Winfried Georg Sebald (18 May 1944 – 14 December 2001), known as W. G. Sebald or (as he preferred) Max Sebald, was a German writer and academic. At the time of his death at the age of 57, he was according to ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. It was founded on February 21, 1925, by Harold Ross and his wife Jane Grant, a reporter for ''The New York T ...

'' ”widely recognized for his extraordinary contribution to world literature.”

Life

Sebald was born in Wertach,

Bavaria Bavaria, officially the Free State of Bavaria, is a States of Germany, state in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is the list of German states by area, largest German state by land area, comprising approximately 1/5 of the total l ...

, the second of the three children of Rosa and Georg Sebald, and his parents' only son. From 1948 to 1963, he lived in

Sonthofen Sonthofen is the southernmost Town#Germany, town of Germany, located in the Oberallgäu region of the Bavarian Alps. Neighbouring Oberstdorf is situated 14 km farther south but is classified as a market town. In 2005, Sonthofen was awarded ...

. His father had joined the

Reichswehr ''Reichswehr'' (; ) was the official name of the German armed forces during the Weimar Republic and the first two years of Nazi Germany. After Germany was defeated in World War I, the Imperial German Army () was dissolved in order to be reshaped ...

in 1929 and served in the

Wehrmacht The ''Wehrmacht'' (, ) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the German Army (1935–1945), ''Heer'' (army), the ''Kriegsmarine'' (navy) and the ''Luftwaffe'' (air force). The designation "''Wehrmac ...

under the

Nazis Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...

. His father remained a detached figure, a

prisoner of war A prisoner of war (POW) is a person held captive by a belligerent power during or immediately after an armed conflict. The earliest recorded usage of the phrase "prisoner of war" dates back to 1610. Belligerents hold prisoners of war for a ...

until 1947; his maternal grandfather, the small-town police officer Josef Egelhofer (1872–1956), was the most important male presence during his early years. Sebald was shown images of

the Holocaust The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...

while at school in

Oberstdorf Oberstdorf (Low Alemannic German, Low Alemannic: ''Oberschdorf'') is a Municipalities of Germany, municipality and skiing and hiking town in Germany, located in the Allgäu region of the Bavarian Alps. It is the southernmost settlement in German ...

and recalled that no one knew how to explain what they had just seen. The Holocaust and European modernity, especially its modes of warfare and persecution, later became central themes in his work. Sebald studied German and English literature first at the

University of Freiburg The University of Freiburg (colloquially ), officially the Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg (), is a public university, public research university located in Freiburg im Breisgau, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. The university was founded in 1 ...

and then at the

University of Fribourg The University of Fribourg (; ) is a public university located in Fribourg, Switzerland. The roots of the university can be traced back to 1580, when the notable Jesuit Peter Canisius founded the Collège Saint-Michel in the City of Fribourg ...

in Switzerland, where he received a degree in 1965. He was a

lector Lector is Latin for one who reads, whether aloud or not. In modern languages it takes various forms, as either a development or a loan, such as , , and . It has various specialized uses. Academic The title ''lector'' may be applied to lecturers ...

at the

University of Manchester The University of Manchester is a public university, public research university in Manchester, England. The main campus is south of Manchester city centre, Manchester City Centre on Wilmslow Road, Oxford Road. The University of Manchester is c ...

from 1966 to 1969. He returned to St. Gallen in Switzerland for a year, hoping to work as a teacher, but could not settle. Sebald married his Austrian-born wife, Ute, in 1967. In 1970 he became a lecturer at the

University of East Anglia The University of East Anglia (UEA) is a Public university, public research university in Norwich, England. Established in 1963 on a campus university, campus west of the city centre, the university has four faculties and twenty-six schools of ...

