Facts Outside the Body

On the Novels of Thomas Bernhard

Abstract

This study examines the poetics of Thomas Bernhard's novels through the concept of paranoia. It argues that the recurring motifs and stylistic features of his oeuvre—monologic discourse, repetition, exaggeration, and mediated narration—not only serve as vehicles for a radical critique of the world but also represent the workings of a paranoid consciousness. The paper demonstrates how the narrative position is transformed in Bernhard's novels, how the perspective of consciousness becomes increasingly closed, and how the boundary between legitimate social criticism and paranoid projection gradually dissolves.