Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck

WINNER OF THE INTERNATIONAL BOOKER PRIZE 2024

Berlin. 11 July 1986. They meet by chance on a bus. She is a young student, he is older and married. Theirs is an intense and sudden attraction, fuelled by a shared passion for music and art, and heightened by the secrecy they must maintain. But when she strays for a single night he cannot forgive her and a dangerous crack forms between them, opening up a space for cruelty, punishment and the exertion of power. And the world around them is changing too: as the GDR begins to crumble, so too do all the old certainties and the old loyalties, ushering in a new era whose great gains also involve profound loss.

From a prize-winning German writer, this is the intimate and devastating story of the path of two lovers through the ruins of a relationship, set against the backdrop of a seismic period in European history.

About the Author

Jenny Erpenbeck is the author of The Old Child & The Book of Words (2008), Visitation (2010) and The End of Days (2014, winner of the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize), and Go, Went, Gone (2017). as well as Not a Novel: Collected Writings and Reflections (2020). Her work is translated into over thirty languages.

About the Translator

Michael Hofmann is a poet and German translator. His most recent collection of poems is One Lark, One Horse. He is a Granta contributing editor.

Reviews

"Erpenbeck has proved time and again that she is a fearless, astute examiner of a country's soul... Kairos powerfully examines individual as well as collective history." ―Economist

"An ambitious story of love and betrayal" ―Irish Times

"Carefully structured and [...] emotionally resonant... As ever with Erpenbeck, history makes mincemeat of those swept along in its wake: which is to say, all of us. Kairos furthers the conviction that Erpenbeck is a dead cert for a future Nobel prize." ―Guardian

"A subtle, richly layered, densely allusive and hugely ambitious novel... Kairos is an impressive achievement that has deepened my admiration for Erpenbeck's talent for weaving into her fiction clashes of ideology and convulsions of history." ―Spectator

"An extraordinary story of twisted love that unspools in East Berlin during the last years of the GDR... Like all the best allegories, Kairos cannot be reduced to a single, unambiguous message. Kairos is an autopsy of those broken bonds that you were sure would last forever." ―Sunday Telegraph

"Erpenbeck is a writer with a roving, furious, brilliant mind. Kairos bears with it the absolute urgency of existential questions... Erpenbeck's handling of characters caught within the mesh (and mess) of history is superb." ―Los Angeles Times

"Erpenbeck is among the most sophisticated and powerful novelists we have. Clinging to the undercarriage of her sentences, like fugitives, are intimations of Germany's politics, history and cultural memory. It's no surprise that she is already bruited as a future Nobelist." ―New York Times

Dimensions: 12.8 x 1.7 x 19.8 cm