From Powells.com
Discover the books that made our 2022 list.
Staff Pick
A woman is plunged into the bitter heart of isolation after a mysterious event separates her from the whole of humanity. It's not simply the imaginative premise, the beautiful depictions of care amongst animals, or the political underpinnings of this novel that make it one of the most important and criminally unrecognized books of the 20th century, but some ineffable linguistic quality particular to the experience of a woman (and mother) trying to connect and survive in post-war Europe. Slowly and subtly, the multiform perils of civilization come to light as our narrator sheds her worldly attachments and embarks on a new way of life. Recommended By Nadia N., Powells.com
Synopses & Reviews
While vacationing in a hunting lodge in the Austrian mountains, a middle-aged woman awakens one morning to find herself separated from the rest of the world by an invisible wall. With a cat, a dog, and a cow as her sole companions, she learns how to survive and cope with her loneliness.
Allegorical yet deeply personal and absorbing, The Wall is at once a critique of modern civilization, a nuanced and loving portrait of a relationship between a woman and her animals, a thrilling survival story, a Cold War-era dystopian adventure, and a truly singular feminist classic.
Review
“Brilliant in its sustainment of dread, in its peeling away of old layers of reality to expose a raw way of seeing and feeling. Doris Lessing once remarked that only a woman could have written this novel, and it's true: I know of no closer study in claustrophobia and liberation, and of an independence whose severity is at once ecstatic and doomed. I've read The Wall three times already and am nowhere near finished.” Nicole Krauss
Review
“It is about our reasons for living, self-sufficiency, solitude, men, women, war, and love, and the problem of other minds. And the animals in this book — oh! I don't understand why this book is not considered one of the most important books of the twentieth century. I have been anxiously pushing it on everyone I know, and now I push it on you.” — Sheila Heti, The Paris Review
Review
“The Wall is a wonderful novel. It is not often that you can say only a woman could have written this book, but women in particular will understand the heroine's loving devotion to the details of making and keeping life, every day felt as a victory against everything that would like to undermine and destroy.” — Doris Lessing
About the Author
Marlen Haushofer (1920-1970) was an Austrian author of short stories, novels, radio plays, and children's books. Her work has had a strong influence on many German-language writers, such as the Nobel Prize-winner Elfriede Jelinek, who dedicated one of her plays to her. The Wall was adapted into the 2012 film, directed by Julian Pölsler and starring Martina Gedeck.
Shaun Whiteside's translations from the German include classics by Freud, Musil, and Nietzsche.
Powell's Staff on PowellsBooks.Blog
June is one of my favorite months, especially here in Portland, where the weather can be beautiful and sunny one minute and a gray downpour with threats of thunder the next. It’s important to always be prepared to take advantage of those rainy afternoons, with a good mug of tea and a great book. Below, we’ve rounded up some of the books in translation released this past month that have got us the most excited and intrigued.....
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