living german writers - Empfehlungen??

[Lorentzen / Nicklaus]

> On Thu, 7 Sep 2000, pynchon-l-digest wrote:
>
> quick poll, especially to those of you whose mother tongue is german--
>
> who are the main, younger up-and-coming german writers around right now?
> what contemporary german authors do you like to read? 
>
> suggestions mightily appreciated--

> thank you!
> --christina

 
                      well, not so easy to answer, this question of yours.      
                 leaving out the bofs (grass, lenz, walser etc pp) one must     
                  say that the best german writers of trp's generation   
         - hubert fichte, bernward vesper &, of course, rolf dieter brinkmann - 
                 are all dead for some time now. the only living german 
                fiction writer i'm really interested in (- means i order any new 
              book the day i hear about its publishing & read it immediately) is 
                  rainald goetz, who's style is pretty brilliant though he does, 
           unlike benn, jahnn or brinkmann, not reach pynchon's deepness. by his 
        ethnographic welthaltigkeit you can learn a lot of things about the 80s 
     & 90s in (west)germany. goetz' much debated "proletarism" - using and    
affirming lots of every day mainstream culture - is rooted in that post-punk 
           scene of '82. [about this you may read some diedrich 
   diederichsen, our leading "popkulturexperte", especially "freiheit macht arm. 
 das leben nach rock-n-roll", köln 1992: kiwi, containing btw the best text on 
hiphop in dtschlnd: "schwarze musik und weiße hörer"]. in case you wanna check 
  out rainald goetz i recommend from his most recent project "heute morgen" 
["... um 4 uhr 11, als ich von den wiesen zurückkam, wo ich den tau aufgelesen 
habe" the harald schmidt sample continues] the books "rave" (ffm 1998: suhrkamp) 
  & "abfall für alle. roman eines jahres" (ffm 1999: suhrkamp), a kind of 
"internet diary novel", which was presented in progess on goetz' website 
(www. rainald goetz.de), too. a must is also his debut novel "irre" from 
 1983 (ffm: suhrkamp). when he read parts of it during the ingeborg bachmann 
    contest in klagenfurt/austria goetz - those were the days! - cut his eyebrow 
with a razor & 
  while he went on reading the blood was dripping on his papers, a cute little 
       scene they now & then still like to show on tv. the best introduction, a 
 collection of essayistic annual reports, is probably "kronos" (ffm 1989: 
suhrkamp). what i personally like very much about rainald goetz is that he - as 
 far as i can see - is the only fiction writer on this planet who truly realizes 
the enormous aesthetical qualities of the systems theory of niklas luhmann 
    (r.i.p). 
               & sonst? na ja ... there's been a lot of talk on "pop-literature" 
 & such but the output of folks like christian kracht or bejamin von stuss can 
    only be called --- embarrasing. anyway, there's one young female author - 
 judith hermann - who really can write. her story book "sommerhaus, später" was 
very well reviewed. some of the stories i read & found them well worked (- you 
  know, i'm in general not so fond of the form "story", so i wasn't as 
enthusiastic as some others). you may check this out, too. [- kirsten, who, with 
  lil' jan,  just came in from the weekend shopping, sez i shall also name the 
swiss woman ruth schweikert].           

> but please, whoever you suggest should ideally still be alive
> (or recently so)

  but please, let me in the end also suggest something from my favourite two    
  although they already rest:

 hans henny jahnn: das holzschiff  /// rolf dieter brinkmann: westwärts 1&2

  both are, again, in print & available: each costs you just about 10 bucks.

gute lektüre wünscht: kfl (- reading "the royal family" on another rainy day)