Jelinek, Elfriede

(1946–)

   Born in Styria, Jelinek received wide-ranging aesthetic training as a student of fine arts, music, and theater history. Her mercilessly critical fiction and writing for the stage negate all possibility of moral values and altruistic action in human life. Although she has been strongly identified with women’s issues in her work—her The Pianist (Die Klavierspielerin, 1983) won international acclaim as a film in 2001—Jelinek has as much contempt for her own sex as for males. The sexual tensions that often underscore her work lead to little more than humiliation of all her protagonists. Her relentless cynicism is further underscored by prose in which she seemingly trivializes works from the German literary tradition, which she interfaces with strikingly dissonant materials found in popular culture. Tabloids, TV shows, and mass entertainment of all sorts are favorite targets. Jelinek won the Nobel Prize for literature in 2004.