The Second Sword: A Tale from the Merry Month of May, and My Day in the Other Land: A Tale of Demons Two Novellas

<p><b> Two novellas by Peter Handke—his first works to be published since he won the 2019 Nobel Prize in Literature. <br></b><i><br>The Second Sword </i>and <i>My Day in the Other Land </i>are two novellas by the 2019 Nobel laureate Peter Handke. The first picks up the story where Handke’s last work of fiction, <i>The Fruit Thief </i>(described in <i>The New York Times </i>as “an experience of unadulterated <i>literature</i>”), left off. Here a man has returned to his home in the suburbs of Paris, only to soon set out again. Why? We learn, over the course of a story redolent of Handke’s harrowing <i>A Sorrow Beyond Dreams</i>, that he is seeking to avenge his mother, who has been unjustly denounced in the pages of a newspaper. <i>The Second Sword</i> is a suspenseful work of self-examination: Will the narrator’s journey end in him throwing down the gauntlet?<br><br><i>My Day in the Other Land</i> is the first work written by Handke after he was awarded the Nobel Prize. Evoking imagery from the Bible and classical mythology, it portrays a man who has been possessed by demons, causing him to rage endlessly against the inhabitants of his rural village. Aided by his sister, he embarks on a journey to a lake on whose opposite shore lies the “other land.” What ensues is an exorcism of sorts—and one of Handke’s most evocative and original endings. Together, <i>The Second Sword </i>and <i>My Day in the Other Land </i>are essential new entries in a body of work like no other.</p>