Woodcutters

In Thomas Bernhard's Woodcutters, a dinner party among Viennese intellectuals and artists becomes the stage for a relentless, digressive monologue. The narrator, a bitter and disillusioned man, recounts his failed relationship with Joana — who committed suicide earlier that day — and his disdain for the theater world, while a famous actor's arrival and a confrontation with his rival Jeannie Billroth escalate the evening's tension. Bernhard's signature prose style turns a single evening into a meditation on failure, art, and the bitterness of the Viennese cultural scene.