Hermann Burger’s Followers (13)

Hermann Burger

Born

in Menziken, Switzerland

July 10, 1942

Died

February 28, 1989

Genre

Literature & Fiction

edit data

Hermann Burger was born in 1942 in Burg, Canton of Aargau; his father worked for an insurance company. He enrolled at the ETH Zurich in 1962 and began studying architecture, but switched to German literature and art history in 1964. The publication of the poetry collection "Rauchsignale" ("Smoke Signals") in 1967 marked the beginning of his literary career, followed by the prose collection Bork in 1970. For the next couple of years Burger focused on his career in literary studies, writing his thesis on Paul Celan and his habilitation treatise on contemporary Swiss literature. He taught at universities in Zurich, Bern and Fribourg and worked as a literary editor for the Aargauer Tagblatt. His academic experience is reflected in the loosely a Hermann Burger was born in 1942 in Burg, Canton of Aargau; his father worked for an insurance company. He enrolled at the ETH Zurich in 1962 and began studying architecture, but switched to German literature and art history in 1964. The publication of the poetry collection "Rauchsignale" ("Smoke Signals") in 1967 marked the beginning of his literary career, followed by the prose collection Bork in 1970. For the next couple of years Burger focused on his career in literary studies, writing his thesis on Paul Celan and his habilitation treatise on contemporary Swiss literature. He taught at universities in Zurich, Bern and Fribourg and worked as a literary editor for the Aargauer Tagblatt. His academic experience is reflected in the loosely autobiographical novel "Die künstliche Mutter" ("The Artificial Mother") which won him the Conrad-Ferdinand-Meyer-Preis in 1980. It was dedicated to his wife and its first edition has the dedication „Für Anne Marie“.
Burger's first major novel "Schilten. Schulbericht zuhanden der Inspektorenkonferenz" ("Schilten. School Report for the Attention of the Inspectors' Conference") was published in 1976 and made into a movie by Swiss film director Beat Kuert in 1979. It is about a teacher who has to tell the conference of inspectors about the development of his pupils, but speaks about death cult, graveyards and burials in a very detailed way. Archetypes of this novels are Franz Kafka and Thomas Bernhard. Burger mixes reality and fiction, and the more one reads about him, the more one finds out, that Burger writes about himself, his own suffering.
He won the Ingeborg Bachmann Prize in 1985 for his story "Die Wasserfallfinsternis von Badgastein" ("The Waterfall-Eclipse of Badgastein"). 1988, a changing of publishers from S. Fischer to Suhrkamp took place in a spectacular way.
The novel "Brenner" (in two volumes, four were planned), shows a protagonist wrapped in cigar smoke, who tells his life - Burger himself was a cigar smoker and descendant of cigar producers. Volume 1 has exactly 25 capitles, like a cigar box contains 25 cigars. Each capitle's name contains the name of a famous cigar brand. The second capitle announces the author's suicide intention: A red Ferrari is bought, because saving money no longer makes sense. It is about the divorce and the grief about having no contact to his two kids. Burger's last lessor was emeritus historian Jean Rudolf von Salis (= „Jérôme von Castelmur-Bondo“ in the novel). The last months of Burger's life and a review on his 46 years are described detailed in this roman a clef, he describes all coining persons (under changed names).
Burger's depressive and desperate moods grew with his literary acclaim, leading him to write the "Tractatus logico-suicidalis" (1988), a collection of aphorisms advocating suicide. The 1046 aphorisms are about the sentence „Gegeben ist der Tod, bitte finden Sie die Lebensursache heraus.“ (Death is given, please finde the cause of life.) The title remembers Ludwig Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. The book about suicide was viewed by the critics with sarcasm, and the seriousity of his suicide plans were not recognized. On February 28, 1989 he committed suicide in Brunegg by taking an overdose of sleeping pills. Not until Burger's death the critics saw similarities to Jean Améry and his book Hand an sich legen (that Burger knew).
Burger's early promoter Marcel Reich-Ranicki, literature critic, wrote March 3, 1989, few days after his death, in an obituary: „Hermann Burger war ein Artist, der immer aufs Ganze ging, der sich nicht geschont hat. Er war ein Mensch mit einer großen Sehnsucht nach dem Glück. Die deutsche Literatur hat einen ihrer originellsten Sprachkünstler verloren.“ („Hermann Burger was an artist who went the whole hog every time, didn't conserve himself. He was a man with a big longing for happiness. The German literature has lost one of her most inventive language artists.")
H ...more

