Girlfriends, Ghosts, and Other Stories

by Robert Walser, Tom Whalen (Translator), Nicole Kongeter (Translator)

Girlfriends, Ghosts, and Other Stories brings together eighty-one brief texts spanning Robert Walser’s career, from pieces conceived amid his early triumphs to later works written at a psychiatric clinic in Bern. Many were published in the feuilleton sections of newspapers during Walser’s life; others were jotted down on slips of paper and all but forgotten. They are strung together like consciousness, idiosyncratic and vulnerable, genuine in their irony, wistful in their humor. Some dwell on childish or transient topics—carousels, the latest hairstyles, an ekphrasis of the illustrations in a picture book—others on the grand themes of nature, art, and love. But they remain conversational, almost lighter than air. Every emotion ventured takes on the weight of a sincerity that is imperiled as soon as it comes into contact with the outside world, which retains all of the novelty it had in childhood—and all of the danger.

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, German Literature, 20th Century, Germany, Classics, Essays

192 pages, Paperback

First published September 13, 2016

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

[Glenn Russell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Robert Walser (1878-1956) - German-speaking Swiss author of Jokob von Gunten and other novels and tales, a writer much admired by Franz Kafka, Robert Musil, Stefan Zweig, Walter Benjamin and Hermann Hesse. I can see the connection with Hesse since dreamy, hypersensitive Robert Walser could have been a character right off the pages of a Hesse novel.

Indeed, reading this collection of short entries on nature, art, writing, love and everyday occurrences, suffering toothache, wearing an overcoat, sipping tea, I had the strong sense Walser captures, in his own unique voice, much of the magic and tenderness of a child’s perception of the world.

You can read Tom Whalen’s informative ten page Afterward in this New York Review Books (NYRB) edition to become acquainted with Robert Walser’s life and writing, including how he worked as a clerk and butler and other menial jobs to support himself and how he spent his later years in mental institutions where he penciled tiny prose works in a coded microscript.

Back on Hesse, by my eye Walser’s connection to his fellow Swiss artist's romanticism and poetic vision of life is so directly linked, I’ve included Hesse watercolors to accompany quotes taken from several of the over eighty miniature pieces, each one usually one or two pages, that comprise Girlfriends, Ghosts and Other Stories.

"I never wrote poems in summer. The blossom and resplendence were too sensuous for me. In summer I was melancholy. In autumn a melody came over the world. I was in love with the fog, with the first beginnings of darkness, with the cold. I found the snow divine, but perhaps even more beautiful, more divine, seemed the dark, wild warm storms of early spring. In the winter cold, the evening glistened and shimmered enchantingly." From Poetry



Reading Robert Walser also put me in mind of Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities, especially Octavia, the spider-web city, a thin city, with its ropes and chain and catwalks bound to two mountain crests over the void. Take a look at the below three quotes, where Robert feels the wind sweeping along like the hope of youth and experiences everything moving; or nature as so soft and delicate; or he reads a book without words, a book of pictures where clouds float in bold simple lines. We can imagine Robert Walser returning to Octavia in the evening where he will climb a rope ladder to mediate on the shape of the stars from a hammock outside his house, a house made like a sack.

"The wind swept along like the hope of youth, like a new, never before felt confidence. Everything moved, the wash flapped and fluttered, the train smoke flew up and was lost. I, too, lost myself. It was as if I were enchanted, as if born anew, and full of delight I looked up at the morning sky where the sacred, golden clouds floated. Melting into splendor and bliss they dissolved, and then the sun came out, day was here." from The Morning



"I stepped under the roof of a summerhouse that stands on the rocks. Everything green quickly became dripping wet. Down on the street a few people stood under the dense foliage of the chestnut trees as if under wide umbrellas. This looked so strange I don't recall ever having seen anything quite like it. Not a single raindrop pushed its way through the densely layered mass of leaves. The lake was in part blue, in part dark gray. Such a pleasant, stormy, sweet rustling in the air. Everything was so soft and delicate. I could have stood there for hours reveling in the world. But at last I went on my way." from On The Terrace



