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jrbyrum's review against another edition
"And now you turn a corner and the fire is right in front of you, it looks as if it wants to leap forward to greet you; an entire street is brightly, garishly lit up by it, it resembles a sunset in the distant south, ten evenings ablaze, a host of suns setting in unison. You see the façades of buildings looking like a pale-yellow paper, and the bright red glow of the fire approaches, a thing glowing, wounded red, and beside it the street lanterns look like feebly burning damp matches. And cries ring out. It seems as if trumpets are sounding everywhere, but this is a false impression, everything is relatively quiet, it's just that you are running, and beside you, before you and behind, others are now loping as well, and hackney cabs are trotting past, and the electric tram passes by. There is something ordinary about all of this, yet at the same time something incomprehensible".
-Robert Walser, "Fire"
-Robert Walser, "Fire"
tsharris's review against another edition
3.0
Short essays and feuilletons by a Swiss emigre to Berlin in the early twentieth century. His perspective is oddly naive, and the essays are mostly impressionistic, but it's still an interesting look at a rapidly industrializing world capital.
paul_cornelius's review
3.0
The introduction to this translation of Robert Walser's short pieces on Berlin promises to reflect the original's playful style and affirming eagerness. The selections translated by Christopher Middleton do that. Those translated by Susan Bernofsky do not. Bernofsky's sense of playfulness, in particular, seems often to fall into mere mockery or cattiness. This is especially true of the pieces gathered under "The Theater" and "Berlin Life." The Middleton translations, however, really do achieve their purpose. Part could be that while "The Theater" and "Berlin Life" deal with slightly earlier prose reviews, the longer works in "Looking Back," translated by Middleton, come a bit later during Walser's sojourn in the German capital. Yet it is night and day reading the legitimate short stories, "Frau Wilke and "Frau Scheer." These latter two take the reader into a melancholic world of an even earlier Berlin, which is now overwhelmed by the vigor, movement, and eagerness of the emergent Berlin of the early 20th century, the capital of an empire seeking its "day in the sun."
I once knew Berlin, although I haven't revisited the city since a few month's before the Wall was torn down. Because of my memories, I was drawn to this volume. In some ways, it disappoints. No doubt a great deal is because two world wars and a cold war now separate Walser's Berlin from today's city. And the appetite that Walser exhibits, which by the way is somewhat akin to that of Thomas Wolfe's in his descriptions of life in New York City and 1930's Berlin, cannot help but be tainted by those catastrophes during which Berlin often stood at the epicenter for most of the last century.
Yet my Berlin is as likely disappeared into the past as is Walser's. No more the rush of commerce and wealth and excitement that was West Berlin contrasted with East Germany. Nor the on edge discomfort of the long checks at the control points for the entrance into East Berlin, where corridors of buildings made of recycled stone and rubble made for a dreary, gray metropolis imprinted with the oversized and alien looking Soviet war memorial.
Walser's Berlin had no hint of the Berlin to come that I would know. So there is still an optimism, sometimes outright joy, at the "electric trams," the boulevards whirling with pedestrians, the brilliance of the Tiergarten, and even the sparkling mysteries of the city at night.
Walser left Berlin to return home to Switzerland in 1913. The war marked the beginning of the great divide between the old Europe and the new. But Walser gives us a brief insight into Germany on the brink. And perhaps his own later schizophrenia might symbolize the crisis of Europe that followed after that war--and the next one.
I once knew Berlin, although I haven't revisited the city since a few month's before the Wall was torn down. Because of my memories, I was drawn to this volume. In some ways, it disappoints. No doubt a great deal is because two world wars and a cold war now separate Walser's Berlin from today's city. And the appetite that Walser exhibits, which by the way is somewhat akin to that of Thomas Wolfe's in his descriptions of life in New York City and 1930's Berlin, cannot help but be tainted by those catastrophes during which Berlin often stood at the epicenter for most of the last century.
Yet my Berlin is as likely disappeared into the past as is Walser's. No more the rush of commerce and wealth and excitement that was West Berlin contrasted with East Germany. Nor the on edge discomfort of the long checks at the control points for the entrance into East Berlin, where corridors of buildings made of recycled stone and rubble made for a dreary, gray metropolis imprinted with the oversized and alien looking Soviet war memorial.
Walser's Berlin had no hint of the Berlin to come that I would know. So there is still an optimism, sometimes outright joy, at the "electric trams," the boulevards whirling with pedestrians, the brilliance of the Tiergarten, and even the sparkling mysteries of the city at night.
Walser left Berlin to return home to Switzerland in 1913. The war marked the beginning of the great divide between the old Europe and the new. But Walser gives us a brief insight into Germany on the brink. And perhaps his own later schizophrenia might symbolize the crisis of Europe that followed after that war--and the next one.
100reads's review against another edition
informative
lighthearted
reflective
relaxing
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Delightful stories. I especially enjoyed reading ‘ the little Berliner, fire, and about a train’.
slefebvre95's review against another edition
lighthearted
reflective
relaxing
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
4.0
mickjen's review against another edition
4.0
Berlin in the early 1900's. This time period is one of my favorites and it was enjoyable visiting a new city thru the eyes of an entertaining and thoughtful narrator
tsundoku281's review against another edition
5.0
Working through them as I try and decide which for the actual coursework essay but ah they're so wonderful and incredible at evoking this contented, highly observant , strolling mind.
yanareads6969's review against another edition
2.0
This really isn't a book of stories or even essays as much as it is a collection of 2-3 page vignettes giving you a glimpse of Robert Walser's pre-WWI Berlin life. I feel bad giving it such a low rating because it's one of those "it's not you, it's me" situations - in the same way that I don't enjoy reading poetry, I don't enjoy reading books that have no plot or character development or actual story. Then again, if you are one of the many readers like me that enjoys those kinds of things, you probably won't like this book either.
jaclyn_youngblood's review against another edition
3.0
At times very funny, and at times endearing, even. A few stories even resonated with me about my time with the metropolis.