The cheap eaters
The Cheap Eater is a story published in 1980 by the Austrian writer Thomas Bernhard .
content
A nameless narrator reports on his relationship with the protagonist of the story, Koller, and gives his thoughts and explanations. At that time, Koller lost his leg to a dog bite and its consequences, what he calls a "happy / unhappy" event. His years of intensive occupation with physiognomy experienced a decisive turning point when one day in Wertheimsteinpark he went "all of a sudden instead of the old ash to the old oak" and remembers the cheap eaters he called from now on intends to make the decisive chapter of his treatise. The four cheap eaters Einsig, Goldschmidt, Grill and Weninger meet daily in a WÖK (Vienna Public Kitchen Company) restaurant and always eat the cheapest of the dishes on offer. After his discharge from the hospital, sixteen years ago, Koller had been accepted into their group and had been their table companion for a long time. Since then he has also been engaged in physiognomics; he wrote his treatise partly and partly in thought. The one who is fully focused on his project goes with the narrator to the pub "Eye of God", which he actually completely rejected. There, towards the end of the story, he is still able to describe the four table companions to his listener, while due to an accident he can no longer get to the presentation of the most important chapter of his treatise, "The Cheap Eaters".
reception
Hans Höller considers "the four life pictures of Weninger, Goldschmidt, Grill and Einzig (...) to be one of the most unusual examples of a friendly, philosophically serene narrative recognition of the individual lived life" in the work of Thomas Bernhard. He sees the idea of the ancient symposium being revived in the familiar table community in the WÖK . The 'spiritual man' Koller, “one of the most extreme spiritual people in Bernhard's work, [experiences] himself as new after his stay in hospital.” In the sketch of the individual life stories of the cheap eaters and their specific characters, what gets “something out of desperation save helps, a special value "," the happiness claim of each individual is honored. "
Web links
- Thomas Bernhard reads from 'Die Billigesser ' (0:01:48 to 0:42:30), audio recording, recorded in Palais Pálffy , Vienna, on April 12, 1978 (Austrian media library)
Individual evidence
- ↑ www.thomasbernhard.at , accessed on December 27, 2015
- ↑ a b Hans Höller: The idea of a happy life , in: ders: The unknown Thomas Bernhard , correction, Mattinghofen publishing house, 2014, ISBN 978-3950331844 , p. 112
- ↑ a b Hans Höller: The idea of a happy life , in: ders: The unknown Thomas Bernhard , correction, Mattinghofen publishing house, 2014, ISBN 978-3950331844 , p. 110