Almost 1 book, almost 1 life

by Elfriede Czurda

"This volume contains almost all of Elfriede Czurda's first book (with the untranslatable title ein griff = eingriff inbegriffen) and all of her second, Fast 1 Leben. Czurda comes out of the Wiener Gruppe's experimental tradition. She is especially fond of letting repetition and permutation shift words through their whole gamut of meanings--and sometimes beyond. However, she is also not averse to thumbing her nose at any rigidities, even those of the experimental imperative. In ALMOST 1 LIFE (novella? politico-cultural satire?), the ruling avant-garde has licenced "monomania" as official...