Thoughts of Destruction and Annihilation in Thomas Bernhard

David W. Price, Keene State College

In the works of Austrian novelist and playwright Thomas Bernhard one is struck by how often the idea of annihilation surfaces in his texts. That words associated with destruction should appear in the writings of a German- speaking author after World War II is hardly surprising. Given the overwhelming levels of devastation wrought on Central Europe through Allied bombing and the invasion of Soviet and Western forces, such words became the stock in trade of a generation of German-speaking writers who survived the war. Some works written after the war, such as those of Wolfgang Borchert, were so replete with images of devastation that they became referred to as Trümmerliteratur. Bernhard, however, cannot be associated with this form of literature precisely because his focus on annihilation and destruction differs distinctly from that of others who chose to render realistic postwar accounts of physical and psychological devastation. Unlike the realism of Trümmerliteratur, Bernhard's narratives elevated the idea of annihilation to a philosophical concept that thereby became the driving force in his narratives, works which not only sought to attack the society in which he lived, but also gave expression to a metaphysical and aesthetic worldview.