Actually, says the narrator in Eckhart Nickel's new novel, he has never cared much about art.

That changes in art class, in order to take revenge on the art teacher.

Along with Carl, he is outraged at how this woman Hügel has treated Kirsten, who is the only one in the class who shows any real talent.

Andrea Diener

Editor in the Feuilleton.

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Fridtjof Küchemann

Editor in the Feuilleton.

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In his novel Hysteria, which made it onto the German Book Prize longlist, Eckhart Nickel dealt with the relationship between nature and art, between the real and the artificial.

This time it's less about the artificial and more about the artistic, the image that springs from the creativity of a mind.

And maybe you have to be a little bit megalomaniac for that, like Carl.

We talked to the author about why he set his novel among high school graduates, which of his favorite pictures didn't make it into the book after all, and why teachers are sometimes our saviors.

In the end, the literature puzzle rounds off this episode of the book podcast.

We'll reveal the solution to last month's riddle and announce the participant who won the book, which we've raffled among the correct entries this time.

Every Sunday morning, the FAZ books podcast alternately publishes talks about books and topics, interviews with authors, readings, literary puzzles and recitations from the Frankfurt anthology.

All episodes and other articles on the topics discussed can be found here.

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