(UEA). There, he completed his PhD in 1973 with a dissertation entitled ''The Revival of Myth: A Study of Alfred Döblin's Novels''. Sebald acquired

habilitation Habilitation is the highest university degree, or the procedure by which it is achieved, in Germany, France, Italy, Poland and some other European and non-English-speaking countries. The candidate fulfills a university's set criteria of excelle ...

from the

University of Hamburg The University of Hamburg (, also referred to as UHH) is a public university, public research university in Hamburg, Germany. It was founded on 28 March 1919 by combining the previous General Lecture System ('':de:Allgemeines Vorlesungswesen, ...

in 1986. In 1987, he was appointed to a chair of

European literature Western literature, also known as European literature, is the literature written in the context of Western culture in the languages of Europe, and is shaped by the periods in which they were conceived, with each period containing prominent weste ...

at UEA. In 1989 he became the founding director of the British Centre for Literary Translation. He lived at

Wymondham Wymondham ( ) is a market town and civil parishes in England, civil parish in the South Norfolk district of Norfolk, England. It lies on the River Tiffey, south-west of Norwich and just off the A11 road (England), A11 road to London. The pari ...

and

Poringland Poringland is a village in the South Norfolk district of Norfolk, England. It lies south of Norwich city centre and north of Bungay. Its population has rapidly grown in the past 50 years. It covers an area of and had a population of 3,261 l ...

while at UEA.

Final year

The 2001 publication of '' Austerlitz'' (both in German and English) secured Sebald worldwide fame: "''Austerlitz'' was received enthusiastically on an international scale; literary critics celebrated it frenetically; the book established Sebald as a modern classic." He was tipped as a possible future winner of the

Nobel Prize in Literature The Nobel Prize in Literature, here meaning ''for'' Literature (), is a Swedish literature prize that is awarded annually, since 1901, to an author from any country who has, in the words of the will of Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel, "in ...

. With grown and still growing reputation, he was now in high demand by literary institutions and radio programmes throughout Western Europe. Newspapers, magazines and journals from Germany, Austria, Belgium, the Netherlands, Britain and the U.S. urged him for interviews. "Condemned to unrest I am, I am afraid", he wrote to

Andreas Dorschel Andreas Dorschel (born 1962) is a German philosopher. Since 2002, he has been professor of aesthetics and head of the Institute for Music Aesthetics at the University of Music and Performing Arts, Graz, University of the Arts Graz (Austria). Ba ...

in June 2001, returning from one trip and setting out for the next. For a considerable time, Sebald had been aware of a congenital cardiac insufficiency; to a visitor from the US, he described himself in August 2001 as "someone who knows he has to leave before too long". Sebald died while driving near

Norwich Norwich () is a cathedral city and district of the county of Norfolk, England, of which it is the county town. It lies by the River Wensum, about north-east of London, north of Ipswich and east of Peterborough. The population of the Norwich ...

in December 2001. The event threw the literary public into a state of shock. Sebald had been driving with his daughter Anna, who survived the crash. The coroner's report, released some six months after the accident, stated that Sebald had suffered a heart attack and had died of this condition before his car swerved across the road and collided with an oncoming lorry. W.G. Sebald is buried in St. Andrew's churchyard in

Framingham Earl Framingham Earl is a small village and civil parish in the English county of Norfolk. Framingham Earl is located north-west of Loddon and south-east of Norwich. History Framingham Earl's name is of Anglo-Saxon origin and derives from the ...

, close to where he lived.

Themes and style

Sebald's works are largely concerned with the themes of memory and loss of memory (both personal and collective) and decay (of civilizations, traditions or physical objects). They are, in particular, attempts to reconcile himself with, and deal in literary terms with, the trauma of the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

and its effect on the German people. In '' On the Natural History of Destruction'' (1999), he wrote an essay on the wartime bombing of German cities and the absence in German writing of any real response. His concern with

The Holocaust The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...

is expressed in several books delicately tracing his own biographical connections with

Jews Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

. Contrary to Germany's political and intellectual establishment, Sebald denied the singularity of the Holocaust: "I see the catastrophe caused by the Germans, dreadful as it was, by no means as a singular event – it developed with a certain logic from European history and then, for the same reason, ate itself into European history." Consequently, Sebald, in his literary work, always tried to situate and contextualize the Holocaust within modern European history, even avoiding a focus on Germany. Sebald completely rejected the mainstream of Western German literature of the 1950s to 1970s, as represented by

Heinrich Böll Heinrich Theodor Böll (; ; 21 December 1917 – 16 July 1985) was a German writer. Considered one of Germany's foremost post-World War II writers, Böll received the Georg Büchner Prize (1967) and the Nobel Prize for Literature (1972). Bio ...

and

Günter Grass Günter Wilhelm Grass (; 16 October 1927 – 13 April 2015) was a German novelist, poet, playwright, illustrator, graphic artist, sculptor, and recipient of the 1999 Nobel Prize in Literature. He was born in the Free City of Danzig (now Gda ...

