after enough abuse.
October 19, 2018
I was given this one to study under conceptions of women's experimental fiction writing. I appreciate Jelinek is one of the few women to win a Nobel Prize in Literature but I could not finish this. To properly understand and appreciate everything going on here I could have to do a very close reading of each page, going back over every sentence. It may be politically and conceptually adroit, and I am not lacking in readership skills, but as an experience for a reader I think it's awful. That may be the point: women have long had only a language that is thoroughly masculine to try to demonstrate their subjectivity. I mean all the words make sense, sometimes the sentences do too, but collectively I had no idea what was happening until I close read some passages and no one has time to fine-tooth a 300 page novel. The point of view jumps around, who knows who or what is narrating? What we're looking for? This is not stream of consciousness even as I have known it. It is a finely crafted, purposeful chaos. It's a beautiful chaos, perhaps my feelings would make Jelinek proud. But do her politics, which shape her form (and in the theory I've read this is a very astute and important thing to do), actually get her anywhere with this? No, qualified. Perhaps only those doing post-grad in women's experimental writing. It's not a workable book. It's obscure, obstinately, purposely, vehemently so. She knows what she's doing. But briefly: It's about a small town police officer in Austria who gets away with an awful murder, it's about how incompatible society has made it for men and women to get along, it's about cognitive dissonance and the political history of Austria. There are lines that are profound, important, which I enjoyed very much. I just can't rate something I couldn't bring myself to finish any higher.
April 27, 2013
Elfriede Jelinek's Greed is supposedly her most accessible work. At least, it says so on the blurb. If this is accessible, I don't know what her other novels are like. It completely defeated me. Jelinek's prose is dense, long (paragraphs extending for pages), frequently unpunctuated; it roars in places, quivers with ferocious disdain for its characters (many of whom are unnamed). Nominally, this is about a country policeman who wants to amass property and so seduces every middle-aged landowning woman in his village; there is much furious and seedy coupling and complete lack of understanding between men and women; there is a murdered girl and her mother who is often terrified by her absence and at other times relieved. I could make neither head nor tail of this novel. Perhaps it is one to be grappled with, treated as an adversary? A reviewer in the Guardian, who has no patience with people demanding easy reads, called it daredevil, risk-taking prose (What is killing the novel is people's growing dependence on feel-good fiction, fantasy and non-fiction. With this comes an inability or unwillingness to tolerate any irregularities of form, a prissy quibbling over capital letters, punctiliousness about punctuation. They act like we're still at school! Real writing is not about rules. It's about electrifying prose, it's about play.) But I made no headway. If any of you read it and understand it, please be sure to explain it all to me.
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December 8, 2015An odd little novel, nowhere near as funny or as dark as Jelinek's The Piano Teacher. Instead, this is an almost pure stream of consciousness, set in the backwoods of Austria. The writing is indeed stunning, and it is decidedly sinister and effective-- I'll think twice about woodland sex in the future-- but it's difficult to say how much I truly "enjoyed" reading it. Worthwhile, but at times arduous, this is something that will appeal to the handful of others who like modernist literature-- and I liked how it pushed my limits-- but few others.
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