Big and Little: Scenes

Literature & Fiction

Strauß, Botho

Dramas & Plays

Farrar. Straus & Giroux

Richard Schroubeck, a Berlin bookseller in his early thirties, has entered a devastating time in his life. His girlfriend, Hannah, has left him, and Richard does not know why. Introspective, egotistic, and terribly dependent, Richard is sure Hannah will return, if only because he cannot live without her. He withdraws to his apartment, pouring out his guilt and hopes into writing. For weeks he quits bathing and shaving, and takes a perverse delight in his heroic despair. Though he is certain that absolution will come when Hannah returns, he comes, in time, to realize that the constant writing has become his true devotion.

Devotion

The Young Man

Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.

<div>The six linked sections of Couples, Passersby present vignettes of frustrated connections and emotional numbness as characters search for meaning in art, in language, and in each other. A man waiting for his beloved to cross the street watches as she's struck by a car. A colorless suburban couple makes the long journey from their home to sit in a gay bar and feel exotic. A man leaves an animated intellectual lunch and goes unrecognized by his companion a few minutes later. Throughout, Strauss filters the particulars of everyday existence through his singular sensibility to creating a portrait of contemporary urban society and the artist's place within it. </div>

Couples, Passersby

Contemporary

Northwestern University Press

Populated by characters who are searching for meaning in life and in one another--a hiker waiting for a train in a deserted station, a television journalist who meets an old lover he doesn't really recognize, mismatched lovers, couples married and casual, lost and lonely people--Botho Strauss's Living Glimmering Lying is a melancholy collection of sketches and vignettes, a series of tableaux of post-reunification Berlin.

Living Glimmering Lying

Literary

The writings of Botho Strauss examine the tension between the individual and society in the anonymity of the contemporary world. A theater director, playwright, and writer, Strauss broke with Berlin's leftist intellectual milieu in the late 1970s and turned to more personal topics; the result, and his response, inform The Young Man, a provocative work by a controversial German thinker. The young man of the title, Leon Pracht, has left the theater to write. Contemplative, brooding, alienated from both society in general and those to whom he should be closest, Pracht moves numbly through a series of encounters, the precision of his observation of both the everyday and the fantastic underscored by his increasing detachment. His reflections, meditations, and reactions build a compelling portrait of contemporary society and of the individual struggling to find a place both within and without it.

Richard Schroubeck, a Berlin bookseller in his early thirties, has entered a devastating time in his life. His girlfriend, Hannah, has left him, and Richard does not know why. Introspective, egotistic, and terribly dependent, Richard is sure Hannah will return, if only because he cannot live without her. He withdraws to his apartment, pouring out his guilt and hopes into writing. For weeks he quits bathing and shaving, and takes a perverse delight in his heroic despair. Though he is certain that absolution will come when Hannah returns, he comes, in time, to realize that the constant writing has become his true devotion.

Tumult (English and German Edition)

Carcanet Pr

Tumult

These three plays, first published in German in the 1980s, show Botho Strauss developing an enigmatic, unsettling, and uniquely theatrical style. Set in Hamburg, The Park is Strauss’ take on A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Seven Doors brings together a jilted husband, a wedding without guests, and two monks with an intimate knowledge of hell. In Time and the Room, the room contrives to be the play’s main character.

Botho Strauss: Three Plays (Oberon Modern Plays)

Oberon Books

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Books by Strauß, Botho

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Strauß, Botho. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Big and Little: Scenes

Devotion

The Young Man

Couples, Passersby

Living Glimmering Lying

The Young Man

Devotion

Tumult (English and German Edition)

Tumult

Botho Strauss: Three Plays (Oberon Modern Plays)