: "I hate ..the German postwar novel like pestilence." He took a deliberate counter-stance. Sebald's distinctive and innovative novels (which he mostly called simply:

prose Prose is language that follows the natural flow or rhythm of speech, ordinary grammatical structures, or, in writing, typical conventions and formatting. Thus, prose ranges from informal speaking to formal academic writing. Prose differs most n ...

("Prosa")) were written in an intentionally somewhat old-fashioned and elaborate German (one passage in '' Austerlitz'' famously contains a sentence that is 9 pages long). Sebald closely supervised the English translations (principally by

Anthea Bell Anthea Bell (10 May 1936 – 18 October 2018) was an English translator of literary works, including children's literature, from French, German and Danish language, Danish. These include ''The Castle (novel), The Castle'' by Franz Kafka, ''Aus ...

and

Michael Hulse Michael Hulse (born 1955) is an English poet, translator and critic, notable especially for his translations of German novels by W. G. Sebald, Herta Müller, and Elfriede Jelinek. Life and works Hulse was educated locally in Stoke-on-Trent unti ...

). They include ''

Vertigo Vertigo is a condition in which a person has the sensation that they are moving, or that objects around them are moving, when they are not. Often it feels like a spinning or swaying movement. It may be associated with nausea, vomiting, perspira ...

'', '' The Emigrants'', ''

The Rings of Saturn ''The Rings of Saturn'' ( - An English Pilgrimage) is a 1995 novel by the German writer W. G. Sebald. Its first-person narrative arc is the account by a nameless narrator (who resembles the author in typical Sebaldian fashion) on a walking tour ...

'' and '' Austerlitz''. They are notable for their curious and wide-ranging mixture of fact (or apparent fact), recollection and fiction, often punctuated by indistinct black-and-white photographs set in evocative counterpoint to the narrative rather than illustrating it directly. His novels are presented as observations and recollections made while travelling around Europe. They also have a dry and mischievous sense of humour. Sebald was also the author of three books of poetry: '' For Years Now'' with

Tess Jaray Tess Jaray (born 1937) is a British painter and printmaker. She taught at The Slade School of Fine Art, UCL from 1968 until 1999. Over the last twenty years Jaray has completed a succession of major public art projects. She was made an Honorary ...

(2001), ''After Nature'' (1988), and ''Unrecounted'' (2004).

Works

* 1988 ''After Nature.'' London: Hamish Hamilton. (''Nach der Natur. Ein Elementargedicht'') English ed. 2002 * 1990 ''

.'' London: Harvill. (''Schwindel. Gefühle'') English ed. 1999 * 1992 '' The Emigrants.'' London: Harvill. (''Die Ausgewanderten. Vier lange Erzählungen'') English ed. 1996 * 1995 ''

.'' London: Harvill. (''Die Ringe des Saturn. Eine englische Wallfahrt'') English ed. 1998 * 1998 '' A Place in the Country.'' (''Logis in einem Landhaus'') English ed. 2013 * 1999 '' On the Natural History of Destruction.'' London: Hamish Hamilton. (''Luftkrieg und Literatur: Mit einem Essay zu Alfred Andersch'') English ed. 2003 * 2001 '' Austerlitz.'' London: Hamish Hamilton. English translation by

won the 2002

Independent Foreign Fiction Prize The ''Independent'' Foreign Fiction Prize (1990–2015) was a British literary award. It was inaugurated by British newspaper ''The Independent'' to honour contemporary fiction in translation in the United Kingdom. The award was first launched i ...

