Lukas Bärfuss

Koala

«They had invited me to my hometown to give a lecture on a German poet, who, two hundred years earlier on a day in November, had sought out a hollow along the Wannsee in Berlin and, shortly thereafter put a bullet through his girlfriend, Henrietta Vogel’s heart, followed by another through his own throat.»

Schweizer Buchpreis 2014

The Dramatist and novelist Lukas Bärfuss comes from Thun. At the beginning of the 19th century, the distinguished poet Heinrich von Kleist – who later committed suicide – spent a month there – and Bärfuss is to deliver a lecture about him, in his home town. The occasion gives him the chance – for the first time in many years – to meet his brother: he has spent his whole life in Thun and has hardly ever left this small community. Bärfuss has no idea that this will be the last time the two will meet. Shortly afterwards, his brother also takes his own life.
This is the point where Lukas Bärfuss‘ novel «Koala» begins, as he remembers that last meeting with his brother. When the author receives the news of his suicide, he is at first dismayed and dumbfounded; but soon, his grief becomes mingled with rage. He searches for an explanation, for possible reasons for his brother’s death; but he comes up against nothing but silence. Even the few friends his brother had are baffled, and he realises how little he really knew about him.
Nevertheless, he pursues his investigation and learns that when his brother was in the Scouts, he had the nickname «Koala». He had kept the nickname into his adult life, and the narrator now sets out to answer the question, why? He gathers information about this strange animal – which has now been driven almost to extinction – and immerses himself in the history of Australia, and particularly in the time, when that continent was still serving as a penal colony for British prisoners. In the process, he discovers the Koala has a real significance: this solitary, idle animal shuns any unnecessary activity and so sets itself apart from our Swiss philosophy of life, based not least on our notions of hard work and ambition. Was the narrator’s brother also a «Koala» in his lifestyle? In this novel, Lukas Bärfuss sets out an impressive debate on the basic questions of human existence.

Recommended for translation by the Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia:
www.12swissbooks.ch

Wallstein Verlag, Göttingen 2014

ISBN: 978-3-8353-0653-0