Thomas Bernhard

Extinction is the last of Thomas Bernhard’s novels. It was originally published in German in 1986.

Instead of the book he's meant to write, Rudolph, a Viennese musicologist, produces this tale of procrastination, failure, and despair, a dark and grotesquely funny story of small woes writ large and profound horrors detailed and rehearsed to the point of distraction."Certain books—few—assert literary importance …