When Austrian writer Elfriede Jelinek won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2004, the reaction among her compatriots was not what might have been expected. There was dismay and anger as well as celebration. Jelinek’s novels and plays touched on subject matter which made many Austrians very uncomfortable – the country’s anti-Semitic tradition, the Nazi skeletons still rattling in the closet, the oppression of women, the sexual neuroses of the Austrians and the dark side of consumer capitalism.
Jelinek was so stung by the criticism she received after what should have been her moment of greatest triumph that she stopped giving interviews. Nonetheless, she is supporting German director Claudia Müller’s new film about her, Elfriede Jelinek – Language Unleashed, which screens in International Competition in DocLisboa this week.
“First of all, I have to say she influenced me from my youth onwards. I read a lot of her books. She deals with very universal subjects, not only Austrian subjects,” Müller reflects on her own interest in Jelinek. “Of course, she is very well known in Germany too.”
Berlin-based Müller had made an earlier film about avant-garde Austrian performance artist Valie Export, Icon And Rebel(2015) She saw Jelinek as someone with a similar radicalism and originality.
Before she won her Nobel prize, Jelinek gave a lot of highly provocative interviews to Austrian TV. Müller drew heavily on this material. “In the beginning, I started on my own because I wanted to do a documentary on her work, not her biography,” the director explains. In this footage, Jelinek is often very outspoken. “She was always driven by rage, especially in her younger years,” the director says of her.
Müller has remained in constant contact with her subject, speaking to her on the phone, sending her emails and sometimes meeting her. However, she decided not to film Jelinek. “I wanted to have her work and thoughts at the centre. It was not so important for me to have her on camera.”
Even so, the old footage makes it seem as if this is Jelinek telling her story in her own voice. The novelist is from a Jewish-Catholic background – and so has an unusual vantage point on Austrian politics and culture. Born in 1946, she grew up in the aftermath of the war, when many in the society were desperately trying to cover their traces and hide their links with Hitler. Trained as a pianist, Jelinek has formidable discipline and a very strong work ethic. At the same time, she was strongly influenced by Beat culture.
“In Austria, so many people know her and a lot of people really hate her because she is so openly speaking about political things happening in this country. She has a lot of enemies,” the director points out how sharply the author of novels like The Piano Teacher, Lust and Envy has split opinion. “When I started the research, I was overwhelmed with all the literature about her. That was just crazy. I thought, ‘Oh my god, how can I do this when there are so many opinions about her?’ I thought it was best if she speaks for herself. [So] I have this interview montage.”
Müller spent two years preparing the film. There were “tons of material” to consult, radio as well as TV interviews and enormous amounts of newspaper coverage.
From her own encounters with the author, the director believes that Jelinek has been stung by the personal attacks and criticism she has received. “But she is also very strong, a strong artist.”
One of the novelist’s fiercest detractors was the right wing leader Jörg Haider who died after a car crash in 2008. Haider rarely missed an opportunity to taunt or attack Jelinek. “But it was not just him. It was the whole public opinion.” Even today, newspapers come after her and the public taunts her. At the same time, among young artists and ”theatre people,” Jelinek is revered and considered inspirational.
One of the author’s most unpopular decisions was to go after Paula Wessely, a much-loved Austrian actress who didn’t like to talk about the Nazi-backed movie
s in which she had appeared. Jelinek reminded Austrians that Wessely’s links with the Third Reich were uncomfortably close. Müller was filming in the Burgtheater in Vienna and couldn’t help but notice that there was still a huge portrait of Wessely hanging in a prime position. “She [Jelinek] was hated for writing about that [Wessely’s Nazi connections]. That was a huge scandal.”
In Germany, Jelinek is regarded in a far less controversial light. She is admired and respected. Her plays are frequently staged and her novels sell well. It’s only in her native Austria that she really gets under the skin.
Jelinek may have a forbidding reputation but the director reveals that, in person, the novelist and playwright is a charmer. “She is a very nice person! She is very warm, very funny. She has a great sense of humour. It’s very sad she is not talking more in public because she’s…great! I absolutely like her.”
And, yes, Müller has shown her the documentary. “I was very nervous. I showed her the rough cut before I made the interview – and she loved it. She was extremely happy with it. She said, yes, you have understood me.”
Müller’s documentary won a Fipresci prize at Filmfest München in the summer. The Jelinek project is just one of a number of films she has made in recent years about international artists, among them Jenny Holzer (2009), Shirin Neshat (2010) and Helmut Lang (2016).
The Jelinek film is now showing widely on the festival circuit. Now, Müller is turning toward new projects including a documentary about US novelist, Carson McCullers, and one on artist Rebecca Horn.