Combine Editions
Hermann Burger’s books

Average rating: 3.92 · 249 ratings · 38 reviews · 30 distinct works • Similar authors

	Tractatus Logico-Suicidalis: On Killing Oneself by Hermann Burger, Adrian Nathan West (Translator, introduction) 3.96 avg rating — 99 ratings — published 1988	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Schilten. Schulbericht zuhanden der Inspektorenkonferenz 4.16 avg rating — 37 ratings — published 1976 — 6 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Brenner 3.86 avg rating — 36 ratings — published 1989 — 8 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	L'illettore by Hermann Burger, Anna Ruchat (Translator) 3.38 avg rating — 24 ratings — published 1986 — 6 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Diabelli i inne pisma do dyrekcji by Hermann Burger, Jacek St. Buras (Translator) 3.88 avg rating — 17 ratings — published 1979 — 9 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Diabelli 4.29 avg rating — 7 ratings	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Die künstliche Mutter 3.60 avg rating — 5 ratings — published 1982 — 5 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Der Schuss auf die Kanzel 4.67 avg rating — 3 ratings — published 1991 — 2 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Die allmähliche Verfertigung der Idee beim Schreiben 3.67 avg rating — 3 ratings — published 1986	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Brenner, Band 2 (Kapitel 1-7). Menzenmang it was amazing 5.00 avg rating — 2 ratings — published 1989	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

More books by Hermann Burger…

Quotes by Hermann Burger (?)

“...but gentle fate has arranged things so that the sick must beg for excuses before the chronically healthy, and not the other way around; it is the privileged who demand consideration, and not those consigned to their doom. The moribundus is compelled to ask his visitor how he is feeling, and his friend, depositing his gift of a floral wreath – I do not mean Adam Nautilus Rauch specifically, he would never set foot in a hospital – will not hesitate to stand there at the deathbed gabbing about his migraines or his recent dental checkup. Distinctions collapse, existence has no feeling of proportion with regard to death, when your number comes up, it’s best to just slink off without disturbing anybody’s sleep...”
― hermann burger, Brenner

0 likes

“We scrape by in a miserable, almost invisible existence, and of course, no one notices. Only those with sharp ears, with perfect pitch for disgrace, will realize, when they speak to us, that we are as far from them as another continent.”
― Hermann Burger, Tractatus Logico-Suicidalis: On Killing Oneself

0 likes

“but gentle fate has arranged things so that the sick must beg for excuses before the chronically healthy, and not the other way around; it is the privileged who demand consideration, and not those consigned to their doom. The moribundus is compelled to ask his visitor how he is feeling, and his friend, depositing his gift of a floral wreath – I do not mean Adam Nautilus Rauch specifically, he would never set foot in a hospital – will not hesitate to stand there at the deathbed gabbing about his migraines or his recent dental checkup. Distinctions collapse, existence has no feeling of proportion with regard to death, when your number comes up, it’s best to just slink off without disturbing anybody’s sleep,”
― Hermann Burger, Brenner

0 likes

See all Hermann Burger's quotes »

Topics Mentioning This Author

topics	posts	views	last activity
Libri dal mondo: Svizzera: autori	3	17	May 24, 2024 10:27AM

Hermann Burger’s Followers (13)

Hermann Burger

Combine EditionsHermann Burger’s books

Topics Mentioning This Author

Combine Editions
Hermann Burger’s books