Patrick Suskind: biography of the screenwriter. Patrick Suskind - Biography - current and creative path

Patrick Suskind(German Patrick Suskind, born March 26 in Ambach) is a German writer and screenwriter.

Biography

Patrick Suskind was born in 1949 in Ambach, a German community near Munich, to the writer Wilhelm Emanuel Suskind. His mother was a sports coach and his older brother Martin is a journalist. Suskind has many relatives from the Württemberg aristocracy, thus being one of the descendants of the exegete Johann Albrecht Bengel and the Swabian reformer Johann Brenz. He studied at the school of the small Bavarian village of Holzhausen. Received musical education, studied history at the University of Munich. Later he studied in Aix-en-Provence (France), but never finished his studies. He changed many professions - he worked in the patent department of Siemens, as a pianist in dance hall, trainer for table tennis. Being in the care of his parents, Suskind moved to Paris and began to engage in writing. He wrote short stories, which were not published, and scripts, on which no one made a movie.

Success came in 1980, after the release of his first work, the one-act monologue "Contrabass". The novel "Perfume" was released, which became famous work author. In 2006, director Tom Tykwer made a film based on the novel, starring Ben Whishaw. To date, the work has been translated into more than 46 languages. In addition, Suskind wrote several screenplays.

Suskind leads a secluded life with no space for interviews or photo shoots.

Artworks

Year	Type	Russian name	original name
	drama	double bass	Der Kontrabass
	novel	Perfumer. The story of a killer	Das Parfum. Die Geschichte eines Mörders
		literary amnesia	Amnesie in litteris
	story	Dove	Die Taube
	story	The Tale of Herr Sommer	Die Geschichte von Herrn Sommer
	story	Craving for depth	Der Zwang zur Tiefe
	stories	Three stories and one observation	Drei Geschichten und eine Betrachtung
	screenplay	Rossini	Rossini
	essay	About love and death	Uber Liebe und Tod

Filmography

Theatrical performances

• - "Contrabass", Theater "Satyricon" named after Arkady Raikin; director Elena Nevezhina, performer - Konstantin Raikin
• - rock opera "Perfumer", theater "New Opera". Music by Igor Demarin, libretto by Yuri Rybchinsky

Double bass Moscow Art Theatre. Chekhov performer - K. Khabensky

Music

• The song "The Story of a Murderer" from the album "Phoenix" by the rock band "Aria" (2011)
• The song "Scentless Apprentice" from the album "In Utero" by the rock band Nirvana (1993)

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Notes

Literature

• Markin A. German literature XX century / / Encyclopedia for children: In 35 volumes - M., 2001 .- T. 15. Worldwide. lit. Ch. 2. XIX and XX. - S. 454-457;
• German literature after 1945 / / Foreign literature XX century / Ed. V. M. Tolmacheva.- M. .. 2003 .- S. 503-535.

Links

Patrick Suskind Novels Novels Stories and essays Drama double bass (1981) Scenarios Ordinary insanity(1979) Monaco Franze(1981–1983) Kir Royal (Fernsehserie)(1985) Rossini, or The Killing Question of Who Slept With Whom(1997) Looking for love(2005)

