Concrete, by Thomas Bernhard

Thomas Bernhard (1931-1989) has no less than six entries in 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die (2006 edition), and now that I’ve read Concrete (1982) I am certainly going to read the others: Correction,  Extinction, Old Masters , Wittgenstein’s Nephew and Yes.   From what I read of his profile at Wikipedia the author is widely considered to be one of the most important German-speaking authors of the postwar era but was Austria’s Bad Boy, continually writing novels and plays that were hyper-critical of Austria and its sacred cows.  But the picture I have of this author from a guest post by Andrej Nicoladis at Winston’s Dad is entirely different:

Bernhard writes about society in collapse: society rotten with dishonesty, corruption and deep-rooted lies. … The narrator of the story is caught up in a fundamental battle with that society … [but eventually realises that] his conflict with society…