Crossing the Sierra de Gredos
Charles Peterson, calling Peter Handke "one of the greatest German writers of the past 50 years" reviews his translated work "Crossing the Sierra de Gredos" over at The Village Voice.
Crossing the Sierra de Gredos, both brilliant and maddening by turns, makes an artistic apologia for Handke's reactionary politics. Call it the Don Quixote defense: the novel, set largely in the mountains above La Mancha, contrasts a poetic female banker—a stand-in for the Don as well as Handke—with an "objective," Sancho Panza–like reporter. The setup produces surprising comedy; Handke, as one critic puts it, has never been known for wit, and, "even by German standards, is remarkably humorless."
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