One lazy Sunday afternoon I realized that I have some unfinished books, left to read and gather the dust on a shelf. One of these days I will write a blog named - "Unfinished book" telling you all about my obsession with starting at least two books at the same time and finishing only one.

There on the shelf, minding it's own business, sat this light (in number of pages) little novel, calling me to read it. It looked short, so I thought I had time for some light reading..
I was wrong.

Book title: A Sorrow Beyond Dreams
Writer: Peter Handke
Genre: Fiction (semi-autobiography)

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The plot

This book is about writers mother who committed suicide when she was just 51 years old (as if there is the right age for doing it). He is introducing us to his mother, her life, his life and all the circumstances that led to that tragic event. The novel is, as I said before, quite short, but that doesn't take an ounce of it's value.

It's often spoken about as a best written novel of our generation and I agree.

My impressions

I thought about how to write this post, because I felt I needed to. If I had this book waiting for me for so long, maybe someone else has it to. I also thought haw can I as an amateur writer say anything meaningful about it, or should I write it in short but full context like the author did?

What made me keep reading this, by no means an easy reading, is the curiosity. We know right from the start that the book will end in suicide, there is no surprise there, but yet his amazing writing is what pulls you in, further down the rabbit whole.

I've read many books in my life and this was by far one of the best I ever had an honor of reading. Something about this book makes you think about not just your life, but lives of those around you. It's deeply sad, very strangely written, full of breath-taking descriptions. The writer says, and you can almost feel it by reading it, that he wrote it as soon as he could, before he went numb from the pain of loosing his mother.

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The idea itself, of losing a mother is always painful, there is nothing graceful about that sorrow. But his way of writing makes you feel her pain and losing her identity, in a short life-span. She lost herself in efforts to overcome life itself. She did everything in her power not to give up too easily, but time wounded her too deeply, so deep in fact that she had no desire to come out of the situation, she remained silent, obedient and waiting. Once a strong woman full of life, now crushed right in front of our eyes, makes me wonder if it can happen to any of us. How long would we last?

“Horror is something perfectly natural: the mind’s emptiness. A thought is taking shape, then suddenly it notices that there is nothing more to think. Whereupon it crashes to the ground like a figure in a comic strip who suddenly realises that he has been walking on air.”
― Peter Handke, A Sorrow Beyond Dreams

Short, but amazing novel, that made me love the style of this writer and left me hungry for more.

With love,
Tamara