Simon Schama, in defence of the essay in the age of Twitter, writes: 'The self-propulsion of a ranging intelligence is the dynamo that drives a powerful essay; the headlong gallop of thought to a destination the reader can't predict and which may not have occurred to the writer when he began.' That power, that propulsion, that surprise is evident in every one of this selection of the very finest of the essays produced over the past 20 years by the Romanian-German Nobel Laureate Herta Muller. She interrogates Communist society - especially in its bizarre Romanian Ceausescu variation - and matters of complicity, secrecy, betrayal, guilt, responsibility, resistance and the power of literature. Her writing is bewitching and convincing; her approach is unswerving, unsparing and undeluded. Her reader is grateful. These are among the most powerful demonstrations of the pen's might exceeding the sword's to be produced in the last forty years in Europe.

The finest essays of Nobel Prize winner Herta Muller, selected from twenty years of her fearless, intelligent, unsettling truth-telling in a life lived in opposition, courage, secrecy and uncertainty

About the Author
Born in Romania in 1953, HERTA MUELLER lost her job as a teacher and suffered repeated threats after refusing to cooperate with Ceaucescu's Secret Police. She succeeded in emigrating in 1987 and now lives in Berlin. The recipient of the Nobel Prize for Literature, and the European Literature Prize, she also won the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award for her novel, The Land of Green Plums.


Book Information
ISBN 9781846274756
Author Herta Muller
Format Hardback
Page Count 208
Imprint Granta Books
Publisher Granta Books
Weight(grams) 320g
Dimensions(mm) 206mm * 161mm * 17mm