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Clairvoyant of the Small : The Life of Robert Walser
Author
Title
Clairvoyant of the Small : The Life of Robert Walser / Susan Bernofsky.
ISBN
9780300258264
Publication
New Haven, CT : Yale University Press, [2021]
Copyright Notice Date
©2021
Physical Description
1 online resource (384 p.) : 18 b-w illus.
Local Notes
Access is available to the Yale community.
Notes
In English.
Access and use
Access restricted by licensing agreement.
Summary
The first English-language biography of one of the great literary talents of the twentieth century, written by his award-winning translator"Bernofsky takes us into the heart of an artist's life/work struggles, brilliantly illuminating Walser's exquisite sensibility and uncompromising radical innovations, while deftly tracking how his life gradually came apart at the seams. A tragic and intimate portrait."-Amy Sillman "Robert Walser is the perfect pathetic poet: pithy, awkward, drinks too much, sibling rivalrous, ambitious, broke, and mentally ill. Was he proto queer or trans, this red headed writer who next to Gertrude Stein might be the most influential writer of our moment? Riveting and heart-breaking, this biography kept me drunk for days."-Eileen Myles The great Swiss-German modernist author Robert Walser lived eccentrically on the fringes of society, shocking his Berlin friends by enrolling in butler school and later developing an urban-nomad lifestyle in the Swiss capital, Bern, before checking himself into a psychiatric clinic. A connoisseur of power differentials, his pronounced interest in everything inconspicuous and modest-social outcasts and artists as well as the impoverished, marginalized, and forgotten-prompted W. G. Sebald to dub him "a clairvoyant of the small." His revolutionary use of short prose forms had an enormous influence on Franz Kafka, Walter Benjamin, Robert Musil, and many others. He was long believed an outsider by conviction, but Susan Bernofsky presents a more nuanced view in this immaculately researched and beautifully written biography. Setting Walser in the context of early twentieth century European history, she provides illuminating analysis of his extraordinary life and work, bearing witness to his "extreme artistic delight.&rdquo
Variant and related titles
De Gruyter University Press eBook pilot project 2021.
Format
Books / Online
Language
English
Added to Catalog
July 12, 2021
Contents
Frontmatter
Contents
Introduction. Searching for Robert Walser
One. Behind the Toy Shop (1878-1894)
Two. From the Bank to the Stage (1885-1896)
Three. The Young Poet (1896-1899)
Four. Drama (1899-1900)
Five. The German Cities (1900-1903)
Six. The First Published Book (1903-1905)
Seven. A Berliner and a Novelist (1905-1906)
Eight. The Balloon Ride (1907-1908)
Nine. The Fall (1908-1913)
Ten. The Return to Switzerland (1913-1914)
Eleven. A Walk in Wartime (1915-1917)
Twelve. The Aftermath of War (1917-1920)
Thirteen. The Secret Novel (1921-1925)
Fourteen. The Unraveling (1925-1929)
Fifteen. The Quiet Years (1929-1956)
Epilogue
Appendix: Robert Walser's Known Addresses
Notes
Acknowledgments
Credits
Index
Subjects
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