Thomas Bernhard

The Austrian Thomas Bernhard was born in the Netherlands in 1931. He spent his childhood in Bavaria, Vienna, and Salzburg, where he studied singing, violin, and musicology. Part of his youth, which he described in a five-volume autobiographical novel, was spent in a sanatorium. His first poetry collection was published in 1957. Through his prose and theatrical works (largely unknown in Greece), Bernhard offers sharp social criticism of his homeland. In 1970, he was honored with the Georg Büchner Prize, the most prestigious literary award in West Germany. Thomas Bernhard passed away on February 12, 1989, at his home in Upper Austria. (photo: Isolde Ohlbaum)