<blockquote>Above us Tyll Ulenspiegel turned, slowly and carelessly — not like someone in danger but like someone looking around with curiosity. He stood with right foot lengthwise on the rope, his left crosswise, his knees slightly bent and his fists on his hips. And all of us, looking up, suddenly understood what lightness was. We understood what life could be like for someone who really did whatever he wanted, who believed in nothing and obeyed no one; we understood what it would be like to be such a person, and we understood that we would never be such people.</blockquote>

Meet Tyll, trickster extraordinaire. Self-centred, eternally childish, or perhaps wise, a disruptor of the highest order. Like the devil, he's a disappearing act.

Tyll, by Daniel Kehlmann, is a somewhat picaresque novel that spans the Thirty Years' War, of which I know very little, and featuring the likes of the Winter Queen and Athanasius Kircher. It's a time of upheaval — religion wars against religion, and religion wars against both witchcraft and science. Modernity wars against tradition. There is no clear winner, and everyone is hungry.

<blockquote>He says: "Are we going to die?"

"Absolutely," says Korff. "Us and everybody else."

He's right again, thinks Tyll, although, who knows, I, for one, have never died yet.</blockquote>

The story skips across Europe nonchronologically, telling of the arrest of Tyll's father for heresy, a quest for dragon's blood ("Dragon blood is a substance of such power that you don't need the stuff itself. It's enough that the substance is in the world."), and the siege of Brno. There be ghosts, Jesuits, and a talking donkey.

<blockquote>Due to the darkness your thoughts don’t stay with you alone, you overhear those of the others, whether you want to or not.</blockquote>

It seems wherever tragedy lies, Tyll is near, but it's never clear if he incites it, feeds off of it, or is merely happening by, a witness. Angels and demons are both light as air.

<blockquote>A broad lewd grin appeared on the face of the famous man. A strong power now stretched between him and the woman. He was impelled toward her and she toward him, so forcefully were their bodies drawn together, and it was hardly bearable that they had not yet touched. Yet the music he played seemed to prevent it, for as if by accident it had changed, and the moment had passed, the notes no longer permitted it. It was the Agnus Dei. The woman folded her hands piously, qui tollis peccata mundi, he backed away, and the two of them seemed startled themselves by the wildness that has almost seized them, just as we were startled and crossed ourselves because we remembered that God saw all and condoned little.</blockquote>

Life is such that I had difficulty fully engaging in the history and deciphering the politics in play, but there was humour and intrigue and depth at every turn.

See the enlightening interview in BOMB Magazine: Daniel Kehlmann by Álvaro Enrigue.

Not what I expected, and not something I enjoyed. I felt the writing was more tell than show, which made it feel like it drug on at times. Great premise but poor execution.

Ross Benjamin gives us a gorgeous translation of Daniel Kehlmann’s tale of court jester, folk hero, and archetypal trickster, Tyll Eulenspiegel. Indeed, there were times I forgot that the book had not been written in English. It begins with the perfect balance of classical gravitas and fairy tale whimsy. While the more detailed history that develops is masterfully presented, I was somewhat disappointed to lose the more magical element. The history is, no doubt, more familiar to the original German-speaking audience, but it is both captivating and informative for an English-speaking reader from a different part of the world.

The character of Tyll is pure joy and sympathy, and the dialogue is so crazy-good that it had me laughing out loud more than once. This would possibly be a five-star review if not for the abrupt, jarring time shifts. I’m not fond of structure-forward narration, and in this case, each chapter begins almost as a standalone, dropping a reader into a confusing time and group of characters that will gradually come into alignment with the rest of the story as the chapter proceeds. Nonetheless, Kehlmann’s skill is undeniable.

Thank you to Daniel Kehlmann, Ross Benjamin, Knopf Doubleday Publishing, and NetGalley for an Advance Reader Copy in exchange for an honest review.

Tyll is an overwhelming book. There is nothing subtle about it, there is nothing quiet about nor does Daniel Kehlmann holds back. The readers are quickly pulled into the ongoing conflict, the war and what the author presents here is the darkness of it; the disease that follows, the poverty, the looting, the rape, the death due to lack of help and so forth. Yet in the villages that are ravaged by war, they laugh and dance - with and around Tyll.

