I chose a short story collection, "I am still afraid of Michael Pedersen Casper" and I will analyze the short story, "the specter of Ottemachauer Steig."
Novel is divided into 12 sections and is built like a letter. I have chosen to call the writer of the letter, it will tell the story tells of "B" when he is not named. In the letter he tells of a series of horrific incidents - attacks - he has had in connection with a study in Berlin, where he was writing his final thesis.
In the first section you will be introduced to the B and the recipient of the letter, which he describes A. Here B says that he knows to write this letter brings the feeling that he otherwise thought was gone again. He says also that he is at a safe distance now. He tells about the lack of control he had, and led him further towards the abyss. Here you as a reader domain of the mystery about what he lived through. "I am fully engaged in yet another metamorphosis, and consciousness therefore looking back to what was" (p. 439 line 17-19). This shows that he has undergone a change but also that he has started a new one.
B tells of a friend, Ib, he had one once. Ib hypokondrisk was a young man who had not had physical contact with a woman and yet were tested for AIDS. "And the one point in this story is that Ib seeing visions ... The second is that Ib certainly got AIDS and died during the worst of torture shortly after the test. The doctors had used a contaminated needle for blood test "(s.442-443 line 33-39). Then B says that the story of Ib is a parabola in Bs fateful stay in Berlin. I would conclude that B either figuratively have been dead or had experienced death from that Ib is dead and seeing visions. B says in the beginning "of the past several years I've been beyond .." (s.438 line 15-16) as "beyond" means "on the other side of life", he must somehow have been dead .
The second chapter takes B to Berlin because he has won a scholarship to write her thesis there. He wants to isolate himself completely for one year to start over. He has very high expectations for themselves and have no doubt that he is in every sense, a brilliant. So it will go well with him.
In Berlin, he moved into an idyllic neighborhood with an old lady named Mrs. Schmidt. A few days after moving in his subconscious trying to tell him something "Flee! Go away! Do all in the world do not stay here ". B is aware that it is a voice from his subconscious. Here begins the conflict escalation. When he must begin his studies, he feels an incredibly uncomfortable "There was never a day without something made me aware that I am for all the world had gone" (p. 449 linie14-16).
In the third section is a clear relationship between his offensive and thesis. This is seen when he gets the first panic attack, he gets in the fourth section, after having talked with some teachers about his specialty. When he goes home through a forest, there is again a voice that says something to him, "Go! Go away! Connectors! It is not good for you to be here "(p. 453 line 29-30). It's the same voice as he first knew came from his subconscious. The difference from the first time that he now can not identify the voice, and think these are things that speak to him, "Things started to make noises from him .." (p. 453 line 28). The forest went to attack him, and he climbed with difficulty under a thorn bush. As an amphibian crawled up in his hand, stopped the attacks. Padden had a piece of jewelry on him, and he took it, then something touched him, and he ran out from the thorn bushes. But no matter where he fled away, he could not enjoy peace. Thus viewed the relationship between Special Studies and anxiety when he gets a seizure immediately after having discussed the thesis.
When he finally came home, he began to sleep. When he awoke, he fainted away. Here it may be essential to involve something he said earlier. He said that Ib seeing visions, and their stories are similar. This may mean that he probably will not be attacked, but he gets a panic attack. His psyche plays him a chit. Bs subconscious is symbolized by the forest, he can not recognize. The conflict is that he did not know that it is his subconscious - it supplanted - by attacking him. The attacks are in line with that B begins on his thesis and a mental illness begins to manifest itself. He can no longer distinguish between reality and imagination.
The second anxiety is the fifth section in the middle of an hour, where a floc is a worm and crawl up in the teacher's ear. None of the other students see this and it surprised him. When he comes home, it becomes jewelry, he has found in the woods, to a worm and crawl up your nose at him. "... And I grabbed panic after a little sharp paper scissors, as always, was on the table. If not Mrs. Schmidt happened to come in at the moment, I would have to cut and cut my nose in half "(s.461 linie15-17). This suggests that his illness is taking momentum, and he becomes self-defeating.
The entire third anxiety, which is part of the sixth paragraph is written in present and italic, alone in the story. Here begins a new view of B's mental disorder to come forward. He walks down a street and sees his mirror image, which turns so he can see his back. A clown appears and cuts off his back up and it rolls off of snakes, spiders and salamanders. This can be interpreted as an incipient schizophrenia. The fourth anxiety, in the seventh section, the interpretation is based on schizophrenia. Here he sits at home and hear a scream, as he can not locate. It should prove to be a man who screams and runs around in a deep swoon. It turns out to be B itself. ( "For it was myself" (s.463 line 28)). B tries to help the man, but he escapes. After a few hours succeeds B to sneak up on the man who keeps kissing something resembling a jewel. B tries to console him by placing a hand on him. As a result, the man fled. The man rushes home and puts himself to sleep. Then becomes the man and one B again and sleep again three days in a row before he pass out again and goes into a coma. It is very clear that he is sick, and a page of him know. It can be seen when he describes the man "He ran up and down the street while he screamed long drawn out, ugly and persistent, in absolute fear of death - as an escapee insane" (s.463 linie17-19). This attack has it together as the first, which occurred in the woods, just viewed from two different sides of B. The first time when he is the insanity that crawl in the shelter of a thicket, and the second time when he looks at and tries to comfort the other side of himself.