"This is a book without words, it tells its story in pictures, in fleetingly drawn sketches of a singular art and gracefulness; it contains a fine, understandable language, a tale filled with age-old suspense; it breaths with life, and when you turn its pages, the sorrow and bliss of nature step toward you entrancingly. The vast, sedate country life breathes its wind upon you. Wind and clouds blow and float in these bold and simple lines. Bushes blooming, country roads – and then the masterly pen compels the sun towards its natural, thought-provoking demise." from An ABC in Pictures by Max Liebermann



"Then, as I lay there comfortably and languidly summer humming all around, there appeared from out of the sunny ocean-and-sky-bright bliss two eyes that looked on me with infinite kindness. I also clearly saw cheeks drawing nearer to my own as if they wanted to touch them, and a wonderfully beautiful, as if formed from pure sun, finely curved, voluptuous mouth came out of the reddish-blue air close to mind as if it wanted to touch my mouth as well. The firmament I saw through my eyes I had pressed closed was completely pink and hemmed by a splendid velvety black. I looked into a world of pure bliss. But then all of a sudden I stupidly opened my eyes, and the mouth and cheeks and eyes were gone and all at once I was robbed of the sky’s sweet kiss. What’s more, by then it was time to go back down to the city to business and my daily work." from Lunch Break

Reflecting on the above quote, perhaps this is one reason Robert Walser spent the last years of his life in a sanatorium – he could take his long walks in nature, lie down in the grass or lie down in the snow and never be obliged to open his eyes and return to work so as to be robbed of the sky’s sweet kiss. Fortunately for lovers of literature, he kept his eyes open enough during his lifetime to pen or pencil a string of highly imaginative first-rate fictions.

Recognizing just how sensitive a man he was, we can begin to understand after a certain point he quite writing. As he told Carl Seelig, one of his great admirers, who payed visits to the sanatorium: “I am not here to write, but to be mad.”





"I am crowned with the most cheerful serenity. Yesterday I was like a snapped-off plant, while today I’m a sturdy tree. What illusions can do to us! Brain power, you’re weird! Now that this Nobel Prize business no longer weighs on me, how noble I seem. Yes, the world is gay and serious.” from The Nobel Prize.

[S̶e̶a̶n̶ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some may consider this collection to be ‘lesser’ Walser, consisting as it does of mainly the feuilletons he wrote for the newspapers in order to pay the bills. But I've always loved Walser’s ‘little prose pieces’ and I found the ones in this collection to be just as rewarding as the others I’ve read in the past. One never knows what the next piece will bring, which is part of what makes turning the pages such a delight. The majority of these pieces are only between one and two pages long. But that’s just enough space for Walser to convey a slice of his elegant prose, imbued with humor, pathos, and/or wit. It’s like an espresso shot of Walser. One can pick up the book, read one or two of these pieces, and sally forth in daily life with an added spring in one’s step. Of course not all of them are uplifting. Take, for example, the piece entitled ‘Schwendimann’, in which a man wanders from place to place, never finding one where he belongs, until eventually...well, I won’t give it away. One can’t help but see a bit of Walser himself in the character of Schwendimann. But even with darker pieces like this Walser has a way of presenting the darkness so it is viewed as equal to the light. In all of his writing he displays this innate understanding of the parallelism of light and dark in the world—and in all of us, as well. And for that he will always remain a favorite of mine.

[M. Sarki · Rating 3 out of 5]

https://msarki.tumblr.com/post/154241...

Eighty-one short snippets on love, nature, and art. Slow reading at first, but halfway through a realization hits that the collection is actually coherent and worthy of review. Somewhat of a journal, the mostly one or two page entries focus on a wide range of topics and experiences. Nothing momentous or remarkable occurs, but Walser’s charming tone emerges as he develops in this body of work a bit of osmosis on the reader. It is often remarked, after reading, how quickly Walser’s short work is forgotten. What remains is a feeling, almost childlike in its memory, charming and fondly held as you would a precious artifact found and displayed reverently on the shelf. But fragile in its innocence. Likely to be lost to our own aging experience, wrinkled and jaded, twisted out of shape.