An excerpt characterizing Suskind, Patrick

“But this, brothers, is another fire,” said the batman.
Everyone turned their attention to the glow.
- Why, they said, Mamonov Cossacks lit Maly Mytishchi.
- They! No, this is not Mytishchi, it is far away.
“Look, it’s definitely in Moscow.
Two of the men stepped off the porch, went behind the carriage, and sat down on the footboard.
- It's left! Well, Mytishchi is over there, and this is completely on the other side.
Several people joined the first.
- Look, it's blazing, - said one, - this, gentlemen, is a fire in Moscow: either in Sushchevskaya or in Rogozhskaya.
Nobody responded to this remark. And for a long time all these people silently looked at the distant flames of a new fire.
The old man, the count's valet (as he was called), Danilo Terentyich, went up to the crowd and called out to Mishka.
- You didn’t see anything, slut ... The count will ask, but there is no one; go get your dress.
- Yes, I just ran for water, - said Mishka.
- And what do you think, Danilo Terentyich, it's like a glow in Moscow? one of the footmen said.
Danilo Terentyich made no answer, and again everyone was silent for a long time. The glow spread and swayed further and further.
“God have mercy! .. wind and dry land ...” the voice said again.
- Look how it went. Oh my God! you can see the jackdaws. Lord, have mercy on us sinners!
- They'll put it out.
- Who to put out then? came the voice of Danila Terentyich, who had been silent until now. His voice was calm and slow. “Moscow is indeed, brothers,” he said, “she is the mother of the squirrel…” His voice broke off, and he suddenly let out an old sob. And as if everyone was just waiting for this in order to understand the meaning that this visible glow had for them. There were sighs, words of prayer, and the sobbing of the old count's valet.

The valet, returning, reported to the count that Moscow was on fire. The count put on his dressing-gown and went out to have a look. Sonya, who had not yet undressed, and Madame Schoss came out with him. Natasha and the countess were alone in the room. (Petya was no longer with the family; he went ahead with his regiment, marching to Trinity.)
The Countess wept when she heard the news of the fire in Moscow. Natasha, pale, with fixed eyes, sitting under the icons on the bench (in the very place where she sat down when she arrived), did not pay any attention to her father's words. She listened to the incessant groan of the adjutant, heard through three houses.
- Oh, what a horror! - said, come back from the yard, cold and frightened Sonya. - I think all of Moscow will burn, a terrible glow! Natasha, look now, you can see it from the window from here, ”she said to her sister, apparently wanting to entertain her with something. But Natasha looked at her, as if not understanding what she was being asked, and again stared with her eyes at the corner of the stove. Natasha has been in this state of tetanus since this morning, from the very time that Sonya, to the surprise and annoyance of the countess, for no reason at all, found it necessary to announce to Natasha about the wound of Prince Andrei and about his presence with them on the train. The countess was angry with Sonya, as she rarely got angry. Sonya cried and asked for forgiveness, and now, as if trying to make amends for her guilt, she did not stop caring for her sister.
“Look, Natasha, how terribly it burns,” said Sonya.
- What is on fire? Natasha asked. – Oh, yes, Moscow.
And as if in order not to offend Sonya by her refusal and to get rid of her, she moved her head to the window, looked so that she obviously could not see anything, and again sat down in her former position.
- Didn't you see it?
“No, really, I saw it,” she said in a pleading voice.
Both the countess and Sonya understood that Moscow, the fire of Moscow, whatever it was, of course, could not matter to Natasha.
The count again went behind the partition and lay down. The countess went up to Natasha, touched her head with her upturned hand, as she did when her daughter was sick, then touched her forehead with her lips, as if to find out if there was a fever, and kissed her.
- You are cold. You're all trembling. You should go to bed,” she said.
- Lie down? Yes, okay, I'll go to bed. I'm going to bed now, - said Natasha.
Since Natasha was told this morning that Prince Andrei was seriously wounded and was traveling with them, she only in the first minute asked a lot about where? How? is he dangerously injured? and can she see him? But after she was told that she was not allowed to see him, that he was seriously injured, but that his life was not in danger, she obviously did not believe what she was told, but convinced that no matter how much she said, she would be answer the same thing, stopped asking and talking. All the way with big eyes which the countess knew so well and whose expressions the countess was so afraid of, Natasha sat motionless in the corner of the carriage and was now sitting in the same way on the bench on which she sat down. She was thinking about something, something she was deciding or had already decided in her mind now - the countess knew this, but what it was, she did not know, and this frightened and tormented her.

Suskind found world fame thanks to his novel Perfume: The Story of a Murderer, first published in 1985.

