Collected Poems

Bernhard's Collected Poemis a key to understanding Bernhard's irascible black comedy found in virtually all of his writings-even down to his last will and testament. Beloved Austrian writer Thomas Bernhard (1931-89) began his career in the early 1950s as a poet. Over the next decade, Bernhard wrote thousands of poems and published four volumes of intensely wrought and increasingly personal verse, with such titles asOn Earth and in Hell, InHoraMortis, andUnder the Iron of the Moon. Bernhard's early poetry, bearing the influence of GeorgTrakl, begins with a deep connection to his Austrian homeland. As his poems saw publication and recognition, Bernhard seemed always on the verge of joining the ranks ofIngeborgBachmann, PaulCelan, and other young post-war poets writing in German. During this time, however, his poems became increasingly more obsessive, filled with undulantself-pity, counterpointed by a defamatory,bardicvoice utterly estranged from his country, all of which resulted in a magisterial work of anti-poetry-one that represents Bernhard's own harrowing experience with his leitmotif ofsuccess and failure, which makes his fiction such a pleasure.There is much to be found in these pages for Bernhard fans of every stripe.