"Die Ursache" und ihre Folgen: In fünf Bänden zwischen Dichtung und Wahrheit legt Thomas Bernhard offen, wie er der Schriftsteller wurde, der er war - von der Kindheit über die Internatszeit in Salzburg, die Lehre und das Studium bis zur Isolation des Achtzehnjährigen in einer Lungenheilstätte. Wer die Welt des Thomas Bernhard verstehen will, findet hier den Schlüssel: "Das ist die Geschichte eines jungen Menschen, auf dem eigentlich nur herumgetrampelt worden ist, sei es von Seiten der Stadt, ihrer Bewohner, der Verwandtschaft, ganz gleich." (Thomas Bernhard) Eine kongeniale Graphic Novel, die sich dem großen Autor mit Respekt und zeichnerischer Frische nähert.

Die Geschichte einer Erziehung ohne Erzieher: Der letzte Band von Thomas Bernhards „Autobiographischen Schriften“ erzählt von den Kindheitsjahren des Autors. Am Ende der Selbsterzählung steht der Anfang, das Martyrium des jungen Thomas beginnt. Die Schande einer unehelichen Geburt und der Vorwurf der Mutter: Du hast mein Leben zerstört! stehen im Zentrum der Kindheit. Es sind Jahre des Schreckens und des Krieges, eine Zeit ohne Idylle, wenn auch nicht ohne Augenblicke des Hochgefühls: erste Freundschaften, unerwartete Siege und die enge Beziehung zum Großvater geben dem „Kind“ die Kraft, Schule und Elternhaus zu überstehen. Lukas Kummers einfühlsame Gestaltung erreicht hier einen abschließenden Höhepunkt.

His admission into the lung sanatorium Grafenhof heralded the start of a new chapter in the young Thomas Bernhard’s tale of suffering. In the isolation of the sanatorium he was at the mercy of the doctors, the nursing staff, his fellow patients and above all, himself and his will. In this hopelessness he practised revolt. It is his self-affirmation as a writer, the friendship with a musician, and singing which are stirring his will to survive and give him strength. In the end, Thomas Bernhard escapes the isolation of the lung sanatorium which is seems in Lukas Kummer’s illustrations like the coldest circle of hell, and emerges as the person we know today: one of the greatest writers of the 20th century.

In Salzburg ist Thomas Bernhard aufgewachsen, hier hat er die prägenden Jahre seines Lebens verbracht, hier sind seine ersten Theaterstücke aufgeführt worden und seine ersten Bücher erschienen. „Eine perfide Fassade, hinter der alles Künstlerische absterben muss“, hat er Salzburg genannt, aber auch immer wieder beschrieben, dass es nichts Schöneres gebe als den Blick vom Mönchsberg hinunter auf die Festspielstadt. Ausgewählte Zitate belegen diese lebenslange Hassliebe, der kongeniale Zeichner Nicolas Mahler illustriert sie mit präzisen, liebevollen Bildern und der Experte Manfred Mittermayer begleitet sie mit einem kenntnisreichen Nachwort. Ein unverzichtbares Geschenk für Salzburg-Fans und Bernhardianer, die schon alles haben!

“The Breath” forms the core of Bernhard's autobiography. It is where deepest despair and creative force are blended into the potent mix that makes his writing so unique, fascinating and boundary-breaking to this day. Bernhard was in his late teens when severe pleurisy abruptly wrenched him from his apprenticeship. He was hospitalised and considered terminally ill. But the 'room for lost causes' into which he is shunted turns out to be a place of new beginnings. Thomas Bernhard decides to live – and following the death of his grandfather resolves to become a writer himself. Lukas Kummer has found a rich and powerful imagery for this journey from near death to redemptive self-creation.

Thomas Bernhard’s childhood years, the beginning at the end, a martyrdom commences. The shame of being born out of wedlock and the mother’s accusation: You have ruined my life! These were years of fear and war. It was a time far removed from joy, although not entirely without its moments of elation.

His admission into the lung sanatorium Grafenhof heralded the start of a new chapter in the young Thomas Bernhard’s tale of suffering. In the isolation of the sanatorium he was at the mercy of the doctors, the nursing staff, his fellow patients and above all, himself and his will. In this hopelessness he practised revolt.

Severe pulmonary disease tore Thomas Bernhard away from his daily life before he was even eighteen. His body forced him into the isolation of hospital wards, into the company of the barely alive. His final stop was the bathroom from which only the dead returned. There he suddenly knew that he mustn’t stop breathing, that he wanted to live.

One morning, the pupil decides to withdraw from his life. In the cellar, on the fringes of the detested town, in the ghetto of the have-nots and criminals, Thomas Bernhard finds himself an apprenticeship in a grocery store. There he gets to know those who have been cast aside by society, and he gets to understand himself.

