Stigmata of Bliss: Three Novellas (Hardbound-2017)

Klaus Merz is one of the most prominent, prolific and versatile Swiss writers working today. Celebrated as a master of concise, condensed sentences, Merz brings depth and resonance to spare narratives with lyrical prose and striking images. Stigmata of Bliss brings together three of Merz’s critically acclaimed novellas, offering English readers the perfect introduction to his work.Jacob Asleep introduces a family marked by illness, eccentricity and a child’s death. In A Man’s Fate, a moment of inattention on a mountainous hike upends a teacher’s life and his understanding of mortality. And finally, The Argentine traces the fluctuations of memory and desire in a man’s journey around the world. In each novella, Merz takes readers on a profound and intimate journey. Read as a whole, the works complement, enrich and echo each other.

Klaus Merz is one of the most prominent, prolific and versatile contemporary Swiss writers. He has written more than two dozen books of poetry, long and short fiction, essays and commentary, along with screenplays for television and film, as well as stage and radio plays. His projected seven-volume Collected Works is being published by Haymon Verlag. Merz has won numerous important prizes, most recently the 2012 Friedrich Hölderlin Prize.