Speaking to the Rose: Writings, 1912-1932

by Robert Walser, Christopher Middleton (Translator)

The Swiss writer of whom Hermann Hesse famously declared, “If he had a hundred thousand readers, the world would be a better place,” Robert Walser (1878–1956) is only now finding an audience among English-speaking readers commensurate with his merits—if not with his self-image. After a wandering, precarious life during which he produced poems, essays, stories, and novels, Walser entered an insane asylum, saying, “I am not here to write, but to be mad.” Many of the unpublished works he left were in fact written in an idiosyncratically abbreviated script that was for years dismissed as an impenetrable private cipher. Fourteen texts from these so-called pencil manuscripts are included in this volume—rich evidence that Walser’s microscripts, rather than the work of incipient madness, were in actuality the product of desperate genius building a last reserve, and as such, a treasure in modern literature. With a brisk preface and a chronology of Walser’s life and work, this collection of fifty translations of short prose pieces covers the middle to later years of the writer’s oeuvre. It provides unparalleled insight into Walser’s creative process, along with a unique opportunity to experience the unfolding of his rare and eccentric gift. His novels The Robber (Nebraska 2000) and Jakob von Gunten are also available in English translation.

Genres: Fiction, Short Stories, Literature, German Literature, 20th Century, Literary Fiction

134 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2005

About the author

Robert Walser, a German-Swiss prose writer and novelist, enjoyed high repute among a select group of authors and critics in Berlin early in his career, only to become nearly forgotten by the time he committed himself to the Waldau mental clinic in Bern in January 1929. Since his death in 1956, however, Walser has been recognized as German Switzerland’s leading author of the first half of the twentieth century, perhaps Switzerland’s single significant modernist. In his homeland he has served as an emboldening exemplar and a national classic during the unparalleled expansion of German-Swiss literature of the last two generations.

Walser’s writing is characterized by its linguistic sophistication and animation. His work exhibits several sets of tensions or contrasts: between a classic modernist devotion to art and a ceaseless questioning of the moral legitimacy and practical utility of art; between a spirited exuberance in style and texture and recurrent reflective melancholy; between the disparate claims of nature and culture; and between democratic respect for divergence in individuals and elitist reaction to the values of the mass culture and standardization of the industrial age.

Reviews

[Eddie Watkins · Rating 5 out of 5]

I like things that are completely and perfectly formed: crystal-like objects (be they poems or paintings or a samosa) complete unto themselves, hermetic and radiant; but I also like ill-formed things, unfinished fragments, sloppy lasagnas, awkward-seeming contrivances, and things with endless possibilities for ramification. Both types of art are revealing in their own ways, as long as that intense and personal spirit is inherent, but it’s the second type of object that more often offers inner views into the private processes involved, revealing faults along with flawlessness, and imperfection can be as illuminating, and as satisfying, as perfection.

So, obviously, this book falls into the latter camp for me. But before I say anything else let me reiterate that Walser’s short works are his best works, and specifically the short works produced in the latter half of his life. The novels, all but one of which were written in his early period, provide a landscape in which his short works can be better understood and appreciated, but are not nearly as radical and lively as his later short works. Also, as much as I like all periods of his production, his early period is too wide-eyed-youthy to completely satisfy my present tastes. This wide-eyed-youthiness never actual leaves him or his work, but later in his life more natural complexities and darknesses of his own mind (not to say insanity! emphatically not to say insanity!) creep through his works, and this is what I like. The complexities are there from the beginning, but are buttoned down, concealed beneath his scrivener’s vest.

This is a collection of short works with a main focus on his later production, including a generous sampling from his microscripts, some of which were never finished, and which seem to be, in most cases, pure unfettered improvisations where he exercised himself and piled idea upon idea. These microscripts were apparently used as breeding grounds for more finished works; he would rework sections of them into finished works which he would sell for a pittance to fugitive publications.

There is in these microscripts a feeling of the act of writing as being a deliverance (even a salvation) in and of itself, a jazzy cathartic improvisation (Walser maybe fitting into the freebop category (Nefertiti Miles), with its tight interplay of structure and freedom) and joy of play, a release. Given the spirit that suffuses these works I do not care one whit that some are unfinished or that others turn on a dime multiple times and head off in directions technically unjustified by the context. After all, one of Walser’s greatest charms is the supremely playful flexibility of his mind, putting us under its spell as we follow every turn it takes, not caring where it came from or where it’s going.

[Jimmy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Apparently Kafka used to read Robert Walser stories aloud at gatherings of friends and writers and they would all laugh joyously for hours. Ah, fun times.

But it is perhaps because these 'stories' are not exactly funny that Walser is so great. Which doesn’t mean that they aren’t funny, but that they cannot be reduced to a joke, or even to any particular idea. Each piece is so complex in its unpredictable goings-ons, so unfocused in its anti-narrative-arc, that what arises is a meaningfulness so personal that it erases all intention to be summarily about one thing, and so that each piece is a thing unto itself, or many things individually, to be encountered fully without easy digestion.

I dog-eared almost every single page of this wonderful book.

[Brian · Rating 5 out of 5]

On the rivers swim barques abounding with pleasures and with music. Bridges span the delicate waters. On the shores grow trees like veils. Delectable slopes are densely covered with houses. Everything sensuous is neighbour to everything good. The morning has an enchanting glow, and in the evening everyone is drunk with tenderness and contentment.

Everything is concerted, work with entertainment, serious things with pleasurable things. Over pathways soft as carpets beautiful young maidens go riding on zebras and gazelles and cannot help smiling all the time. In a blue haze, among greenish shrubs, lie adorable villages with reddish-brown roofs. [20–1]

[Eric · Rating 2 out of 5]

80% of this didn’t work for me. Too often Walser left my brain scattered.

[Zachary Lacan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I did something I shouldn't have and now find myself reading this-tagging the read bookshelves because I know picking up the half-read book will trigger something in me, and I'll have all but finished in fifteen minutes!

[Jonathan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Walser is for savoring, not devouring.

[Brenna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Normally I adore Walser, and Christopher Middleton's translations do not disappoint, but this particular collection just didn't do it for me.

[Cecilia Cecchis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Per me: Preferisco sparire. Colloqui con Robert Walser 1954/56 a cura di Marco Ercolani
Meraviglioso

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

!!!

[Wendy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Many of these pieces are Walser at his best, and others are just moderately wonderful.

[Richard · Rating 5 out of 5]

Remarkable author, great translation. I think reading Walser makes me less of a pseudo intellectual.

[Lysergius · Rating 4 out of 5]

Microscripts indeed. Each one a polished gem.