The causes were catastrophic: the boarding school was a prison, the town a terminal disease. There was war and there was his grandfather, who only talked to him about the masters, Mozart, Rembrandt and Beethoven. The causes were destructive, and they left indelible traces in Thomas Bernhard’s life and work.

Thomas Bernhard's memoirs of his youth - consisting of five volumes "Die Ursache" (1975), "Der Keller" (1976)," Der Atem" (1978), "Die Kälte" (1981), "Ein Kind" (1982) - contain central motifs of his novels, as well as the origins of the hurts he endured. His childhood, his schooldays as a boarder in Salzburg, his apprenticeship and student days, and his isolation at the age of eighteen in a sanatorium. Anyone wishing to understand Bernhard's world will find the key here. The sister comes in, grabs the washing, and throws it onto a chair beside the bath. Then she lifts my hand. All night she calls at various rooms, lifting people’s hands and feeling their pulses. She starts stripping the bed, the bed in which someone has just died. She throws the covers on the floor and then lifts my hand again, as though waiting for me to die. Then she bends down, gathers up other covers, and goes out with them. Now I want to live. (From: In the Cold) The autobiography is Thomas Bernhard's richest and most mature work. It is one of the great literary documents of our '70s. (Marcel Reich-Ranicki, FAZ)

In 1972 the estate agent Karl Ignaz Hennetmair, a friend and neighbour of Thomas Bernhard, decided to keep a diary of the events and conversations involving Bernhard that year, creating a document of incalculable value to Thomas Bernhard fans. His enemies would have found much to enjoy too, as the manuscript sometimes shows the master in a dark light – but where are the Bernhard detractors today? Thomas Bernhard had understandable difficulties with the outside world; initially it took no notice of him, but as his reputation grew it began to beleaguer him, coming too close for comfort. Sometimes it tended to present him – a man interested solely in his literature –simply as stupid. To counteract all that, he had Hennetmair, who found him his property, his houses and woods, negotiating the deals at favourable prices, but also mediated between the writer and the outside world on an everyday level. Hennetmair dealt with everything from broken window frames to mental garbage, acting as dumping ground and recycling facility. He always kept unwanted visitors away from Bernhard, but equally received him into his own family circle. There they chatted, joked and put the world to rights. Later Hennetmair retreated to his study to write it all down in his diary, which we can now satisfy our curiosity by reading.

For many decades, and until his death in 1989, Thomas Bernhard was the dominating personality in Austrian contemporary literature. His literature is unthinkable without his environment. It is characteristically Austrian, and belongs firmly in the ranks of world literature. He was available and he was public as none of his colleagues were, while he was also considered to be a loner and unapproachable. Everyone talked about him, and yet he was unknown. Erika and Wieland Schmied are two of the few people privileged to experience Thomas Bernhard in private, as a neighbour and friend. Their image of Thomas Bernhard is built on the memories of innumerable encounters and shared experiences, and is documented with unrivalled completeness in hundreds of photographs. The photos, characterful and unsentimental in equal measure, give an insight into Bernhard's environment, the houses and landscapes in which he lived. However, they also convey an impression of the places he wrote about. In short, the authors have created a comprehensive overview of Thomas Bernhard's cosmos, pervaded throughout by his life and work.

Thomas Bernhard was all that and more, as this comprehensive biography shows. The acknowledged expert Manfred Mittermayer has drawn together Bernhard’s life and work into one great story, reaching from his ‘origin complex’ – his grandfather Johannes Freumbichler’s family – to his premature death following years of illness. Mittermayer creates a nuanced picture of Bernhard’s multi-layered public image and the various phases of his private life, placing his most significant works of prose and theatre in relation to a life story inseparably bound to post-war history. “I cannot deny that I’ve always led two existences: one which comes close to the truth, which I do have the right to describe as reality, and another which I have played out. Over time, the two together have formed the existence which keeps me alive.” Thomas Bernhard, Der Keller (The Cellar – part II of his autobiography)

In the first of his autobiographical books, Thomas Bernhard carries out a root cause analysis that spares nothing and no one. The boarding school was a prison and the town of Salzburg a terminal disease, where destruction was omni-present. The only guiding light was his grandfather, who spoke to him about Mozart, Rembrandt and Beethoven. These “root causes”, which are more than just hinted at by Bernhard, leave indelible traces across all his work. With precise, sparing strokes and a poignant use of repetition and variation, Lukas Kummer has succeeded in creating a visual take on Thomas Bernhard’s recollections of the horrors of boarding school, war and National Socialism. This is a sympathetic graphic novel that approaches the great author with respect and originality.