Pascale Kramer

Switzerland

Pascale Kramer

Born in Geneva in 1961, Pascale Kramer has received many awards for her novels. In 2017 she received the Swiss Grand Prize for Literature. Kramer grew up in Lausanne, then lived for several years in Zurich. In 1987, she went to Paris, where she currently lives. Her literary breakthrough came in 2000 with her fourth novel Die Lebenden (The Living). In her writing, Kramer’s persistently explores the tragedy of family relations and dynamics, which she has described in an interview as a fertile terrain for stories, “because it is precisely within this intimacy that the worst catastrophes take place.”

In her most recent novel, Kramer once again skillfully dissects the microcosm of the family. Eine Familie (A Family) recounts two days that follow the birth of a granddaughter when an entire family has gathered in Bordeaux. Only the oldest brother is missing and his shadow is powerful. Romain, was once a dreamy child who touchingly took care of his siblings and had drunk himself into a coma as an adolescent. Now he is in the area, claiming he has finally straightened out his life when a telephone call destroys the burgeoning hope. In the NZZ, Roman Bucheli praised the author’s descriptive skill: “With the precise poetry of her style and her profound knowledge of the human soul, Kramer illuminates her characters’ thoughts and feelings. And in turn, with distressing clarity, the individual family members become aware of their own insufficiency. The more distinctly the characters perceive the disastrous side of their actions and their entanglements, the more they lack the willpower to break free.”


Eine Familie. Roman. Aus dem Französischen von Andrea Spingler. Rotpunktverlag 2019
Autopsie des Vaters. Roman. Aus dem Französischen von Andrea Spingler. Rotpunktverlag 2017
Die Lebenden. Roman. Aus dem Französischen von Andrea Spingler. Arche 2003

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28th Leukerbad International Literary Festival: 6.21.–23.2024