Le roman de Jenny Erpenbeck, qui avait déjà été sélectionné pour le Deutscher Buchpreis en 2015, est en lice pour le Man Booker Prize dans la catégorie dédiée aux auteurs nés en dehors du Commonwealth.

Au Royaume-Uni, le livre a été publié par Portobello Books sous le titre « Go, Went, Gone ».

“A deeply humane novel, coming exactly at the right time” DeutschlandRadio Kultur

GEHEN, GING, GEGANGEN
by Jenny Erpenbeck
Knaus, August 2015

How can you bear the passing of time when you are forced to do nothing? How can you cope with losing loved ones? Who passes on your legacy? Richard, a retired professor, has a chance encounter with asylum seekers in the middle of Berlin, and this gives him the idea of searching for answers to his questions where no one else would look: among those young refugees from Africa who have been stranded in Berlin and condemned to wait for years. And suddenly this world looks at him, the man living in Old Europe, and might well know better than he himself who he really is.
In her inimitable way, Jenny Erpenbeck has told a story of looking the other way and taking a look, of death and war, of perpetual waiting and of everything that is lying hidden beneath the surface.

Jenny Erpenbeck was born in 1967. After graduating from high school she first trained as a bookbinder before going on to study theatre science and music stage direction. While working as an opera director she debuted with her short novel Story of the Old Child, which was followed by other literary publications, including novels, short stories and stage plays. Her novel The End of Days was enthusiastically received by both the public and press alike and has been awarded several prizes, including the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize in 2015.