Patrick Suskind was born on March 26, 1949, next to Lake Starnberg (Starnberger See), in the German community of Ambrach, near Munich (Munich, Germany). He attended school in Holzhausen, a small Bavarian village.

His father was the writer, journalist and translator Wilhelm Emanuel Süskind. Wilhelm worked for the largest German daily newspaper, the Süddeutsche Zeitung. He co-authored a well-known collection of critical essays, "Aus dem Wörterbuch des Unmenschen" ("From the Dictionary of an Inhuman"), written in the language of the Nazi era.

Patrick's mother worked as a sports coach; his older brother Martin Suskind became a journalist. Suskind's pedigree contains many representatives of the aristocracy from Württemberg, which makes the writer one of the descendants of the founder of New Testament textology, the exegete Johann Albrecht Bengel and the Swabian reformer Johannes Brenz.

Having received a certificate of secondary education and passing an alternative civil service, Suskind began to study medieval and modern history at the University of Munich and Aix-en-Provence in France (Aix-en-Provence, France). The study lasted from 1968 to 1974, but Patrick never received a diploma.

Relying on the financial support of his parents, Suskind moved to Paris (Paris), where he wrote, "for the most part, short and unpublished literary works and long scripts that never made it into films."

In 1981, Suskind's career had a breakthrough - with the release of his play, a one-act monologue "Der Kontrabaß" / "The Double Bass", originally conceived as

radio play. During the theatrical season 1984-1985. the play has been played over 500 times.

The main and only star of "Contrabass" was a tragicomedic orchestral musician who had a lot of problems with his instrument and a sense of his own insignificance. Due to his difficult situation, the monologue's hero becomes a victim of relentless fatalism.

In the 1980s, Patrick also achieved success as a screenwriter for television productions such as "Monaco Franze" in 1982 and "Kir Royal" in 1987. For the screenplay for Helmut Dietl's chamber tragicomedy "Rossini", Suskind won the screenplay award of the Department of German Culture in 1996.

The most notable work German writer- The novel "Perfumer: The Story of a Murderer", which became an international bestseller. This work was filmed in 2006 by Tom Tykwer; leading role Performed by Benjamin Whishaw in the film.

Perfumer: The Story of a Murderer remained on the bestseller list of the German weekly Der Spiegel for nine years.

Suskind wrote the novel "The Pigeon", about a day in the life of " little man", in 1987. His next work, "The Story of Mr. Sommer" ("The Story of Mr. Sommer"), was born in 1991. Following this, in 1996, a collection of stories "Three stories and one observation" ("Three Stories and a Reflection"), and in 2006 - a collection of essays "On Love and Death" ("On Love and Death").

Suskind prefers to lead a reclusive life in Munich, on Lake Starnberg and in France. Very little is known about his personal life to the public. He has declined the honors of the German literary scene and has never given interviews or allowed himself to be photographed.

- 38.94 Kb

The second son of the publicist Wilhelm Emmanuel Süskind, he grew up in the Bavarian town of Holzhausen, where he first visited village school and then high school. After graduating from school and doing alternative military service, Suskind began studying history in Munich and earning money from any job that came to hand. For one year, Suskind attended the lectures of "Aix-En-Provonce" and improved his knowledge of French and French culture. After that, he earned money by writing scripts.

Together with director Helmut Dietl, scripts were written for two successful television films"Kir Royale and Franz Monaco" and "Rossini, or The Question of Who Slept With Whom".

Süskind's first success on the theater stage came with the writing of "Contrabass" (1980). Five years later (1985) with "Perfumer" Süskind comes to worldwide success.

Following the phenomenal success of the novel "Perfumer", new, no less significant books "Dove. Three Stories and One Observation" (1987) and "The Story of Herr Sommer" (1991) appear.

