From the Berlin Journal

Max Frisch

Translated by Wieland Hoban

 

5 x 8.5 inches, 136pp. 2017

ISBN : 9780857424334

Rs  499.00 (HB)
$24.50 (HB)
£16.99 (HB)

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Max Frisch (1911–91) was a giant of twentieth-century German literature. When Frisch moved into a new apartment in Berlin’s Sarrazinstrasse, he began keeping a journal, which he came to call the Berlin Journal. A few years later, he emphasized in an interview that this was by no means a 'scribbling book,' but rather a book 'fully composed.' The journal is one of the great treasures of Frisch’s literary estate, but the author imposed a retention period of twenty years from the date of his death because of the 'private things' he noted in it. From the Berlin Journal now marks the first publication of excerpts from Frisch’s journal. Here, the unmistakable Frisch is back, full of doubt, with no illusions, and with a playfully sharp eye for the world. 

From the Berlin Journal pulls from the years 1946–49 and 1966–71. Observations about the writer’s everyday life stand alongside narrative and essayistic texts, as well as finely-drawn portraits of colleagues like Günter Grass, Uwe Johnson, Wolf Biermann, and Christa Wolf, among others. Its foremost quality, though, is the extraordinary acuity with which Frisch observed political and social conditions in East Germany while living in West Berlin. 

Max Frisch (1911–91), was one of the giants of twentieth-century literature, achieving fame as a novelist, playwright, diarist, and essayist. His works include Andorra, I’m Not Stiller, A Wilderness of Mirrors, and Man in the Holocene.

 

Wieland Hoban is a British composer who lives in Germany. He has translated several works from German, including many by Theodor W. Adorno.

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