The voice in this collection is not one previously accustomed to in previous Walser fictions. Here is a sober, rational mind at work instead of the typical dotty and playful delusions he normally displays. Instead, this collection focusses on the observant and rational Walser employing a confident voice of authority. A work so unlike anything of his previously subjected to. And though it is comforting to realize Walser’s writing can at times be associated as conventional, his amusing and eccentric prose is far more preferred and appreciated. And I am thinking that perhaps he wasn’t crazy at all.

[Christine · Rating 3 out of 5]

2016 NYRB Selection for Sept.

Walser's short stories are really more like flash fiction, though that term had not been invented when his work was first published. If you have read Italio Calvino, you might want to try Walser for the writing, magic, and absurdity are very similar, though Calvino is the better writer.

The best stories in this collection are the ones about the kittens, the spirit of the forest, and the murderess. There is some humor as well, as in the one about the dentist.

[Shawn Mooney (Shawn Breathes Books) · Rating 1 out of 5]

I am gobsmacked at how deeply I enjoyed the whimsicality of the opening story, “A Morning,“ yet hated absolutely every other piece in this little book! While the first story was a hilarious portrayal of office workers goofing off – obviously a timeless and universal theme, as it was written more than a century ago - the rest of these are over-earnest, moony, simpering, and soporific. Yuck.

[Guttersnipe Das · Rating 5 out of 5]

As an ardent devotee of Robert Walser, nothing is bigger or more welcome news than a new collection of stories. Having read all the Walser stories available in English umpteen times, I am delighted to report that this new book is a very worthy addition to the canon. I was put off, at first, by the extreme brevity of the pieces -- only the first is 5 pages, the rest are 1 or 2 -- but I soon found it effortless and delightful to fall into the rhythm of them and the highly agreeable trance they evoke as they evaporate one after the other.

To read Walser is to discover that the word “flimsy” can be extremely high praise. How can it be that he returns to the same subject matter again and again and yet nearly every sentence contains a small surprise? What is this peculiar awkwardness that comes across as perfect charm? For all my rereading I can’t explain it to you, yet I revel in it again and again.

The joy of Walser is the pleasure of sentences like, “Every sensible person sincerely praises a bowl of soup.” He writes most often about the niceness of nice things, the loveliness of the lovely, the lightness of the light -- and yet it is nearly always apparent that he could collapse at any time, that he is only barely and temporarily staving off despair. His mind is capable of the most astonishing leaps. It’s hardly surprising that a mind like his turned out to be a very difficult tool with which to navigate the world.

The pieces I found most revelatory, as well as most fun, were from 1921, a series: “Latest News” as well “News” 2,3 and 4. Each piece consists of about 6 to a dozen paragraphs which dart jauntily from one subject to the next, without caring much about connectivity or development, succeeding by force of charm and forward motion, announcing what’s up, what’s on his agile, edgy, dancing mind.

For example, one piece begins by discussing how he’s dressing, then lists current lectures including “one about the value of psychiatry to the human community”, proceeds to his clerical duties, and then announces, “The nice thing is I have a clear conscience. Indeed, to my knowledge I’ve never lacked one. I regret to say that a short while ago a healthy magnificent tooth fell out, which fortunately however is no great misfortune. Of course now I have to walk around with a gap in my mouth, but I still do this gladly, especially in the evenings at the close of a workday and on Saturday afternoons.” For me, a paragraph like that is the essence of pure irresistibility.

Another ‘News’ piece begins: “Without question I’m filled with self-confidence. Perhaps sometimes I might even be a little bit conceited. I may only live on the outskirts, but at least my room has a parquet floor. Well, I’m told Hesse leads a more genteel life. Often I walk past his former residence.”

How can I respond, except to bow in the gratitude, in this, the presence of pure delight?

(Note: if there are other Walserians who seek, as I do, to create work inspired by the work of Walser, I would very much love to share writing and enthusiasm -- or to be useful to you in any way. Please feel free to contact me.)

[Subashini · Rating 4 out of 5]

A beguiling and perplexing collection of feuilletons and prose pieces, many of which were written after Walser achieved some fame and success with his novels (that I've not read). Walser's writing is bird-like, ambiguous, flitting from one idea to another. The tone is light and swift-footed, but it's a fugitive kind of lightness--underneath, Walser is burrowing into some deep stuff and can often be unsettling. It's necessary to read him closely.

