Swiss Literature
3 total works
Last Last Orders is the third part of Arno Camenicsh's award-winning trilogy set in the Swiss Alps. It is the final evening in the Helvetia bar, and the regulars sit around one last time to drink and talk before the bar closes forever. Characters familiar to book two of the trilogy - villagers past and present, dead and alive - gather at the table as tales from the world they inhabit, both tragic and hilarious, are shared and relished. Everything's coming to an end but as long as someone is still speaking, the last glass will not empty. Camenisch's work is touching, hilarious, harrowing, and immediate.
The first novel in Arno Camenisch's celebrated "alpine" trilogy is set during a single summer. The four main (unnamed) characters are a dairyman, his farmhand, a cowherd, and a swineherd who all live and work in close proximity--but this is no "Heidi." Theirs is an existence marked by dangerous work, solitude, cruelty, alcoholism, and sheer stubbornness; but the author's handling of these situations and lives is characterized at all times by affection, surreal humor, and a brilliant ear for the sounds of the setting.
In the second book of Arno Camenisch's Alp trilogy, "Behind the Station," is told through the eyes of two young brothers growing up in a small, secluded village in a valley flanked by the alpine mountains. Written in the same style as "The Alp," we start to believe that there's little difference between the children and the adults in this village, save for their love for mischief and ghost stories. The grandmother, the parents, and the neighbors: it is an amphitheater full of drama, somehow colored through the eyes of children. Arno Camenisch's quiet control and powerful descriptions of village life prove that he is an international voice to follow.