Das Einhorn

Anselm Kristlein #2

by Martin Walser

Rare Book

488 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1971

About the author

Martin Walser was a German writer. He became famous for describing the conflicts his anti-heroes have in his novels and stories. In 1998 he was awarded the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade in Frankfurt. He was also the father of authors Johanna Walser, Theresia Walser and Alissa Walser.

Reviews

[MJ Nicholls · Rating 3 out of 5]

One of the scant selection of prolific German author Martin Walser’s works available in English (the others are similarly out of print), The Unicorn is an avant-garde novel where a writer is commissioned by a female publisher to write a ‘factnov’ on love, a novel that must be an autofictional representation of his own experiences in that particularly lovely realm of emotion. As simple as that synopsis sounds, the bulk of the novel is composed in an atemporal, achronological, alogical style where the narrator’s social/business/romantic/interior activities coagulate into a frequently electrifying and discordantly compelling wtf-is-this-prose, that over time completely obscures the line between the factnov the writer is composing and the original novel itself, to the point of hair-pulling irritation—slowly becoming little more than a test of readerly fortitude bereft of sound artistic reasons for the reader to carry on wading through the soup. My exit came on p.244. Walser’s works seemingly have had no warm reception in English—Calder & Boyars scrapped plans to translate his opus Halftime, and the other translations have vaporised.

[Günter Wahl · Rating 3 out of 5]

After a reading of Martin Walser with 400 guest I began the review of Das Einhorn the unicorn a novel of 1966 were Anselm Kristlein an advertising texter met Basil Schlupp and Melanie Sugg while he is married to Brigitte and has four children to feed after moving from Stuttgart-Sonnenberg a real suburb to Munich he takes a job of writer on erotics for Melanie as editor and the traveling by steam engine to Düsseldorf and Bielefeld, he has five speeches present and participates in debates in evangelical academies, he is paid by Barbara Salzer and spends the night in her apartment while she talks about the banker financing the fur coat and a Volkswagen Ghia.
The topic is like a Lazzarillo, the jester in the underclasses but Anselm Kristlein is a fictive character and underdog in industry club, he studied advertising only in New York.
His latest novel he read Basil Schlupp is a writer who has a mail exchange in letters with Maja Schnailin a theologician, he kept that name for fifty years now.
I also heard the reception speech after his honorary doctoral degree after teaching writing in the USA and this were approaches to Goethe, a very lively lecture he presented as a fifty years old man, now he is eightyfive years old and still present to entertain 400 listeners in an audience and interview, his early book on the unicorn magical figure in a town that has that as heraldic sign was great, his letter exchange story in the age of internet and email old fashioned as the man who found back to catholicism in the week pope Benedict resigned. He lost a diary in a train and never mentioned the crash of an airplane with another over his house and village so philologically the autobiographic jester story tells some aspects of his life and the series of diaries since 1962 make third editions to a story, he has three drafts and makes the novel after the third. Here we want to review texts of 1961 to 1966 only, the reprint was 2002.

[Heather · Rating 4 out of 5]

Das Einhorn was easily a subject to it's time period. The German 1970s was obvious in both discussion through geographical referencing and the impression that author gives on his views of women especially in the working world. Martin Walser uses metaphors heavily which may be the reason for his use to of the unicorn as his subject which seems to symbolize his sexuality and love life during the writing of this book. An interesting read, it was difficult to stay roped in as the passages were not clear in time, but rather shiftily referring to unknown knowledge, past incidents, and contained much foreshadowing.