Gradually, Patrick Suskind becomes a famous playwright, prose writer and screenwriter. His anti-heroes have one common feature, namely: difficulties in life search and in communication with other people. They are "special", that is, they prefer to hide from the dangerous world in small rooms. Suskind had not only a natural inclination towards literary creativity, but also a genetic predisposition: his father was familiar with the family of Thomas Mann, wrote literary texts and worked for various newspapers, the last being the Sueddeutsche Zeitung. Patrick Suskind's father was known for his hospitality and for his "tea parties" at which the young Suskind had to present his art of playing the piano.

In general, musical education played, apparently, an important role in the development of the boy and left traumatic memories. Not only the work-monologue "Double bass", but also the autobiographical "History of Mr. Sommer" give an idea of ​​​​such an unpleasant experience in his life. If Patrick Suskind in his works again and again returns to the themes of art, the formation of a genius and his collapse, then there is an assumption that, just like his early experience of failure in art, the protest against his father was reflected in his books.

In general, Patrick Suskind talked a lot about himself. All six volumes of prose and five volumes of scripts are written mainly about himself. The heroes of his compositions, whether it be the klutz-musician from the play "Double bass" or the dull "Mr. Sommer" from the short story of the same name, or the timid Jakob Windisch from the film "Rossini". These heroes (or rather, anti-heroes), if not twins, then at least brothers.

When Suskind in "The Story of Herr Sommer" gives the right to vote to the protagonist, who says the famous "Leave me alone, finally!", it becomes clear that this is said just as sincerely by the author himself. Suskind once characterized his writing as a rejection of the "merciless compulsion to depth" that requires literary criticism. Suskind also showed his attitude towards his most successful novel, The Perfume. “Writing a novel like this is terrible. I don't think I'll do it again," he admitted in 1985.

It is known that Patrick Suskind lives somewhere between Munich and Paris. Due to his secretive lifestyle and persistence in declining offers of interviews and official statements for his works, the press calls him the "Phantom of German entertainment literature." He is said to have a son and a wife, a publisher. in the only big interview he promised to tell about himself in 2019 - by the 70th anniversary. "

Writer's Awards

1986 - in France, Suskind was awarded the "Best Debut" award, which he refused.
1987 - World Fantasy Award (World Fantasy Award) for the novel "Perfumer"
For the script for the film "Rossini ...", the writer received an award from the German Ministry of the Interior. It was the only award he accepted.

Bibliography

1985 - Perfumer. The story of a murderer / Das Parfum - Die Geschichte eines Mörders

1987 - Dove (Dove) / Die Taube
1991 - The Tale of Mr. Sommer (The Story of Mr. Sommer) / Die Geschichte von Herrn Sommer

stories

1995 - Literary amnesia / Amnesie in litteries
1995 - Testament of Master Mussard / Das Vermächtnis des Maître Mussard
1995 - Craving for depth / Der Zwang zur Tiefe
1995 - Battle (Duel) / Ein Kampf

1981 - Double bass / Der Kontrabass

Screenplays

1980 - Der ganz normale Wahnsinn
1982 - Monaco Franze
1986 - Kir Royal
1997 - Rossini / Rossini
2005 - About the search for love / Vom Suchen und Finden der Liebe

1997 - Cinema is war, my friend! / Film ist Krieg, mein Freund!
2006 - About love and death / Über Liebe und Tod

Collections

1995 - Three stories and one observation / Drei Geschichten

"Contrabass".

This is a monologue play. There is a man on the stage and he speaks, addressing the audience - that's right, it's not internal monologue, a person speaks to the listener, even an imaginary one, he pronounces to him.
He is a double bass player serving in the state orchestra. This is a favorite job. He loves classical music and is happy to serve it, he is well versed both in it and in the history of his instrument. He treats the double bass with mixed feelings: he proudly says that no music is possible without basses, that he is the most main man in the orchestra, but is also indignant that a solo is impossible on the double bass, because a solitary double bass sounds so ugly!

