Until the End of the World. The Metamorphosis of the Environment in Christoph Ransmayr’s «Fallmeister»

Abstract

This contribution addresses the question of the relationship between humanity and nature in Ransmayr’s works, starting with a recent novel entitled Der Fallmeister. Eine kurze Geschichte vom Töten (2021). At the centre of this novel is in fact not only the waterfall as a flow of water, but also the fall (Fall) that in the author’s dystopian design involves, or rather disrupts, humanity. According to Ransmayr, individual identity is inseparably connected to participation in the original structure of a mit-Dasein. This is why history (of one’s own community, one’s own city, one’s own state, one’s own continent) is not only behind the scenes, but is also in front of our eyes and does concern us.