The End of Days, by acclaimed German writer Jenny Erpenbeck, consists essentially of five books, each leading to a different death of an unnamed woman protagonist. How could it all have gone differently? the narrator asks in the intermezzos between. The first chapter begins with the death of a baby in the early twentieth-century Hapsburg Empire. In the next chapter, the same girl grows up in Vienna, but her strange relationship with a boy leads to another death. In the next scenario, she survives adolescence and moves to Russia with her husband. Both are dedicated Communists, but our heroine is sent to a labor camp. She is spared in the next chapter with the help of someone s intervention and returns to Berlin to become a respected writer. . . . The End of Days is a brilliant novel of contingency and fate. A novel of incredible breadth, yet amazing concision, The End of Days offers a unique...
Visa mer
Recensioner
Betyg
En väldigt skickligt skriven bok som både handlade om europeisk historia(tysk/österrikisk typ) och en kvinnas liv. Den var skriven i flera böcker som ett kalejdoskop, mellan varje bok skakades allt om. Samma personer, men lite skruvat. Svårt att beskriva. Jag tyckte väldigt, väldigt mycket om den, även om den inte var helt enkel att bemästra. Avsnittet när hon var i Moskva/Östberlin var svårbegripligt. Men jag antar att det är meningen, livet var nog inte alltid så begripligt under den tiden heller.