Ein fehlerhaftes Manuskript. La lingua «ferita» di Brigitte Schwaiger in Fallen lassen

Abstract

Brigitte Schwaiger (1949-2010) achieved notable success in German-speaking countries and internationally with her 1977 novel Wie kommt das Salz ins Meer?, a success that led to her being regarded as one of Austria’s most prominent authors in the late 1970s and early 1980s. From the 1990s onwards, she experienced psychiatric disorders. In 2006, she published an autobiographical account entitled Fallen lassen, which describes her experiences in Austrian psychiatric facilities. This text was based on some accounts previously published in the “Spectrum” supplement of the Austrian daily newspaper “Die Presse”. The essay aims to identify the numerous anomalies in linguistic expression that characterise the volume (hardly classifiable as a novel or a reportage, but very much like a monologue). The analysis will address various elements of Brigitte Schwaiger’s language in Fallen lassen, initially focusing on syntax, followed by an examination of the lexicon and the collocations of specific key terms, and subsequently shifting to the text’s organisation and thematic development. The study will also draw upon a corpus of other texts by the author, beginning with the renowned 1977 novel Wie kommt das Salz ins Meer?, and in some cases the posthumous autobiography Wenn Gott tot ist, with the aim of highlighting differences and expressive affinities.