When I Was Still Immortal

Those who look for the classic tone of great stories in the twelve white volumes of Christoph Ransmayr's works of prose in which he experiments with narrative form will discover the 13 stories that have now been collected in one volume for the first time. The voyage of discovery leads from Ireland to the Transhimalaya, from the Upper Austrian mountains to the civil war scenes of Sri Lanka or to the Sahara, to the peace of African cloud forests and the South China Sea.
Life itself determines the seductive rhythm of the narratives, the emergence and transience, the departure into the world and the return home to the familiar. In Christoph Ransmayr's words, through his sharp gaze, the world is transformed into one that seems more colourful, more detailed and a little bigger than we know it.

"Narratives do not merely lead into  the labyrinths of reality, but always also into the merely possible. For what is, is never everything."

“the greatest contemporary writer in the German language” - La Repubblica

"World literature." - News, Susanne Zobl

"Christoph Ransmayr's greatness lies in his storytelling, which allows itself no weaknesses and does not shy away from pathos." - sueddeutsche.de, Harald Eggebrecht

"[...] take the reader to all parts of the world. Under Ransmayr's gaze, it appears more lively, more colourful and larger than we know it." - ORF III - erLesen

"Only a narrator without limitations writes like this." - Kölnische Rundschau, Hartmut Wilmes

"Ransmayr's tone has authority and grandeur." - SWR2 lesenswert, Wolfgang Schneider

"With his "playful forms of storytelling", Ransmayr once again proves himself to be the Homer of our strange times." - Die Presse, Erwin Uhrmann

"Christoph Ransmayr's literature is of timeless beauty." - ORF ZIB

"Ransmayr always talks about the people he has met on his travels at eye level - form-consciously and, despite all empathy, never in a pretentious manner." - Welt am Sonntag, Marko Martin