. * 2001 '' For Years Now.'' London: Short Books. * 2003 ''Unrecounted'' London: Hamish Hamilton. (''Unerzählt, 33 Texte'') English ed. 2004 * 2003 ''Campo Santo'' London: Hamish Hamilton. (''Campo Santo, Prosa, Essays'') English ed. 2005 * 2008 ''Across the Land and the Water: Selected Poems, 1964–2001.'' (''Über das Land und das Wasser''. Ausgewählte Gedichte 1964–2001.) English ed. 2012 * 2025 ''Silent Catastrophes: Essays'' ''(Die Beschreibung des Unglücks'', ''Unheimliche Heimat'')

Influences

The works of

Jorge Luis Borges Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo ( ; ; 24 August 1899 – 14 June 1986) was an Argentine short-story writer, essayist, poet and translator regarded as a key figure in Spanish literature, Spanish-language and international literatur ...

, especially "

The Garden of Forking Paths "The Garden of Forking Paths" (original Spanish title: "El jardín de senderos que se bifurcan") is a 1941 short story by Argentina, Argentine writer and poet Jorge Luis Borges. It is the title story in the collection ''El jardín de senderos que ...

" and "

Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius "Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius" is a short story by the 20th-century Argentina, Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges. The story was first published in the Argentine journal ''Sur (magazine), Sur'', May 1940 in literature, 1940. The "postscript" dated ...

", were a major influence on Sebald. (Tlön and Uqbar appear in ''The Rings of Saturn.'') In a conversation during his final year, Sebald named

Gottfried Keller Gottfried Keller (19 July 1819 – 15 July 1890) was a Swiss poet and writer of German literature. Best known for his novel '' Green Henry'' (German: ''Der grüne Heinrich'') and his cycle of novellas called '' Seldwyla Folks'' (''Die Leute von Se ...

Adalbert Stifter Adalbert Stifter (; 23 October 1805 – 28 January 1868) was a Bohemian- Austrian writer, poet, painter, and pedagogue. He was notable for the vivid natural landscapes depicted in his writing and has long been popular in the German-speaking wo ...

Heinrich von Kleist Bernd Heinrich Wilhelm von Kleist (; 18 October 177721 November 1811) was a German poet, dramatist, novelist, short story writer and journalist. His best known works are the theatre plays ''The Prince of Homburg'', '' Das Käthchen von Heilbronn'' ...

and

Jean Paul Jean Paul (; born Johann Paul Friedrich Richter, 21 March 1763 – 14 November 1825) was a German Romanticism, German Romantic writer, best known for his humorous novels and stories. Life and work Jean Paul was born at Wunsiedel, in the Ficht ...

as his literary models. He also credited the Austrian novelist

Thomas Bernhard Nicolaas Thomas Bernhard (; 9 February 1931 – 12 February 1989) was an Austrian novelist, playwright, poet and polemicist who is considered one of the most important German-language authors of the postwar era. He explored themes of death, iso ...

as a major influence on his work, and paid homage within his work to

Kafka Franz Kafka (3 July 1883 – 3 June 1924) was a novelist and writer from Prague who was Jewish, Austrian, and Czech and wrote in German. He is widely regarded as a major figure of 20th-century literature. His work fuses elements of real ...

and Nabokov (the figure of Nabokov appears in every one of the four sections of ''The Emigrants'').

Memorials

Sebaldweg ("Sebald Way")

As a memorial to the writer, in 2005 the town of Wertach created an eleven kilometre long walkway called the It runs from the border post at

Oberjoch Oberjoch is a small village in the municipality of Bad Hindelang in the German district of Oberallgäu, Bavaria Bavaria, officially the Free State of Bavaria, is a States of Germany, state in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is ...

(1,159m) to W. G. Sebald's birthplace on Grüntenseestrasse 3 in Wertach (915m). The route is that taken by the narrator in ''Il ritorno in patria'', the final section of ''

'' ("Schwindel. Gefühle") by W. G. Sebald. Six

stele A stele ( ) or stela ( )The plural in English is sometimes stelai ( ) based on direct transliteration of the Greek, sometimes stelae or stelæ ( ) based on the inflection of Greek nouns in Latin, and sometimes anglicized to steles ( ) or stela ...

s have been erected along the way with texts from the book relating to the respective topographical place, and also with reference to fire and to people who died in the Second World War, two of Sebald's main themes.

