Geometric Regional Novel
- Book Review,
by Gert Jonke
From Publishers Weekly
The traditional regional novel celebrating simple rural living is gleefully subverted in this experimental fiction, originally published in Germany in 1969, by Austrian writer Jonke. Alternating mathematically precise descriptions with dreamlike interludes, the author evokes a stultifying village where a schoolteacher obsesses over petty rules while the ineffectual mayor enacts meaningless public rituals. Instead of taking their place in a linear plot, daily events, such as a tightrope walker's performance in the village square, are refracted through multiple points of view, concrete verse and associative word clusters. Alleging that "black men" are hiding in the shadows of trees, the town authorities begin to monitor all citizens' activities; permission to take a walk in the woods requires submission of a six-page form in duplicate. Ordinances, pat aphorisms and pseudo-informative diagrams pervade the narrative, testifying to the onslaught of bureaucracy. Meanwhile, a flock of violent birds periodically destroys villagers' houses, perhaps symbolizing nature's revolt against a fossilized social order. Leavened with irreverent humor, this Kafka-esque fun house of a novel raucously protests the regimentation and standardization of modern life. Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
This first novel, originally published in 1969 and revised in 1980, is the English-language debut of Austrian avante-gardist Jonke. Intended as a sarcastic comment on traditional, provincial German literature, it attempts to convey its theme by means of structure, utilizing diagrams, questionnaires, government ordinances, and repetitive narrative to support a minimalist plot. Two unidentified characters discuss crossing a village square that "is paved with 1946 white stone slabs." A street sweeper repeats the Sisyphean task of clearing leaves from the tree-lined square. Jonke gives lengthy, tedious descriptions of such things as the layout of the blacksmith's house, devoting several pages to the bridge leaving town, the bridgekeepers' duties, etc. The best passage considers "an artist or acrobat, or whatever such a man should be called," who walks a tightrope across the square. Jonke cutely offers alternative versions: He either fell and broke his back or was able to hang, "fingers clawed in the cracks, chinks, gaps in the walls of air." A difficult work best suited to large foreign literature collections.Ron Antonucci, Hudson Lib. & Historical Soc., OhioCopyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
German literature has long been obsessed with Heimat, an untranslatable, emotion-laden concept embracing the sense of local identity and belonging. In Jonke's brief novel, the components of Heimat are geometrically presented, dissected, recombined, and made to evolve in a satirical commentary on recent history. The setting is an unnamed, unchanging village whose inhabitants' lives are of such invariant order as to resemble elements in a mathematical equation. Each leader of the village performs repetitive functions identical to those of predecessors. Into this stasis Jonke introduces changes, each of which presents possible disaster. Jonke satirizes a type of nostalgia quite prevalent in today's Austria by showing how such a rigid order breaks down catastrophically by resisting growth. The novel is written in a style not unlike that of Samuel Beckett's late works--precise, objective, deliberately unemotional. Even in translation, it appears to be a masterpiece, most peculiar. John Shreffler
From Kirkus Reviews
This delightful novel, the first by the prolific Austrian to appear in English, makes a welcome addition to the postmodernist canon. An ersatz guidebook to a small town? A treatise on village rules and regulations? Medieval or futuristic? Working with the simplest yet most universal of geometric structures--the town square with streets and buildings branching out around it--Jonke gives his small conceptual novel vast overlays. Aided by crudely drawn blueprints and diagrams, he takes readers back to basics, beginning each chapter with comments that might be found in a child's primer. ``The village square is empty'' opens several of the ``Village Square'' chapters, which alternate with sections about the blacksmith, the mayor, and the various architectural structures. Jonke makes excellent use of repetition, building up momentum with short paragraphs, slowly enlarging them, then moving forward without redundancies. He does a nice job of chorusing the townsfolk's reaction to such municipal ``events'' as noisy children or the removal of tree stumps on which people often sat. Within the mathematically correct setting of the town square, everything else takes on precise dimensions: The spanking of a child is measured in meters; a schoolteacher explains church carvings as various geometric forms. Gradually, almost invisibly, the plot thickens in what seemed a plotless novel. The town government takes the ecologically disastrous measure of cutting down forests because of the shadows or ``black men'' who might be hiding there. We learn that the nameless couple debating whether or not to walk across the village square in every other chapter is actually in hiding. An element of racial tension added near the end causes readers to go back and rethink earlier passages. Jonke has achieved what his American counterparts merely dream of: highly experimental fiction that is both entertaining and accessible. -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
Kirkus, 4/1/94
An important voice in the contemporary German-language literary scene. . . . This delightful novel makes a welcome addition to the postmodernist canon. . . . Jonke has achieved what his American counterparts merely dream of: highly experimental fiction that is both entertaining and accessible.
John Shreffler, Booklist
The novel is written in a style not unlike that of Samuel Beckett's late works--precise, objective, deliberately unemotional. Even in translation, it appears to be a masterpiece.
Publishers Weekly
Leavened with irreverent humor, this Kafka-esque fun house of a novel raucously protests the regimentation and standardization of modern life.
Publishers Weekly
"Leavened with irreverent humor, this Kafka-esque fun house of a novel raucously protests the regimentation and standardization of modern life."
Book Description
The first time in paperback for the English-language debut of this leading Austrian writer. Geometric Regional Novel is an innovative satire on the process by which bureaucracy and official regimentation insidiously pervade society. In a deadpan, pseudo-scientific tone, the nameless narrator takes us on a tour of a bizarre village whose inhabitants lead such habitual, regulated lives that they resemble elements in a mathematical equation. The traditional leaders of village life--the mayor, the priest, the teacher--uphold the status quo with comically exaggerated attention to ceremony and trivia, and other villagers perform roles identical to those of the generations who preceded them. That nearly every aspect of village life has been codified in some way is suggested by the intrusive presence of warnings, instructions, aphorisms, diagrams, historical records, ordinances, and forms--including a hilarious 6-page one for anyone wishing to take a stroll in the forest that makes the IRS's long form look user-friendly by comparison. Contrasting with the mathematical descriptions of village life are flashes of colorful, surrealistic writing, exemplifying the life of the imagination so often smothered beneath the monotonous routine of traditional rural existence. The stifling conservatism of such life has rarely been exposed as mercilessly as Jonke does here.
Language Notes
Text: English (translation)
Original Language: German
About the Author
Born in 1946, Jonke is the recipient of numerous literary awards, including the Franz Kafka Prize and the Erich Fried Prize. First published in Austria in 1969, none of Jonkes over a dozen other novels have been translated into English.
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