Mark Haber

“When I insisted she tell me what she had found so funny my second wife, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, shouted, ‘Him! Him! He’s an absurd man, she’d said, and the more serious he is the more absurd he becomes.’”

So says second wife about our man Schmidt, a Bernhardian character straight outta Austria with a John Bolton mustache. I’ve read only a couple of Bernhard’s works but unlike second wife I have not yet, at least, found all the misanthropic ranting very funny. More than in its Bernhard tribute act I found some amusement here in the novel’s Lars Iyer tribute act, a couple of ridiculous art critics subbing for a couple of ridiculous philosophers. A page about the holy donkey was, indeed, fairly amusing.

While reading this novel I felt cause to think of David Foster Wallace’s comments on how irony has become an end in itself, how “few artists dare to try to talk about ways of working toward redeeming what’s wrong, because they’ll look sentimental and naive to all the weary ironists. Irony’s gone from liberating to enslaving.”

Haber does try to escape the prison of irony, however, to his credit. His narrator, contra the miserable Schmidt, believes that art should be felt through the heart and the emotions, a sentimental approach that leads to “the horrible thing” that his narrator says, and writes, which turns the miserable Schmidt against him, which is that art is subjective and for everyone to experience as they will. The miserable Schmidt becomes his narrator’s enemy, breaking contact until calling him to his deathbed, where the miserable Schmidt does the Bernhardian ranting thing before proclaiming with his dying breath that he’s discovered evidence that their life’s work is all wrong.

The death of Schmidt is thus not the death of irony to be sure, but a way out is there.… (mehr)

An unnamed American narrator receives a nine-page email from his estranged Austrian friend and fellow art critic, Schmidt, who is dying. These two bonded over a painting while they were students at Oxford. At that time, they had discovered the titular Saint Sebastian’s Abyss, and became fascinated with it. Each has made a career by writing about this painting. We follow the narrator as takes a flight from the US to Berlin, giving him ample time to reflect on his turbulent relationship with Schmidt. They had a falling out years ago over differing opinions about the artwork.

This is a story of obsession, and how it can derail personal relationships. In this case, it has come between the two friends and has also been a contributing factor to the demise of two marriages. Along the way, we learn the rather sordid backstory of the (fictional) Renaissance artist who created the painting.

The author examines the realm of art and art critics, and the seeming capriciousness of what is extolled as “great art.” It is filled with wry humor and satire. I was absorbed in this book for the first three quarters. It is, unfortunately, marred by an unsatisfying ending and too much repetition. I believe the repetition is indicative of the psychological state of the narrator, and is most likely intentional on the author’s part, but it gets old. I liked it enough to read another book by this author.… (mehr)