Robert Menasse

The Life Decision

A Novella
U1 for The Life Decision
Suhrkamp | Insel
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Domestic rights sales: German Audiobook (DAV)

Fiction
Robert Menasse
The Life Decision / Die Lebensentscheidung
A Novella
Robert Menasse's striking novella about life and death, love and family
Frustrated at being a small cog in a big wheel, Franz Fiala makes a »life decision« and quits his job at the European Commission. When he visits his mother in Vienna for her 89th birthday, however, he keeps his early retirement a secret. And his conversation with Nathalie, with whom he has been in a relationship in Brussels for four years, about their shared future also goes off the rails. Then he starts being plagued by recurring pains that he can no longer ignore. The diagnosis: cancer,...
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Frustrated at being a small cog in a big wheel, Franz Fiala makes a »life decision« and quits his job at the European Commission. When he visits his mother in Vienna for her 89th birthday, however, he keeps his early retirement a secret. And his conversation with Nathalie, with whom he has been in a relationship in Brussels for four years, about their shared future also goes off the rails. Then he starts being plagued by recurring pains that he can no longer ignore. The diagnosis: cancer, unlikely he will live another year. And suddenly, his only focus is deceiving his mother, sparing her the pain of seeing her son die: »For him, surviving could only mean surviving his mother. To conceal his illness from her until her death. It was now a competition of survival. That was now the life decision.«

Is it possible to decide on one’s own life? Not about the end, but to consciously decide to continue living, for longer than expected? An existential tour de force told with a surprisingly light touch, Robert Menasse’s The Life Decision tells of a struggle with death. Living and dying, love and family, that’s what is at stake in this sophisticated and skilful novella.
2026, 158 pages
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Fiction

Persons

Robert Menasse

Author

Robert Menasse was born in Vienna in 1954. He studied German philology, philosophy and political science in Vienna, Salzburg and Messina and received his PhD in 1980 with a thesis on the character of the outsider in literature. Menasse then spent six years teaching at the University of São Paulo, returning to Vienna in 1988, where he has since been based. Menasse has published some 18 books with Suhrkamp, which have been translated into more than 25 languages. He has won numerous awards for his work, including the German Book Prize in 2017 for Die Hauptstadt, and the European Book Prize in 2023 for Die Erweiterung.

Robert Menasse was born in Vienna in 1954. He studied German philology, philosophy and political science in Vienna, Salzburg and Messina and...

© Rafaela Proell

OTHER PUBLICATIONS

Latest first
The World of Tomorrow
Year of Publication: 2024
Robert MenasseYear of Publication: 2024

The World of Tomorrow

In The World of Yesterday, Stefan Zweig depicted the cosmopolitan Europe he had lived in prior to 1914. By the time he put his memories on paper, though, this world no longer existed, having been...
Rights sold to:

Portuguese rights (Gradiva), France (Verdier)

Enlargement
Year of Publication: 2022
Robert MenasseYear of Publication: 2022

Enlargement

2019 – membership negotiations between the European Union and the Western Balkan countries have come to a standstill; France and the Netherlands have put in a veto. This has toppled many a...

Rights sold to:

France (Verdier), Italy (Sellerio), Netherlands (Arbeiderspers), Hungary (Geopen), Slovenia (Mladinska Knjiga), Albania (Dudaj), Montenegro (ZUNS)

Domestic Rights Sales: German Audiobook (Hörverlag)

The Capital
Year of Publication: 2017
Robert MenasseYear of Publication: 2017

The Capital

Brussels. A panorama of tragic heroes, manipulative losers, involuntary accomplices. In his new novel, Robert Menasse spans a narrative arc between the times, the nations, the inevitable...

Rights sold to:

UK & Commonwealth (MacLehose Press), USA & Canada (W.W.Norton/Liveright), Spanish world rights (Seix Barral), Chinese simplex rights (People's Literature Publishing House), Russia (Text), Portuguese rights (Dom Quixote), Arabic world rights (AFAQ), France (Verdier), Italy (Sellerio), Netherlands (Arbeiderspers), Denmark (Vandkunsten) Sweden (Weyler), Japan (Hosei UP), Poland (Noir sur Blanc), Czech Republic (Plus), Hungary (Geopen), Bulgaria (Lege Artis), Lithuania (Tyto Alba), Croatia (Fraktura), Serbia (Arhipelag), Slovenia (Cankarjeva založba), Greece (Patakis), Albania (Dudaj), Georgia (Intelekti), Armenia (Antares), India/Hindi (Saar Sansaar)

Domestic Rights Sales: German Audiobook (Der Hörverlag), German Book Club (Büchergilde Gutenberg)

Previously published in the respective language/territory; rights available again: Chinese complex rights (Linking), Turkey (Everest)

Anyone Can Say »I«
Year of Publication: 2009
Robert MenasseYear of Publication: 2009

Anyone Can Say »I«

History repeats itself. Memories as well. When did the post-war order come to an end? When did the wall fell? A young pair who spent their wedding night watching TV will remember November 9, 1989...
Rights sold to:

Netherlands (de Arbeiderspers), Hindi (Aryan)

Previously published in the respective language / territory; rights available again: English world rights (Ariadne), France (Jacqueline Chambon), Bulgaria (Lege Artis)

Don Juan de La Mancha or the Education of Lust
Year of Publication: 2007
Robert MenasseYear of Publication: 2007

Don Juan de La Mancha or the Education of Lust

»You can only be happy with your first woman or with your last« announces Nathan's father, thus summarizing the seducer's dilemma.

  Nathan too is a seducer, albeit...
Rights sold to:

France (Verdier), Latvia (Jumava), Serbia (Karpos), Hindi (Vani)

Previously published in the respective language / territory; rights available again: English world rights (Alma Books/Calder Publications), Spanish world rights (Alianza), Italy (Scritturapura), Netherlands (de Arbeiderspers), Slovakia (Kalligram), Hungary (Kalligram), Bulgaria (Lege Artis), Lithuania (Pasvires Pasaulis)

Domestic Rights Sales: German Audiobook (Lindhardt & Ringhof / Saga Egmont)
Expulsion from Hell
Year of Publication: 2001
Robert MenasseYear of Publication: 2001

Expulsion from Hell

During a school reunion, 25 years after graduating from highschool, Viktor confronts his former fellow pupils with their teachers’ Nazi past. The result is real row, and the reunion evening...
Rights sold to:

Previously published in the respective language / territory; rights available again: Spanish world rights (Alianza), Russia (Text), France (Verdier), Portugal (Ulisseia), France (Verdier), Netherlands (Arbeiderspers), Norway (Aschehoug), Czech Republic (Academia), Hungary (Ulpius Ház), Bulgaria (Lege Artis), Slovenia (Cankarjeva založba), Greece (Polis)

Wings of Stone
Year of Publication: 1994
Robert MenasseYear of Publication: 1994

Wings of Stone

Leo Singer, a philosophy student and son of Jewish parents who emigrated to Brazil during the Nazi era, returns to Vienna with his parents in the early 1960s.

He falls in love with...

Rights sold to:

Previously published in the respective language / territory; rights available again: English world rights (Calder), Spanish world rights (Alianza), Russia (Fantakt), France (Verdier), Netherlands (Arbeiderspers), Poland (PIW), Czech Republic (Vlasty Brtnikove), Hungary (Jelenkor), Slovak Republic (Kalligram), Bulgaria (Lege Artis), Serbia (Stubowi Kulture)