In fact, his dream of a solo is connected, among other things, with the fact that he dreams of a girl who sings in an opera, a mezzo-soprano. After the concert, she is taken to expensive restaurants by aging tenors, and he searched through the entire music library and found that there are two arias for mezzo-soprano accompanied by a double bass in the world - so his chances of meeting her through music with good accuracy are zero. And in the orchestra, he is as invisible as possible.
He hates his instrument for getting between him and the singer.

"Dove".

Jonathan Noel, that is the name of the protagonist, survived the Nazi occupation as a child, his mother and father were sent to the camp, where they died, and the boy and his sister were hidden with relatives in the south of France.
At the time of the story, Noel works as a janitor at a bank. This dullness, boredom, regularity, lack of aspirations convey the deep tragedy of the loneliness of a person in the post-war period.
Noel, whose name, through an ironic paraphrase, resurrects the name of the holy elder Mael from the novel by A. Frans "Penguin Island", was convinced of own experience that "you can not rely on people, you should stay away from them." He belongs to the type of "little people", which are numerous in world literature.

Noel closed himself in a seven-meter room on the seventh floor, this is his case, almost impenetrable protection from the world. The hero evokes compassion: he is ridiculous, extremely sensitive, unable to adapt. The hero is shaken to the core by a dove that suddenly appeared on the threshold of his room, it destroys his familiar world, deprives him of the shell, stability, and confidence. Over the years, he has transformed his apartment into a citadel of solitude, housing all the trappings of civilized life, from a microscopic refrigerator to a library of seventeen books. He is happy - no one knows him, except for the concierge, his life is clear for many years to come, he is healthy as a bull and financially secure.

The thought that a creature that shits, drops feathers and can inadvertently peck will live under the same roof with him terrifies him. He runs away from home, rents a hotel room, calculates how much he has enough savings so as not to return to the house that has ceased to be a fortress. As luck would have it, it was on this day that several other minor troubles happened to him, finally finishing him off and turning him into a trembling creature by the end of the day.

"The Tale of Herr Sommer"

we are talking about a strange old man who was known as Herr Sommer by the inhabitants of one locality forty years ago, when the narrator was still a child.
This individual did not communicate with anyone, all the time being on an endless aimless walk. Let's say he could walk from the village to the city, turn around on the spot and go back. He didn't go anywhere, he didn't make any purchases, he didn't do anything at all. Neighbors suspected he was claustrophobic. At first they tried to ask him where he was in such a hurry, but then they fell behind. The only intelligible phrase that Mr. Sommer has been pulled out over the years is "Ah, leave me alone at last!"

In addition to the story of Mr. Sommer, another story develops in the story - about growing up, the joys and sorrows of the little protagonist. These are funny and touching episodes from childhood - about mastering the piano, about falling in love for the first time, about taming a bicycle. But there is also a completely not funny memory - about how the main character finally left Mr. Sommer alone.

This tale, if published correctly, is accompanied by color illustrations by Jean-Jacques Sempé. Suskind himself believes that it is worth publishing this book only with these illustrations.

It is easy to see that there are similarities between the main characters of all three Suskind's stories. They are all sociophobes.
The double bass player is still nothing like that, still relatively young and works in a team with which, sometimes, he kicks himself in the trash after unsuccessful concerts. But all the same, you have to be fairly unsociable to live alone in a soundproof room and talk either with a double bass or with an imaginary audience.
Jonathan Noel, who suffered from a dove, is already an unhealthy misanthrope, moreover, suffering from phobias.
Herr Sommer is not just a misanthrope, he is also an idler. No one will ask stupid questions to the porter: why is he alone, and why does he not talk to anyone. A man in service, implying the silence of the sphinx. And Sommer, in his long useless life, was tired of such questions. Now he is always on the road, that is, in business. Do not pester a man who is in a hurry from point A to point B, do not call him for tea, do not be interested in the health of his wife. You see, he has no time for you. A bad legend, but life also ends, and such a thing will do for the rest of it.

"Perfumer. The Story of a Murderer.