What struck me the most at this point was that many of the pieces in the first half of the book were written during the first world war, and Walser does not once talk about it directly. Instead, there are constant references to the beauty of nature, of the miniscule things one notices on a daily basis, and most importantly, the kindness of people. In the Walserian world, a sense of being in the world is enhanced when people and nature itself are friendly, gentle, and tender. "A heaven open when people are kind to one another". In one of the only pieces where he dwells in the dark, written in 1917, he says, "And the people were poor, pale, sick, storm-driven slaves lashed into terror. No one trusted anyone anymore."

This typical Walserian focus on kindness and a general sense of hospitality is a kind of salve. Far from being a retreat from serious matters and "real life", it seems to suggest a commitment to people and the world in a time of brutality, when it would have been easy to simply write about how bad things were, and that's interesting to think about.

My full review is available here.

[Melissa · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received an ARC from the publisher via Edelweiss.

This collections defies classification as far as genre is concerned. The introduction to the book calls the writings a collection of eighty-one “brief texts” that were written throughout the course of Walser’s life. Some of the writings appear to be fictional short stories but others have a distinctly autobiographical feel to them. Walser even writes a few short dialogues and a book review. In addition, he has a wide range of topics and themes and writes about anything from nature, to fashion, to death and dying. This is a collection best absorbed a few pieces at a time so one can savor his pithy and didactic collection.

Walser makes mundane things seem fascinating. My favorite piece that falls into this category is entitled, “A Morning” in which he describes a Monday morning in a bookkeeping office as the minutes painfully tick by. The central figure is man named Helbling who unapologetically walks into work almost thirty minutes late. Walser’s description of the interaction between Helbling and his boss makes us laugh and cringe:


Totally be-Mondayed, his face pale and bewildered, he shoots in a jiffy to his place and position. Really, he could have apologized. Up in Hasler’s pond, I mean head, the following thought pops up like a tree frog: “Now that’s just about enough.” Quietly he walks over to Helbling and, positioning himself behind him, asks why he, Helbling, can’t, like the others, show up on time. He, Hasler, is, after all, really starting to wonder. Helbling doesn’t utter a word in response, for some time now he’s made a habit of simply leaving the questions of his superior unanswered.

Walser makes ordinary events like suffering from a toothache, wearing a fashionable overcoat, having afternoon tea and observing a beautiful woman absolutely riveting.

Another common and enjoyable theme that occurs frequently in his writing is that of nature. There are pieces dedicated to the description of a peaceful morning and a walk on a beautiful autumn afternoon.One of my favorite pieces, entitled “Poetry” reads more like poetry than prose. In this brief and reflective writing we get the sense that Walser is constantly fighting against a deep melancholia and he uses the occasion of a winter day as the inspiration for expressing his emotions. He writes:


I never wrote poems in summer. The blossoming and resplendence were too sensuous for me. In summer I was melancholy. In autumn a melody came over the world. I was in love with the fog, with the first beginnings of darkness, with the cold. I found the snow divine, but perhaps even more beautiful, more divine, seemed the dark wild warm storms of early spring.

It is not surprising that Walser fought a deep depression and anxiety for which in 1929 he was voluntarily hospitalized in Waldau, a psychiatric clinic outside Bern. By the early 1940’s he was permanently confined to the hospital and declared that his writing career was over. There are hints in this collection that even as early as 1917 Walser is fighting some powerful demons. In the story entitled “The Forsaken One,” written during that year, Walser pictures himself as a lonely, hopeless vagabond who is wandering around on a gloomy night. He finds a house that is terrifying but he feels compelled to step inside and wander around until he finds an angelic female figure whom he calls a “celestial outcast.” He feels an affinity toward her and is relieved that he has found someone that is just a lonely and isolated as himself.

It is truly impossible to cover the scope of this collection unless I were to make my review several pages long. I have tried to sum up the writings that have made the greatest impression on me. But I am confident that everyone can find something in this collection that he or she loves. Thanks to the New York Review of Books for bringing us this brilliant classic in translation.

