Der Blog zu Thomas Körners Fragmentroman Das Land aller Übel
Entdecke die Entschleunigung des Lesens – Discover the Deceleration of Reading
Thomas Körner loves the game with an exchange of only a small number of words with a great change in meaning, e.g. the difference between capitalism and socialism. Or what does the Economics of the Political have to do with the Polit-economical approach? Thomas Körner plays the wordgame for us.
Click to the word game between Capitalism & Socialism
Click to the game on Polit-economics (of the GDR) vs. Economics of the Political
Or do you know the term of Democritic? Here you get it!
Thomas Körner wants to find new forms for language, he uses formulas or graphics.
On the subject of “Everything is broken, nothing works anymore” he finds the following presentation:
You can find the above formula in the Fragment of the Book First Box card file (0170)
Through the triangle the author sets terms in relation to each other, which characterize for him the generic term: he calls sex, show and politics as qualities of the narrative voice barbaroccan cabaretism (with the abbreviation brk) and eros, poetry and the universe serve to characterize the voice of the commentless realism, abbreviation klr (both are neologisms created by Thomas Körner):
Fragment of the Book First Box (0232)
The narrative voices brk and klr are characterized by the graphic representation of the triangles, and the § signs stand as § I (producing) for the Fragment of the People and § II (consuming) for the Fragment of the State. With these diagrams, Körner characterizes in a simple way complex relationships between the narrative voices brk and klr and the contents of the Fragments of the People and State.
In this reading game, which takes place on a kind of game board, the
discussing persons throw their statement on a playing card into the
middle of the game table like in a card game.
They have four-letter codes such as NECK or WULB, whose full names are easily recognized as Honecker and Walter Ulbricht. But there are also codes which are more difficult to interpret.
In the foreground they act according to the rules of socialist game
theory, they talk about the five-year plan. Georg Klaus, the cybernetics
pope of the GDR, appears as an expert. But actually only fermentation
bubbles come out of the cards (of the party members), because it seems
nobody really understands what they are talking about.
At the end of the very extensive reading game with more than 50 moves WULB hands over the power to NECK.
But play or read the game yourself:
d r ü b e n oder erinnerungen an ein tollhaus / Over there or Memories of a Madhouse
The term “over there” is known to every former West German, that meant East Germany, at the time of the GDR.
The title suggests that this is probably a lost, all known land “Das Land aller Übel”.
There was even a separate calendar in the vacuole of the GDR : before and ndm – nach den maßnahmen means after the (forced) measures.
Have fun reading this.
This is the latest text by Thomas Körner, published in 2017. He describes how propaganda in the GDR worked, but in the narrative voices of the commentless realist or rather barbaric cabaret artist. Which one is used you have to decide yourself.
The excerpt above is taken from page 4 of Part I of the Toll House Memoirs. Here you get to part II of the memories of a madhouse by Thomas Körner, 2017 and part III. Whereby you can relate many of his “memories” to the present. There are still many vacuolities, in states, in minds …
The Fragment of the Book consists of 5 boxes and is part of the online novel by Thomas Körner, which he describes as a “system of a way of life in five index boxes”. This system should be looked at more closely by calling up these five index boxes in detail:
The First Box contains Das Karteiprogramm – the index program – and gives information about the writing worker. Körner describes it as his workbook in which he writes down the concept for the novel and loose notes, which are re-emerged and elaborated in the other fragments. The first box consists of 1,533 index cards or pages.
The Second Box is called Der Karteibeitrag – the index posts – and contains words from everyday life in the GDR, expressions by other writers that are ambivalent and ambiguous, but often they seem to have been invented by Thomas Körner himself. For example, do you know what an Ideenbordell – which means idea brothel in English – is? Look it up at Körner, under the letter i.
The Third Box is titled Das Karteimitglied – the index member – or The Ego as a subjective object. Or perhaps as an objective subject? What would be the difference? This you can only clarify by delving into the file box. (1488 index cards await you).
In the Fourth Box we read of Die Karteiführung – the card file management. On more than 1,400 pages, Körner has compiled his reading notes and quotes on other writers, in the form of a very systematically organized order. He has developed his own system of how the reading notes are arranged. Knowing this makes it easier for the reader of the online novel to retrieve quotes.
The last file box is called the Fifth Box Der Karteitag – The index day – In society of prevailing conditions. We read in a kind of diary of Thomas Körner’s everyday life or from his travels (after his escape from the GDR). These records go into the year 2005. (The box ends with the page number 1463!)
We can also try to replace the K in the titles (of each box) with a P from Kartei (index in english) to Partei (political party): party convention, party program, etc. Then new worlds open up. The five index boxes show us the “system of a way of life” as a whole. Is that the life of Thomas Körner, or of the commentless realist klr or the barbaric cabaret artist brk? Which immediately addresses the next topic – the two narrative voices brk and klr, whereby brk is the more ironic side of the system.