His schizophrenia is beginning to emerge clearly in the eighth paragraph. B has a theology student visits and they discover that B's books are completely identical with the theology students' childhood books "out of curiosity when he looked closely, he saw the same dedication and Bookplate, which he remembered from his childhood home, yes, they were without doubt exactly the same books. But we both knew that I had never had the opportunity to steal them because I had never visited him or his parents "(p. 465 line 26-30). His mother is also very offended that he had been in Copenhagen without contacting her. But he is sure that he never left Germany. "She did not believe a word, for she had even seen me at Lyngby Main Street and out in Søborg, near where Gudrun live" (s.466 linie7-8). He has probably even been books and been in Copenhagen. He does not seem to know what he is doing and has no control over her body.
The fifth attack happens in the ninth section, that he wakes up and is beaten in the head with something hard, so all his teeth fall out. This event may not have in the way tenant in fact when he subsequently goes to the dentist and get his teeth repaired. Event is seems to be a delusion. He has not been beaten but surely fallen and has turned his teeth out. It can be seen if you look closely at these two quotes: "There were tears in clothes, for he dropped repeatedly onto the pavement or in hawthorn hedges, with his face first" (s.463 line 21-23) This quote is from B's first physical meeting his schizophrenic page where he sees himself running around out on the streets. "The moment after I was hit by a rain of cones, and from a location near flew a heavy branch out and hit me straight in the chest so I was bowled over" (s.454 line 13-15) This is a quote from the same anxieties in the woods, where B is the insane trying to flee. It shows that B's performance does not match the same with what actually happens.
B finds out in the tenth paragraph, the only way he can use against these "attacks" is to stupefy themselves with alcohol, drugs and techno. He does not believe that "they" (those who hunt and attack him) can find him when he stayed at the disco, very full of drugs and alcohol. "When I stayed at these new Ironically, perfidious discos, nothing could touch me, so I almost do not exist" (s.468 line 27-28). The drug itself is his way of hiding for fear.
All these attacks are the prelude to the final attack that takes place in the eleventh paragraph of climax on the night turn of 1991/1992. He is alone at Christmas, and stun well with alcohol from the beginning. He begins to write the introduction, in his very important essay on aesthetics and information. Since starting the attack.
It starts as a bottle, and he falls into an endless abyss and is paralyzed on the floor. He tries to belly out to the bathroom. It takes him a long time to stand up to the sink, but when he looks in the mirror, he is nothing but a skull. A choir begins to laugh at him. And he says "Are ye beat me to death?" (P. 471 line 30-31) and the voices answered "Yes, we must, yes, we must" (p. 471 line 30-31). These are voices in his head. He talks to himself. Then his entrails will be emptied on the floor. "In rapid sequence images passed over by people I had hated and despised, the places I had not cared about the celebrations I had enjoyed myself too much for the exams, I was dumped in, the girls I had loved unilaterally I felt my body go into decay and become humus, and there were worms, and from the organism's seat I looked down at my own funeral at Trinity Church "(s.472 line 7-12). What he thinks about to be everything he has displaced and fled. This is apparently the cause of his anxiety, and therefore his illness.
This is also where he "dies", but is ridden by something which at first did not have a real figure, but which manifests itself as a ghost. It is just quiet, cold and transparent. It heals his wounds on the soul and body in turn. It wraps itself around him and let him experience a permafrost. This experience, he can only describe with the word "Wizzelethorpe". And then he becomes changed. Ghost represent something religious, you can draw a parallel to Jesus who can heal. "I lay in bed and all the nights since then, I dreamed only of harmony and love. Whatever it was it was over now "(s.474 line 2-3). Here is something that does not fit together. A permafrost is permanently frozen, which must mean that he is permanently følelsesdød. I have tried to beat the word "Wizzlethorpe", but it does not exist in dictionaries. After trying via google took me to this URL: http://www.shoestringradio.net/transcript17.txt. I skim it first. Text Wizzlethorpe with concepts such as, aggression, paranoia, hypnosis, and manipulation of emotions. All words one can relate to forms of insanity. So from what I would conclude that B is insane.
To complete the last B note in the twelfth. He tells the receiver, A, that this sequence of events is why he has not contacted A for so long. He gives himself a lofty, almost gudestatus "The mysterious incident has changed me, so I was able to see everything more clearly. From a lofty distance, I can now look at everything as it really is ... I'm far away now, and nothing can affect me - and nothing can bring me back to it, involving as many accidents in his time "(p. 474 linie7 -11). He concludes by saying that he has changed so radically that A would probably not be able to recognize B when we meet. "But you must, for heaven's sake do not misunderstand me. You must believe that everything is different now. Trust me! I am beyond good and evil. When I turn, there is in principle only one reason: that I will ultimately you the best. With your dearest greetings ... "(s.474 line 17-20)
This inference can be difficult to interpret, since B is so insane, so many things in the letter does not seem to fit together. He tells himself that it is 17 years since A last hear from him, "you now have not heard from me for over 17 years .." (p. 438 line 1). Ie that they had the last contact in 1986. "You have guessed that I am talking about the autumn of 1991 when I arrived in Berlin" (p. 440 line 21). This quote shows to guess they must have had some form of contact in 1991. So it can not be 17 years since the last contact. The return address on the top of the first page of the letter states: Goa, Brixton, Heidelberg, d 23rd December 2003. The three transmission sites located, respectively, India, England and Germany.
