In the Forest of Metropoles - (German List) by Karl-Markus Gauß (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

A chronicle of the diversity and wealth of cultures, predominantly from Eastern Europe, that have played a formative role in shaping contemporary Europe but now risk being forgotten.

A Herodotus of Mitteleuropa, cultural historian Karl-Markus Gauß is essential reading for anyone trying to understand the breadth and complexities of cultures and societies in Europe before, during, and after its decades of division in the twentieth century.

In this book, Gauß takes his readers on a thirteen-station journey across Europe. From Brussels to Istanbul and from Naples to Opole, Gauß weaves a Sebaldian web of connection and coincidence into a hybrid cultural history. Significantly, Gauß's metropoles are not the well-trodden, thoroughly explored, and minutely documented megalopolises and cultural capitals that have been mythologized by writers great and small. There are no visits to Berlin, Paris, Rome, or Madrid, although he does make time for Vienna, where he looks not for imperial remnants, but for traces of genius unrecognized by most. Gauß's lodestars are small but cosmopolitan towns on the periphery, such as Slaghenaufi, Vacaresti, Fontevraud, Dragatus, Vrzdenec, and Sélestat. In these far-flung towns, Gauß assembles a canon of overlooked humanists, expelled or extinguished by political and historical forces that swept the continent.

Review Quotes

"Gauß forges an intriguing blend of travelogue, culture history and literary criticism as he searches out the forgotten wrinkles of European identity. His touchstones are the great writers who helped forge national identities in the Balkans, Romania, Silesia and elsewhere, and I found myself thoroughly charmed even though I'd never heard of most of them."-- "The Berliner"

About the Author

Karl-Markus Gauß is the foremost literary cartographer of a vanishing Europe. He has written more than two dozen books and numerous articles and essays for German, Swiss, and Austrian newspapers and magazines. Tess Lewis's numerous translations from French and German include works by Philippe Jaccotte, Peter Handke, Jean-Luc Benoziglio, Klaus Merz, Hans Magnus Enzensberger, and Pascal Bruckner.