Kehlmann mixes fiction and history in a fascinating mix where the two tread the line of realism and magic, moral and righteous, dark and light, sorrow and peace, in an intimate way. It is unclear if this is all history or heavily influenced by thirty years of war. It does get a bit confusing in places, but its best to take it in stride and pull through.

The humor in this book is reminiscent of Quixote. There is sorrow tinged into these moments, there is inherent sadness to characters who are dead and alive, its glorious and heart breaking. This is perhaps where the joy of reading this book is; to forget the disjointedness that exists from section to section, the confusion that lays in existence of characters and the missing context to certain events. Irrespective of all these, Tyll is still a brilliant read.

A fantastic but chilling journey through the bloody absurdity of one of Europe's most devastating conflicts, the Thirty Years' War as we follow the breathless adventures of Tyll the entertainer. A magnificent tapestry teeming with unforgettable characters as their try collectively to make sense and also survive the very troubled times around them. A very colorful tale of survival. A beautiful and unforgettable fictional journey into 17th century Europe.

Many thanks to Netgalley and Knopf for this wonderful ARC

This book is getting a lot of buzz for the subject matter, the prose, and the experimental nature of the writing. Time and POV is played with throughout. The timeline shifts around, and various types of second person and first person plural are used - lots of "we saw" and "you see" - as well as past and present tense shifting.

So be prepared for an experimental read, but worth it if you are interested in seeing the writer play with styles.

Tyll is the very best kind of historical fiction: Using a folkloric German character (the fabled prankster imp, Tyll Ulenspiegel) and transplanting him into a very real, very tragic period that includes the Thirty Years War (apparently 60% of the German population died in that 17th century conflict, mostly from starvation and disease), author Daniel Kehlmann is able to paint a vivid picture of a truly horrifying time and place without making those horrors overly explicit; this is mostly stench and chills and the telling of fairy tales to still an empty belly. The average person had very little freedom — lives were controlled by custom, superstition, fear of marauding armies and the witch-hunting Church — but as a wandering entertainer, this version of Tyll Ulenspiegel was beholden to no man, neither priest nor king, and he could speak truth to power with a wink; and that wink is what makes this history lesson so entertaining. The timeline in Tyll is jumbled — chapters jump around major episodes from Tyll’s life, and in several chapters from the points-of-view of actual historic characters, Tyll doesn’t necessarily appear at all — and from the sentences to the structure, this is a serious and well-constructed work of fiction that amused and bemused me beginning to end. I loved the whole thing.

Daniel Kehlmann's F was one of my favorite books the year it was released, so I've had an eye out for Tyll. This novel is every bit as engaging as F with an even richer narrative and set of characters.

Tyll is—a trouble-making, work-shirking boy; the son of a father who may or may not be a necromancer; an adventurer; a juggler and tightrope walker; a fool who speaks truth to power as only fools can; and instigator of violence and a firm and loving friend. His story is set during the Thirty Years' War, during which an entire generation of Europeans grew up fearing the sound of soldiers' boots. The reader can simultaneously like, mistrust, and, occasionally, fear him.

The novel Tyll explores life on the margins—the lives of traveling performers, who are free to wander, but have no rights, and can be accused of almost any crime, and the lives of deposed royalty, who experience a different sort of margin, constantly juggling impecunity and dignity. The novel is simultaneously magical and somber, creating a world the reader wants to enter, but that proves risky.

If you like historical fiction, if you like magical realism, if you like stories built around journeys, if you like the unexpected—you will find Tyll a deeply satisfying read.

I received a free electronic review copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley. The Opinions are my own.

This was a nonlinear and rather disjointed retelling of the Thirty years war that made me wish I knew more about the author and the mythological being Tyll going into it. I think I will revisit this one again someday to better understand what I read, but there were definitely parts that were high entertainment. Thank you to the publisher for providing me with a drc available through netgalley even though this title is already released. I would definitely recommend it.