Old masters (novel)

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Bordone room bench search , in room VI with the heading Italian schools , bench found in F. Bassano corner (2014)
Jacopo Tintoretto, white-bearded man . The scenic conditions in the novel do not correspond to the hanging in the KHM

Old Masters. Comedy is a 1985 novel by the Austrian writer Thomas Bernhard .

The title of the book refers to the painters of the pictures in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna , who are constantly being examined for errors by the protagonist of the work, 82-year-old Reger.

It is Bernhard's last prose work before his death in 1989. The novel Eradication , published in 1986, was largely completed by 1982.

content

Reger is a philosophical, lung-sick, strongly negative art critic , he works for the Times and sits down every other day in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, on his Bordone -aal bench in the Bordone-Saal in front of the white-bearded man from Tintoretto , for over 30 years, except on Mondays; The Kunsthistorisches Museum is closed on this day. Here, in this place, Reger can best reflect, criticize and uncover the horrors that exist in this world, but especially in Austria.

A second figure, Irrsigler, is the museum attendant; Reger (and once indirectly also by himself) describes him as a “ Burgenland fool”. According to Reger, it was only through their thirty years of living together in the museum that Irrsigler was gradually brought up to be human. Now, according to Reger, he is a dead man, he almost only lives for his services in the museum. The narrator of the story is Atzbacher. In his critical thinking he resembles Reger and, like the author Thomas Bernhard, has a lung disease.

The outer plot of the novel is very limited: Atzbacher observes his friend Reger as he sits on his Bordone bench and thinks, philosophizes. Atzbacher thinks about Reger's attitudes, his opinion and his life. In the second half, Atzbacher and Reger meet in the museum as agreed. But Atzbacher continues to tell the story, so that Reger's monologues are now mainly conveyed to the reader as a timely occurrence, but the structure of the conveyance does not change (particularly tangible in the frequently recurring Inquit formulas “so Reger”, “said Reger "). The final point is a joint visit to the Burgtheater with the performance of Kleist's Broken Jug : "The performance was horrific."

The whole thing is pervaded by aversion, incomprehension and even disgust for Austrian culture and society. Atzbacher does not justify his points of criticism; they are uttered apodictically and, as is often the case with Bernhard, repeated in increasing, intensifying variations, like a piece of music. Reger, on behalf of Bernhard himself, convicted. However, he does not suggest any options, but repeats over and over again what he has to complain about. In stark contrast to these damning judgments is the subtitle of the novel, which reads "Comedy".

The otherwise monotonously abusive text is interrupted by the narrative of Reger's encounter with an Englishman. This Englishman, who lives in Wales, is exceptionally sympathetic to Reger, the “misanthropist”, and Reger is astonished at the composure of this man and even admires him. This shows that Reger is not as perfect as he would like to be.

As a recurring theme, Reger mentions his very beloved wife, whom he also met in the museum and who was and still is of great emotional importance to him. For years he sat desperately on the bench that was so immensely important to him and was "rescued" by it in this very place, because it was there that they got to know each other. This also explains the central importance of the bench in the Kunsthistorisches Museum for him, which becomes the only remaining vanishing point for him after the death of his wife. Although the “old masters” fill him with hatred, they are still the ones who keep him alive. His suffering results in no small measure from the passing of his wife, which becomes the starting point for his nihilistic lines of thought. The thought that his transferred knowledge could suddenly disappear unexpectedly fills him with consternation. He had always expected a premature death on his part, so that her surprising death plunged him into a crisis of meaning, from which, according to his own statements, he emerged stronger, but which, as a central issue, repeatedly troubles him.

subjects

Rational criticism of society and its manifestations: past love, music ( Bruckner ) and art in general ( Stifter ), philosophy ( Heidegger ), kitsch and sentimentality, religion, justice, the state, stupidity, cleanliness in Austrian toilets.

style

Like other works by Thomas Bernhard, the book consists largely of monologues. Reger generalizes negative criticism and presents his own opinion as a general fact. The author seems to be against everything. Bernhard writes, mostly not realistically depicting, but stylized subjective perceptions in a highly artful way, broken up and intensified into a self-reinforcing permutation fugue with counterpoint . According to the German scholar Axel Diller, Old Masters is "the most linguistically and artistically elaborate prose text of Bernhard".

Adaptations

As part of the exhibition Austria itself is nothing but a stage - Thomas Bernhard and the Theater in the Austrian Theater Museum took place on April 26, 2010 in Hall II of the KHM-Gemäldegalerie, a staged reading of the novel with Hermann Beil (Irrsigler), Martin Schwab (Reger) and Erwin Steinhauer (Atzbacher). For the first time, the play was staged at the original location. In order to do justice to the novel setting, Tintoretto's picture was repositioned for this performance.

On September 10, 2016, a play of the same name by the Dresden State Theater premiered in the Old Masters Picture Gallery in Dresden . Reger was played by Albrecht Goette , Atzbacher by Ahmad Mesgarha .

The Swiss director Thom Luz staged the novel by Thomas Bernhard at the Kammerspiele of the Deutsches Theater Berlin and designed his own version for it with the dramaturge David Heiligers. The premiere was on September 14, 2018 with Christoph Franken , Camill Jammal , Katharina Matz , Wolfgang Menardi and Daniele Pintaudi.

At the Styraburg Festival in Steyr on March 8, 2019, a staged reading of the novel with Martin Schwab (Reger), Hans-Dieter Knebel (Irrsigler) and Hapé Schreiberhuber (Atzbacher) took place in the castle chapel . Four portrait paintings from the Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna also served for this performance.

output

Edition as a comic

literature

Note

There are some works by Paris Bordone in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna . But there was never a Bordone room . There are broad benches.

One episode affects the image countryside in Suffolk by Thomas Gainsborough , which is not currently on display. However, the museum lists this landscape in the official museum guide.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Axel Diller: Bernhard, Thomas - Old Masters . In: Kindler's Literature Lexicon in 18 volumes, 3rd, completely revised edition 2009 online , accessed from Bücherhallen Hamburg on May 31, 2020.
  2. ↑ Old Masters. based on the novel by Thomas Bernhard. Staatsschauspiel Dresden, accessed on October 9, 2018 .
  3. ^ Deutsches Theater Berlin: Deutsches Theater Berlin - Old Masters, after Thomas Bernhard. Retrieved October 22, 2018 .
  4. ↑ Bettina Steiner: There is no Bordone Hall! Die Presse, January 22, 2011