In 1985, Patrick Suskind's novel Perfumer. The Story of a Murderer. The translation of the novel's title is controversial. In the original, it is called "Das Parfum", that is, "Fragrance" or "Perfume". This novel is interesting in that “for the first time it tells about that side of human existence, which, in principle, cannot be verbalized. About that of the five human organic senses, which is always called the last in a row - about smell "

At first, the novel was perceived rather coolly in German philological circles, and only a few years later critical articles and works about it began to appear. The statements of reviewers and literary critics about the novel are striking in the polarity of assessments: from “kitsch” and “epigonism”, “artificial mixing of styles and motifs” to “reader shock”, “phenomenal design” and “ happy occasion in German literature.

The attention of those who wrote about the novel "Perfume" was mainly focused on determining the place of the novel in world literature, defining it as a work of postmodern literature, and in this way unraveling all the mysteries laid down by the author in the novel.

When reading the novel, of course, one is struck by the abundance different plans in the plot of the novel. It closely intertwines the historical realities of the eve of the French Revolution; the reader also naturally has to rethink what meaning in human life smell plays.

For this work, Suskind traveled around the scenes of the novel, delved into the secrets of perfumery at Fragonard, and, above all, studied a large number of literary and cultural sources, which he subsequently used in abundance in the novel

The Age of Enlightenment and all its cultural heritage plays an extremely important role in the novel. The life of Jean-Baptiste Grenouille, who was born on July 17, 1738, falls on the heyday of the ideas of the Enlightenment. It is the enlighteners who believe that a genius cannot use his skill for evil, and education and training lead to virtue.

By the way, all of the above casts doubt on the attribution of Suskind's novel to the literature of postmodernism, in the context of which it is customary to consider this book. Since postmodernism fundamentally cannot contain any evaluation or criticism in its texts, the philosophical background of this work, which poses the problem of the ethics of genius (and solves it in its own way) and contains criticism of the ideology of the Enlightenment, is palpably alien to the spirit and letter of postmodernism. And, of course, it is accessible, first of all, to the understanding of a cultured reader.

The novel was published with a total circulation of more than fifteen million, translated into forty-five languages, including Latin, and finally filmed.

The search for the protagonist of the novel "Perfumer"

Born in a world where ideas about Good and Evil are blurred, he himself did not know love, it is her - Love, as it seems to us, that the protagonist of the novel is trying to find. And the whole path of Grenouille is the path to Love.

Süskind throughout the book compares Grenouille to a tick that completely withdraws into itself and is only waiting for someone to pass under it to cling to and drink that very drop of blood that he has dreamed of all his life.

In the future, a new discovery occurs: Grenouille understood the reason for his alienation from the world. The point, as it turned out, was not at all in his phenomenal sense of smell, but in the absence of a smell on his body, his own smell. Returning to the world of people, Grenouille creates perfumes that have the smell of the human body. Grenouille intuitively comes to the fact that he finds a mechanism for manipulating people, their consciousness, life itself, and the smells, designed by him with devilish coldness, become universal master keys to human souls. Grenouille understood the mechanism of what people call love, he realized that with the help of smell he was able to manipulate the feelings of others, but for him such love of the world has no value. He wanted to be loved all the same himself, and not his skill as a talented perfumer. The suicide of the protagonist is a consequence of his own loneliness in this world, which rejects him from birth, and at the same time an unconscious act of love for the world, sacrificing himself, which, in fact, is love. So the novel responds to eternal question in the history of mankind about the meaning of human life.

Screen adaptation.

The latest surge of interest in Grenouille is due to the accurate adaptation of Tom Tykwer, who turned the story of a maniac into a hymn to the creator. Main character the film, unlike the novel prototype, is not too ugly, but, unlike the writer who invented the killer perfumer, the director is more of a sympathetic observer.

For ten years, German producer Bernd Eichinger persuaded Süskind to sell the film rights. Suskind himself saw only Stanley Kubrick as the director of the adaptation of Perfume. After the director's death in March 1999, Suskind stated through his agent that he no longer cared who made the film.