Sebald Copse

In the grounds of the

a round wooden bench encircles a copper beech tree, planted in 2003 by the family of W. G. Sebald in memory of the writer. Together with other trees donated by former students of the writer, the area is called the "Sebald Copse". The bench, whose form echoes ''

'', carries an inscription from the penultimate poem of ''Unerzählt'' ("Unrecounted"): "Unerzählt bleibt die Geschichte der abgewandten Gesichter" ("Unrecounted always it will remain the story of the averted faces")

''Patience (After Sebald)''

In 2011, Grant Gee made the documentary ''Patience (After Sebald)'' about the author's trek through the East Anglian landscape."Patience (After Sebald): watch the trailer – video"
''The Guardian'' (31 January 2012)

References

Citations

General and cited sources

* Arnold, Heinz Ludwig (ed.). ''W. G. Sebald''. Munich, 2003 ( Text+Kritik. Zeitschrift für Literatur. IV, 158). Includes bibliography. * Bewes, Timothy. "What is a Literary Landscape? Immanence and the Ethics of Form". ''differences'', vol. 16, no. 1 (Spring 2005), 63–102. Discusses the relation to landscape in the work of Sebald and Flannery O'Connor. * Bigsby, Christopher. ''Remembering and Imagining the Holocaust: The Chain of Memory''. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2006. * Blackler, Deane. ''Reading W. G. Sebald: Adventure and Disobedience''. Camden House, 2007. * Breuer, Theo, "Einer der Besten. W. G. Sebald (1944–2001)" in T.B., Kiesel & Kastanie. ''Von neuen Gedichten und Geschichten'', Edition YE 2008. * Denham, Scott and Mark McCulloh (eds.). ''W. G. Sebald: History, Memory, Trauma''. Berlin, Walter de Gruyter, 2005. * Grumley, John, "Dialogue with the Dead: Sebald, Creatureliness, and the Philosophy of Mere Life", ''The European Legacy'', 16,4 (2011), 505–518. * Jacobs, Carol. ''Sebald's Vision''. New York: Columbia University Press, 2017. * Long, J. J. ''W. G. Sebald: Image, Archive, Modernity''. New York, Columbia University Press, 2008. * Long, J. J. and Anne Whitehead (eds.). ''W. G. Sebald: A Critical Companion''. Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 2006. * McCulloh, Mark R. ''Understanding W. G. Sebald''. University of South Carolina Press, 2003. * Patt, Lise et al. (eds.). ''Searching for Sebald: Photography after W. G. Sebald''. ICI Press, 2007. An anthology of essays on Sebald's use of images, with artist's projects inspired by Sebald. * Wylie, John. "The Spectral Geographies of W. G. Sebald". ''Cultural Geographies'', 14,2 (2007), 171–188. * Zaslove, Jerry. "W. G. Sebald and Exilic Memory: His Photographic Images of the Cosmogony of Exile and Restitution". ''Journal of the Interdisciplinary Crossroads'', Vol. 3 (No. 1) (April 2006). * Rupprecht, Caroline. “Silkworms and Concentration Camps: W.G. Sebald’s The Rings of Saturn and Austerlitz” Asian Fusion: New Encounters in the Asian-German Avant-garde, Peter Lang, 2020. 33-54.

External links

Complete bibliography of Sebald's works

An essay
by

Ben Lerner Benjamin S. Lerner (born February 4, 1979) is an American poet, novelist, essayist, and critic. The recipient of fellowships from the Fulbright, Guggenheim, and MacArthur Foundations, Lerner has been a finalist for the National Book Award for P ...

on Sebald in ''The New York Review of Books'' * The last interview *
Audio interview with Sebald on KCRW's Bookworm

Sebald-Forum

BBC Radio4 Program: "A German Genius in Britain"
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sebald, W. G. 1944 births 2001 deaths 20th-century German male writers 20th-century German novelists 20th-century German poets Academics of the University of East Anglia Alumni of the University of East Anglia Emigrants from West Germany to the United Kingdom German male novelists German male poets People from Oberallgäu Road incident deaths in England University of Fribourg alumni Academic staff of the University of Hamburg National Book Critics Circle Award winners