Austerlitz (novel) Summary

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Austerlitz (novel) Overview

In W. G. Sebald's novel Austerlitz, the unnamed first person narrator meets Jacques Austerlitz during his visit to Antwerp in 1967. Over the course of the decades that follow, he and Austerlitz repeatedly run into one another by chance. During one such encounter, Austerlitz asks the narrator if he can tell him the story of his life. The narrator accepts the role of Austerlitz's listener as Austerlitz details his harrowing experiences from childhood through adulthood. Austerlitz's desperation to excavate his childhood trauma and to relate it to the narrator inspires the novel's explorations of memory, identity, and loss. 

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