I banged up in autumn and son Psykologileksikon how schizophrenia is defined: A psychiatrist named Bleuler described the suffering of the famous four "a's". Autism association disorder, ambivalence, affective disorders. B has described his receipt A. Because he suffers from schizophrenia, it appears that he wrote the letter to himself.
The author of the letter describes himself very confidently, and you get an impression that he is talented. He feels very elevated both by what he has lived through, but generally "To you from time to time to interpret my words wrong. Maybe I have forgotten to adjust for the fact that I find myself at a higher level than you "(p. 439 lines 1-3). He is sure that everything he touched, becoming something good. "It would go well with me, because I was brilliant in every respect, my major task would undoubtedly be judged as a masterpiece" (s.441 line 18-20). He intends to spend years in Germany in isolation, so he can be concerts on himself and his thinking. It is with much overconfidence and naive to think that you can handle a year in solitary confinement (which he can not). B says something very essential, when he meets the ghost "in rapid sequence images passed over by people I had hated and despised, the places I had not cared about the celebrations I had enjoyed myself too much for the exams I was dumped in, the girls I had loved unilaterally ... "(s.472 line 7-10), it suggests that he is not so self-confident again, but that he fled from the experiences and failures he previously had. He says himself that he so ardently desired to change. "For the successful, yes, I was actually a second ..." (s.474 linie13-14). He was changed, he managed to escape from his past, but he ends up as an insensible crazy man. "I'm far away now, and nothing can affect me - and nothing can bring me back to that involving so many accidents in his time. But I'm not sad. I miss nothing "(s.474 line 9-11). B seems to last følesløs.
The elderly woman who lives with B in Berlin, says Mrs Schmidt. First, he describes her and her surroundings, as something that looked like Hansel and Gretel. "It looked like gingerbread house in Hansel and Gretel" (s.447 25-26). Mrs. Schmidt has some major role in the story, but when she finally said, she has a positive influence on B's attack. As mentioned earlier, she prevents B, the middle of a panic attack to clip his nose broken. She symbolizes the only love he has to stick in. "If it were not ridiculous, I had fallen in love her" (s.450 line 1-2). The contact he has with her as the only man, the only thing that prevent him from total insanity. When she trips over Christmas, B is more alone than ever before. This is where he experienced his last and greatest anxiety.
This story is told of a first-person narrator, which makes it difficult to rely on reality in the story because the narrator is insane. There is an internal perspective on the first-person narrator makes the story even more surreal because all the events seen through the eyes of Bs.
I believe that Jan Sonnergaard want to destroy the many scraps of our lives and communities, which he thinks is lying about the world we live in. His short stories are very specific in their descriptions of defeat and hopelessness. Jan Sonnergaard teases the reader by surprise when the mundane mixed with the incredible. In almost all his novels, he surprises by breaking their daily business with an exaggerated and radical change in the short story of the end. Jan Sonnergaard expresses that we live in a class divided society. During class, which is described in the first collection of short stories "Radiator", the middle class, as described in the story "Last Sunday in October" and the upper class, which is described in the last collection of short stories "I'm still afraid of Casper Michael Pedersen." Short story collection "I am still afraid of Michael Pedersen Casper" is about the nouveau riche, they are making money through IT and advertising industries. Ie people who may not have a real talent, but come up anyway eg. short story "We write 1995 ... and it will be better yet." Short story about a man who achieves success in the advertising industry by stepping on others. Sonnergaard people are often paltry, selvmedlidende or simply cynical, they can not relate to either love or family. All his short stories is about status, violence, sex and drugs. "I think that the stories in the book, I drove it well beyond the socialist realist - almost surreal. In this way it may well be more realistic: By running it so far, I think better, I could show what living people, a life where people go through seedy and cynical "(quote from an interview with Jan Sonnergaard in Sentura) This quote could be a synthesis of the general theme of virtually all the stories in the trilogy "radiator".
I am very excited about this collection of short stories. I think that Jan Sonnergaard is a very exciting writer, both because he expresses himself through his political novels, but also because, as he himself says he writes so exaggerated that it almost becomes realistic. He makes the stories interesting to read through the complete stories far from what one expects. He provokes his reader by describing the grotesque scenes in a timely and practical world. He is good at finding pain points where it hurts the reader. I do not seem to work as such has some weaknesses but it can be difficult for a reader who does not agree with his criticism of society, to feel enthusiasm for the stories
