Old masters, Thomas Bernhard (anotated ed.)

Thomas Bernhard (1931–1989) was a poet, novelist, and playwright, as well as a vigorous and eloquent polemicist. His work, which brings together elements of the absurd, existentialism, and biting farce, stands among the most admired in contemporary literature—both for the immense originality of his style and for his unyielding critique of the impostures and moral ambiguity of his contemporaries.

In Old Masters (1985), the last of his novels, Bernhard offers a sharp reflection on old age, as well as a kind of wholesale revision of art itself—its supposed rules and alleged virtues. In flawless harmony with the rest of his work, and through the verbal labyrinth born of his obsessive prose, he here crafts a brilliant example of narrative artifice and a new diatribe against the State and a frivolous society he delights in satirizing.

The anotated edition of the novel that captures the quintessence of Bernhard’s spirit: free, incisive, lucid, and mordant.