Gunnar Kaiser
Gunnar Kaiser (born 1976 in Cologne) is a controversial German writer, literary and political blogger, and a stand up comedian.
Life
Gunnar Kaiser studied philosophy, German philology and Romance studies at the University of Cologne. After completing his state examination, he worked as a teacher of German and philosophy in grammar schools in Bonn and Cologne.[1] In summer 2016, shortly before finishing his novel, he started his blog "Philosophisch denken" (Thinking philosphically).[2]
Literary works
Gunnar Kaiser became a blogger, initially on Facebook, according to his own account, because "all the aphorisms and aperçus of philosophers have been waiting for thousands of years for such a platform on which people pay so much attention to a single quotation. These treasures are often hidden in books, they first have to be salvaged, and who still leafs through Marcus Aurelius today? At the most, such sentences can only be heard in holiday speeches as a bourgeois bon mot, but their life span is probably as short as on Facebook. In his opinion, Facebook is only a tool, his goal is to "seduce people to his books, articles and videos in order to have a somewhat freer platform for the discussion of literature and philosophy".[3]
Kaiser's short stories and poems were published in literary magazines. His first novel Unter der Haut (English: Under The Skin) was published in 2018. The paperback edition was printed by German publishing house Piper. The English edition was published a year later, translations in other languages followed.
Under the Skin, 2018
In the tree parts of his first novel, Kaiser tells the life stories of the student Jonathan Rosen who wants to learn the art of seduction, and his seducer and mentor Josef Eisenstein. In the New York City of 1969, the life-experienced and bibliophile yet mysterious and neurotic Eisenstein introduces the naive student of literature to the adventures of love. The narcissistic over-father makes the student completely dependent on himself manipulating him according to his wishes. In the course of the 500-page presentation, Eisenstein's erratic and excentric prehistory is elucidated.[4]
From the perspective of Cornelia Wolters (Neue Ruhr Zeitung), it is all about the aesthetical, about classical and pop music, about books and bibliophilia. Josef Eisenstein, however, sometimes seems to her "like a copy of Patrick Süskind's Jean-Baptiste Grenouille" and that the first woman Jonathan Rosen sleeps with is named Gretchen, and Eisenstein's role as Faust's Mephisto, all this seems a little too exaggerated to her, even if it is cleared up later."[5]
The Wiener Zeitung finds Kaiser's descriptions "three-dimensional and alive". Chapter by chapter, one delves deeper into very different worlds: on the one hand, the metropolis of New York under the sign of the Sexual Liberation at the height of the Flower Power Era; on the other hand, the declining Jewish world of Berlin in the Drittes Reich. The reviewer is equally impressed by his knowledge of "Black Art" and his description of obscure gbook collectors' circles. The author is judged to be eloquent and stylistically confident, "only rarely – for example in the characterization of Eisenstein's helper, a mixture of Quasimodo and Silas, the killer from Dan Brown's "The Da Vinci Code – Sacrilege", Kaiser is exaggerating too much."[6]
In L'Opinion, Bernard Quiriny states Kaiser mixes the "initiation novel" with bibliophile fantasy, combines the thriller with the historical fresco. The reader sometimes dives into Philip Roth's Manhattan and sometimes starts on a popular saga a la Carlos Ruiz Zafon. "One wonders if he has a course in mind or if he is following the thread of his inspiration. A few good strokes to eliminate a hundred pages or more would have made the volume more digestible and less confusing."[7]
Comedy
His show "Of Wolves and Sheep" was perceived as a humorous lecture on the topic of "Community between loneliness and peer pressure", in which he proved how philosophical questions can be dealt with in a profound and entertaining way: "Monty Python" fan Kaiser ... guided the audience through the contradictions of the "Condition Humaine", the condition of being human, with many quotations from Diogenes, Seneca, Adorno and Helmuth Plessner. [8][9]
Positions and criticism
During the Corona pandemic, Kaiser took a critical position, his appearance at a demonstration in Munich on 26 June 2020 was commented on by Sabine Buchwald (Süddeutsche Zeitung) as building up a "scenario of threat". Kaiser is supposed to claim government measures aim at the "abolishment of man as a free and rational being". In particular, Kaiser had called on "the Intellectuals" to resist "repression" and the "imperative of technology".[10]
Milosz Matuschek (NZZ and Schweizer Monat) attests Gunnar Kaiser has summed up the contradiction of the measures regarding funerals, schools, companies and restaurants in relation to the anti-racism demonstrations in June 2020. Matuschek sees it as a colossal triumph in favor of the vilified skeptics, who rightly wonder how dangerous the virus really is.[11] After this the NZZ stoped working with Matuschek. Matuschek just worked several months as a free Writer for the NZZ.
