Demand for Nobel Prize winner’s novels soars

Readers are eager to learn more about Austria’s Elfriede Jelinek, who was virtually unknown in the United States before the announcement that she had received the Nobel Prize for literature.

Within 24 hours of Thursday’s citation by the Swedish Academy in Stockholm, four of her books had jumped into the top 70 on Amazon.com’s list of bestsellers. The ranking of “The Piano Teacher,” a novel adapted into a 2001 film starring Isabelle Huppert, soared from 1,163,804 early Thursday to No. 9 early Friday. Other books selling strongly include “Lust,” “Women as Lovers” and “Wonderful, Wonderful, Times.”

The marketing manager for Consortium Book Sales & Distribution, which releases Jelinek’s work in the United States, said that available copies were already sold out and that new books might not arrive for three to four weeks.

“You don’t keep a large quantity of books around when they’re not moving,” said Susan Doerr, marketing director for Consortium, based in St. Paul, Minn. “This is really going to revitalize an author who hasn’t found as wide a readership as she deserves.”

Although a celebrated and controversial author in Austria and Germany, the 57-year-old Jelinek doesn’t even have a publisher in the United States. English versions of a handful of works have been released by the London-based Serpent’s Tail.