Patrick Suskind agreed when it became pointless to refuse and on the condition that he would not participate in the filming process. "Perfumer" turned out to be one of the most successful projects of Bernd Eichinger (comparable, perhaps, only with the film adaptation of "The Name of the Rose" - another masterpiece of postmodernism). At the premiere of the film, Patrick Suskind did not appear.

Description of work

Patrick Suskind was born on March 26, 1949 in Ambach near Lake Starnberg.
The second son of the publicist Wilhelm Emmanuel Suskind, he grew up in the Bavarian town of Holzhausen, where he first attended a village school and then a gymnasium. After graduating from school and doing alternative military service, Suskind began studying history in Munich and earning money from any job that came to hand.

Suskind Patrick (German: Patrick Süskind, born March 26, 1949 in Ambach) is a German writer and screenwriter.

Born in 1949 in the family of the writer Wilhelm Emanuel Suskind. He received a musical education, studied history at the University of Munich. Later he studied in Aix-en-Provence (France). He changed many professions - he worked in the patent department of Siemens, as a pianist in a dance hall, and as a table tennis coach.

There is no such human fantasy that reality would not surpass effortlessly.

Suskind Patrick

First success on theater stage Syuskindu came with the writing of "Contrabass". Five years later (1985) with "Perfume" Suskind comes to world success. For this work, Suskind traveled around the scenes of the novel, delved into the secrets of perfumery at Fragonard, and, above all, studied a large number of literary and cultural sources, which he subsequently used in abundance in the novel. "Perfumer" saw the light for the first time thanks to the publishing house "Diogenes".

This was followed by the short stories The Dove (1987) and The Story of Herr Sommer (1991). Patrick Suskind becomes equally successful as a playwright, novelist and screenwriter. His (anti-) heroes have one thing in common, namely the difficulty of finding their place in the world and in communicating with other people. They are "special", and prefer to hide from the dangerously perceived world in small rooms. Suskind was predisposed to literature. His father was familiar with the Thomas Mann family. He wrote literary texts and worked for various newspapers, the last being the Süddeutsche Zeitung. Patrick Suskind's father led a respectable life and was known for his hospitality and his "tea parties", at which the young Suskind had to present his art of playing the piano.

In general, musical education played, apparently, an important role in the development of the boy and left traumatic memories. Not only the work-monologue "Double bass", but also the autobiographical "History of Mr. Sommer" give an idea of ​​​​such an unpleasant experience in his life. If Patrick Suskind in his works again and again returns to the themes of art, the formation of a genius and his collapse, then the assumption arises that, just like his early experience failures in art, and protest against his father were reflected in his books. His novel The Perfume finally established Suskind in 1985 as one of the most famous and successful writers of contemporary German literature.

People smell vulgar and miserable.

Suskind Patrick

When Suskind in "The Story of Herr Sommer" gives the right to vote to the protagonist, who says the famous "Leave me alone, finally!", it becomes clear that this is said just as sincerely by the author himself. Suskind once described his writing as a rejection of the "merciless compulsion to profundity" that literary criticism requires. Suskind also showed his attitude towards his most successful novel, The Perfume. “Writing a novel like this is terrible. I don't think I'll do it again," he admitted in 1985. His modesty and secrecy are fundamental. They reflect a deep distrust of the reckoning of the artist to the saints.

Patrick Suskind photo

Patrick Suskind - quotes

Loneliness is the worst thing that can happen to a person. And it doesn't matter who this person is, a poor man or a rich man, a simpleton or a sly one, a fool or a genius. Loneliness does not knock and does not wait to be opened, it has the keys to all doors...

Patrick Suskind is a German writer and screenwriter.

Born in 1949 in the family of the writer Wilhelm Emanuel Suskind. He received a musical education, studied history at the University of Munich. Later he studied in Aix-en-Provence (France). He changed many professions - he worked in the patent department of Siemens, as a pianist in a dance hall, and as a table tennis coach.