With regard to Cancel Culture, Kaiser and Matuschek published the "Appell für freie Debattenräume" (appeal for free debate spaces). In his opinion, Cancel Culture is about "using threats, threats of violence, actual violence, bullying or shitstorms to put people under pressure and force them out of the public debate. Often third parties are put under pressure, for example organizers, publishers, employers or platforms, to make people seem unacceptable, behind their backs, without including them in the discourse. According to Kaiser, the perpetrators often remain in the dark; they remain are anonymous. The new quality seen by Kaiser is a mix of "exuberant political correctness" towards art and culture and the lack of protest against it, with every kind of protest being politically stigmatized and marginalized.[12]
The Friedrich-Naumann-Stiftung distanced themselves from Gunnar Kaiser after they had originally intended to win him over as moderator. In the NZZ of 23 December 2020, Kaiser discussed with the chairman of the foundation, Karl-Heinz Paqué, the accusation Kaisers positions would be close to conspiracy theories. Kaiser, Paqué explained, casted legitimate doubts into a conspiracy-theoretical narrative, grotesquely overestimating the influence of the World Economic Forum. Kaiser believes this istitution was planning a "centrally planned circular economy with maximum control of the economy and the people". Kaiser appears to believe he has discovered a world master plan to eliminate democracy and the market economy. This means to Paqué that he is "far beyond the liberal demarcation line". Kaiser rejected Paqué's classification. "My reproach remains that from a liberal point of view one has to criticize the technocratic plans of the World Economic Forum and other actors, instead of dismissing them as mere book fantasy. Your liberalism is too harmless for me. There is a global threat to the freedom that liberals need to draw attention to."[13] The accusations by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation led in turn to discussions on the political position of the foundation.[14][15][16]
By the Naumann Foundation and others Kaiser had also been critized for interviewing Martin Sellner, die Vulgären Analyse', Hyperion, Oliver Janich, Schattenmacher, Idiotenwatch and Ken Jebsen, who are regarded as right wing activists.[17]
Weblinks
Bibliography (selection)
Non-fictional
- With Florian Radvan: Ödön von Horváth: Stories from the Vienna Woods Part: Copy templates and modules for teaching sequences edited by Dieter Wrobel, R. Oldenbourg-Verlag 2010. ISBN 978-3-637-01061-1 Search this book on
.[18]
Fictional
- Under the skin. Piper Publishers 2019. ISBN 978-3-492-23856-4 Search this book on .
Sources
- ↑ url=https://www.gunnarkaiser.de/about
- ↑ https://buechermenschen.de/lesenswert/10-fragen-an/gunnar-kaiser/
- ↑ "Frag dich, was du selbst lesen willst" (in Deutsch). 12 October 2017.
- ↑ Von Redaktion literaturkritik.de. "Berührung und Verführung, Geschichte und Geheimnis – Gunnar Kaisers anspielungsreicher Debütroman "Unter der Haut" – : literaturkritik.de" (in Deutsch).
- ↑ Cornelia Wolter (2 August 2018). "Gunnar Kaiser aus Köln mit seinem Debütroman "Unter die Haut"" (in Deutsch).
- ↑ Werner Schandor. "Obsessive Bibliophilie" (in Deutsch).
- ↑ ""Relié pleine peau". La critique de Bernard Quiriny" (in français). 18 February 2020.
Intarissable, Kaiser joue sur tous les tableaux : il mélange le roman d’initiation avec la fantaisie bibliophilique, le thriller avec la fresque historique ; on se croit tantôt plongé dans le Manhattan de Philip Roth, tantôt embarqué dans une saga populaire à la Carlos Ruiz Zafon. On se demande s’il a un cap en tête, ou s’il suit le fil de son inspiration. Quelques bons coups de serpe, pour éliminer cent pages, voire plus, auraient rendu le volume plus digeste, et moins confus.
- ↑ VRM GmbH & Co KG. "Philosophische Stand-up-Comedy in Rüsselsheim – Main-Spitze" (in Deutsch).
- ↑ Redaktion (1 December 2019). "Gunnar Kaiser sucht die Gemeinschaft im Alten Wannenbad Gera" (in Deutsch).
- ↑ Sabine Buchwald. "München: Demos gegen Coronamaßnahmen und Rassismus" (in Deutsch).
- ↑ Milosz Matuschek. "Corona-Demos und Black lives matter: Gelten hier Doppelstandards?" (in Deutsch).
- ↑ Hubertus Volmer. "Ein Aufschrei namens "Cancel Culture"" (in Deutsch).
- ↑ Alexander Kissler. "Interview: Es gärt an vielen Stellen»: ein Streitgespräch über die Grenzen des Liberalismus". https://www.nzz.ch/international/ein-streitgespraech-ueber-corona-und-die-grenzen-des-liberalismus-ld.1593530. NZZ-Mediengruppe. Retrieved 27 December 2020. External link in
|website=(help) - ↑ "Skandal um Naumann-Stiftung".
- ↑ Liberale Stiftung dreht frei und diffamiert Gunnar Kaiser..
- ↑ Was Gunnar Kaiser sagt! C: ..
- ↑ SPIEGEL, DER. "YouTube-Hetzkanal "Die Vulgäre Analyse": Die Hetzer hinter dem Hacker – DER SPIEGEL – Panorama". www.spiegel.de (in Deutsch). Retrieved 17 December 2020.
- ↑ dnb.de
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