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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 811
EAN: 9780375756580
ISBN: 0375756582
Label: Modern Library
Manufacturer: Modern Library
Number Of Items: 1
Book Pages: 128
Publication Date: 2003-07-01
Publisher: Modern Library
Product Release Date: 2003-07-01
Studio: Modern Library

After Nature, W. G. Sebald’s first literary work, now translated into English by Michael Hamburger, explores the lives of three men connected by their restless questioning of humankind’s place in the natural world. From the efforts of each, “an order arises, in places beautiful and comforting, though more cruel, too, than the previous state of ignorance.” The first figure is the great German Re-naissance painter Matthias Grünewald. The second is the Enlightenment botanist-explorer Georg Steller, who accompanied Bering to the Arctic. The third is the author himself, who describes his wanderings among landscapes scarred by the wrecked certainties of previous ages.

After Nature introduces many of the themes that W. G. Sebald explored in his subsequent books. A haunting vision of the waxing and waning tides of birth and devastation that lie behind and before us, it confirms the author’s position as one of the most profound and original writers of our time.


From the Hardcover edition.

Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Poetry by the last great novelist of the 20th century
Review: This triptych of three long poems by W.G. Sebald is a jewel-like ornament to his four major prose works, "Vertigo," "The Emigrants," "The Rings of Saturn" and "Austerlitz." I found the first and third poems, dealing with the shadowy German Renaissance painter Matthias Grunewald and with Sebald himself, superior to the second section, on Arctic exploration, but I fully expect other readers to judge for themselves and judge differently. The burning power of what is best in all of Sebald's works is encapsulated in a few lines from the third poem here, describing Sebald's reaction after viewing a painting of the destruction of Sodom in the Kunsthistorisches Museum:

When for the first time I saw
this picture the year before last,
I had the strange feeling
of having seen all of it
before, and a little later,
crossing to Floridsdorf
on the Bridge of Peace,
I nearly went out of my mind.

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Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Thought provoking
Review: This is not a book to be skimmed lightly. The middle poem on the botanist Georg Steller is the most transparent. It provides not only a biography of Steller's explorations with Bering, but insight into the nature-man relationship. The first poem on the 16th century painter Matthias Grunewald is less transparent - less biographical information is available. Sebald again explores the nature-man relationship. The reader, however, must glean their understanding of Grunewald's painting through Sebald's description and from this understanding move towards Sebald's interpretation. The third poem is on Sebald himself, exploring the same nature-man relationship. At times it becomes a "cat and mouse" game as Sebald exhibits both reserve and openess.

If you enjoy Sebald's prose, this is a must-read. If you enjoy less traditional literary presentation, consider this a must-read. For the rest, read the various reviews to determine your interest level - it would never be a mistake to choose this volume. But there is so much wonderful literature and so little time to read, that you may wish to invest your time elsewhere.

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Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Profound
Review: I really don't feel I can do this beautiful book justice but I loved it so much I feel compelled to try.

"After Nature" is written even less conventionally than are Sebald's other books. "After Nature" is a rather longish prose poem that details the unique relationship between three very different men and nature, herself. The three men are Matthias Grunewald, the German Renaissance painter, Georg Steller, the scientist and Arctic explorer and Sebald, himself.

Each one of the men named above begins life with a vision of Nature that is placid and benevolent but come to realize that Nature can often be cruel and can even destroy her own creations. Each man was changed by his experience with Nature; whether for better or worse is something each reader will have to judge for himself.

Sebald was an enormously creative and original writer and he defined himself as a "writer" rather than a novelist. While "After Nature" certainly isn't conventionally plotted there are remnants of stories contained within the poetry. Sebald, however, makes the reader work a little in order to obtain a full understanding of "After Nature." The book may look "easy" but believe me, it's not.

"After Nature" is a beautiful book and, like the ones that followed, its beauty is melacholic. If you need a conventionally plotted work or a page turning storyline, however, "After Nature" wouldn't be the right choice for you. This is a very introspective work and the more you read, the more inward looking the book becomes.

I loved "After Nature." I think I loved it even more than Sebald's other books. "After Nature" made me think more and reflect more and it stayed with me far longer.

If a very reflective, introspective and melancholic prose poem is something you think you'd enjoy, I don't think you could find anything lovlier than "After Nature."

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Customer Rating:
Review Summary: DNA for Sebald's Prose Works
Review: This triptych prose poem actually was published before Sebald's prose books. The word 'poem' is a loose word here, as words like 'fiction' and 'novel' were in "Austerlitz", "Vertigo", "Rings of Saturn" and "The Emigrants". This poem is a progenitor of the later work, and has much of the same agenda as the books.

"After Nature" follows three characters: Grunewald, a Renaissance painter, Steller, an 18th century botanist-explorer, and finally the author himself. The book is preoccupied and troubled by the slow devastation of nature and innocence by history and man, and the book's end, as Sebald himself imagines looking onto the virgin continent of Africa in the times of Alexander the Great, is eloquent and beautifully melancholy as only a Sebald work can be.

This is as luminous and hypnotic as writing can be, and literature will sorely miss the genius of W.G. Sebald, who passed away far too early, at the height of his literary powers, in December of 2001.

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Customer Rating:
Review Summary: After Nature
Review: W.G. Sebald's first literary work is a prose poem divided into three distinct sections. The first is about Renaissance painter Matthias Grunewald, and to me, is the least artful in this triptych. The last is author Sebald's own musings ranging from his parentage, the destruction of Nuremburg, and modern day Manchester. In a stunningly masterful moment, Sebald paints a horrific portrait of Nuremburg in flames by comparing it to a painting of Lot and his daughters, "on the horizon | a terrible conflagration blazes | devouring a large city."

It is the second part about explorer and botanist Georg Wilhelm Steller and his trip with Bering to the Arctic that presents the reader with a watershed moment, an example of the very finest of writing. Steller sees for the first time the weary, depressed Bering seated over a table, compass in hand, practically catatonic. It is such a vivid scene, so powerful, that this slim volume is worth reading for those two pages alone. (Admirers of Beryl Bainbridge's The Birthday Boys will especially appreciate this chilling scene.)

"After Nature" is a terrific start to what would be a distinguished and too soon extinguished career on the part of the now deceased Sebald.

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