Posts Tagged ‘Elfriede Jelinek’

Happy birthday, Elfriede Jelinek! The Nobel-winning playwright and novelist was born in Mürzzuschlag, Austria, on October 20, 1946. To celebrate, you might want to check out the renowned Cahier Series edition of Her Not All Her here (and we’ve written about the Cahier Series here and here and here, among other places.)

A few rather severe words from Ms. Jelinek for the occasion:

“After all, people with a herd instinct hold mediocrity in high esteem. They praise it as having great value. They believe they are strong because they are the majority. The middling level has no terrors, no anxieties. They huddle together, indulging in the illusion of warmth. If you’re in the middle, you’re alone with nothing, and certainly not yourself. And how content they are with that state of affairs! Nothing in their existence offers them any reproaches and no one could reproach them for their existence.”

– from The Piano Teacher, translated by Joachim Neugroschel