Success came after the release of his first work, the one-act monologue "Contrabass". In 1985, the novel "Perfumer" was published, which became the most famous work of the author. To date, the work has been translated into more than 20 languages. In addition, Suskind wrote several screenplays.

Books (4)

double bass

The play "Double bass" is the first work of the outstanding German writer Patrick Suskind.

After the premiere in Munich, it became one of the most popular in Europe. Although Patrick Süskind himself plays the piano rather than the double bass, he managed to create “what no other composer has yet written: a melancholic work for double bass alone” (Dieter Schnabel).

In the one-act monologue "Double Bass", written in 1980, Suskind brilliantly portrays the image of an "outsider, mentally unbalanced individual" (Wolfram Knorr), who, nevertheless, almost immediately wins the sympathy of readers. This is due to three features of Suskind's brilliant style as a writer: his "humor, almost contraband enjoyment of language, and Chekhov-like weakness for losers and loners" (Marcel Reich-Ranitsky).

Perfumer. The story of a killer

Perfumer Suskind was published in Switzerland in 1985, translated into dozens of languages ​​and has taken a firm place among the world's bestsellers. This misterious story, a romantic detective story will excite, attract and intrigue readers and critics for a long time to come.

The fate of the novel is unique. Over the past years, it has been translated into 33 languages, published in more than a million copies, becoming a reference book for readers in Germany, England, France, Italy, the USA, and now in Russia. For more than eight years, more precisely, 439 weeks, the novel was on the bestseller list. And today, the victorious procession of Jean-Baptiste Grenouille - the magnificent all-conquering monster - continues.

The Tale of Herr Sommer

The Tale of Herr Sommer is a very strange and sad story.

Mr. Sommer himself is also strange, who in the story utters only one phrase: “Leave me alone at last!” His fate is tragic... However, it is precisely in this work by Patrick Suskind that lyrical intonations clearly sound. The writer tells his story from the point of view of a teenager whose inner world conveys with undisguised tenderness and light irony. The drawings of the artist Jean-Jacques Sempe perfectly complement the author's text. They are full of humor, naive and touching.

Suskind believes that it should be published only with these drawings.

Reader Comments

Julia/ 06/17/2015 Perfumer lamented, although I had watched the film before, I liked it very much, it is read in one breath. No wonder the book conveys more than the movie. I want to read all the books of P. Suskind, I think it will not disappoint.👍🏻

Azoryu/ 07/04/2014 Syuskind's "Perfume" is an incomparable work! The main thing is to understand that the thinking reader is fascinated not by a perverted killer and a genius at the same time, but by the philological skills of the author, the colorfulness of the recreated era, household trifles, SMELLS, etc.)))

arum moiseevich savchenko/ 04/19/2014 Doctor, why are they like that capital letters and so categorically?
Can a doctor be an asshole?

Olya/ 2.08.2012 super books! I read with pleasure!) no films at all. READ BOOKS!

Guest/ 11/14/2011 I love the works of this writer very much!!! my favorite!!! I read his books in one breath!!! I advise everyone!!! I want to disagree: the book better than the movie 100%

Lord/ 06/27/2011 The author just hit the nail on the head. The story is just supper, unforgettable impressions!

Mila/ 05/04/2011 To appreciate the works of P. Suskind, you need to read them in the original in German, then the impression will be complete. Suskind is a virtuoso of words, a subtle humorist, a philosopher, a master of depiction in a word, he knows how to twist the plot and captivate, so a philologist, poet, artist, romantic nature will understand and immediately fall in love with him, but he will not be understood by a boring, one-dimensional pragmatist. Suskind deserves a literary prize and even a Nobel Prize. Having started reading his work, it is impossible to stop until you have read it to the end. Watch the play "Contrabass" performed by K. Raikin for those who cannot read and understand Suskind. Great actor will open your eyes to the work of this author.