Thomas Bernhard, one of postwar Austria's most original prose stylists, was also one of its most prolific writers. Between the 1950s and his death in 1989 Bernhard wrote fifteen novels and long narratives, eighteen stage plays, six book length autobiographical pieces, and a few volumes of lyric poetry. His popular reputation rests partly on the high quality of his unusual prose with its philosophical pessimism, partly on his combative personal style. A loner both in art and in life, he cultivated the image of an intellectual curmudgeon; he was known for his irascible attacks on cultural and political figures, from the Nobel Prize winner Elias Canetti to Austrian chancellor Bruno Kreisky. In his work Bernhard ponders death, madness, and disease; above all, he concerns himself with modern Austria, a theme that merges seamlessly with the motifs of decay and death.

The details of Bernhard's life are recorded in his...