[Pat · Rating 3 out of 5]

A short collection (~170 pages) of short writings (1-2 pages) by Robert Walser. The writings span a few decades (1910s - 1930s). Some are narrative, while others contemplate certain domestic matters. All seem to concern things on the small scale. A representative writing will address a cute kitten or a beautiful young woman. Few of these writing seems to operate on the grand scale. And I do not think Walser was capable of operating at such a level. He writes like a young, optimistic child who has the eloquence of a well-read adult. Every story is sweet or endearing. Reading one is like popping a candy into your mouth. But just as one can get worn out on the best tasting candies, Walser's tenderness can become tiring.

[Daniel Polansky]

A scattershot selection of commentary from everyone’s favorite late dual-empire stylist (fuck you, Stefan Zweig!) There’s a lot of stuff in here about happy walks in sunlit woods, and the joy of a beer and a good pretzel, threaded through with the sort of melancholy which saw the author spend the final quarter of his life in a mental institution. Sometimes I bought into it, often times I felt that the writing was over-precious, like I was making a meal out of marzipan. I don’t love Walzer, but I appreciate how other, kinder readers would.

[William Patterson · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my favorite books. Possibly as close to a perfect book as I’ve ever encountered, in terms of what I believe a book can and should do, which is to answer that prompt in an unexpected, joyfully creative way. Alongside the “selected stories,” it is the best representation of Walser I can think of. But I think I like this one even better. While “The Walk” looms over that other collection, everything here is of a similar breadth, giving it no arc, no authoritative development, just little punctums of startling life.

[James Murphy · Rating 2 out of 5]

I didn't much care for this. These sketches--they're called feuilletons in the "Afterword" by Tom Whalen--have the feel of being forced by a man making himself write something every day. In fact, they're about everyday events and objects. They didn't interest me at all, and partly because Walser made them sound as if he were doing an exercise. At the end of the sketch on overcoats he writes "My overcoat article has exhausted me. How often have tasks that seemed so easy caused us difficulties!" The final sentence of his sketch of a kitten reads, "This sketch is a bit purringly droll, but I hope nonetheless a usable contribution." Most of these pieces bored me.

[Theresa · Rating 3 out of 5]

He's kind of petty.

[Kumar Ayush · Rating 5 out of 5]

so relatable. even I write stuff like that. do I have to be a famous author to get that published? ;)

[Shawn · Rating 3 out of 5]

A pleasant bit of ephemera reflecting on things such as nature or observations in people and a lot of opining about women, which most women will probably think is ridiculous. Not as caustic as Schopenhauer, not as wise as Whitman but very mellow and relaxing. But be forewarned because its utter pointlessness may prove to be infuriating to some.

[Jane · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm adding this word to my life list of alternate careers: feuilletoniste. And Walser is my role model, writing as he does about whatever his fancy lights upon. Feather light and yet getting right to the heart of what he sees, his essays are tiny gems.

[. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Poignant meditations and heart–felt disquisitions on love, art, the ethereal, afternoon tea, literature, and toothache, to mention only a few, are ensconced within the pages of this compact yet incredibly rich selection of short stories. Except they'd be more aptly titled illluminations or feuilletons on the ephemeral and the quotidian qualities of life. In fact, Walser's writing shines most when he juxtaposes and upends the aforementioned two: imbuing the quotidian with the beatific, the ephemeral with the mundane.

As one comes to expect with Walser, Girlfriends, Ghosts, and Other Stories has that inimitable & idiosyncratic charm of his writing, and the tonal precision that propels said charm, on full show. With any of these stories you get the sense that Walser is speaking directly to you (it might sound cliche, but if you've ever read Walser you'd know), as his conversational style elicits feelings of warmth, despondency (at times) and sardonic humour at others.

One of my favourite stories would have to be The Philosopher. It is a very charming assessment of the endlessly–ruminative–philosopher archetype and the spiritual (and indeed financial) doldrums that awaits such a meditative existence. Like the best of Walser's stories, it raises crucial epistemological and existential cruxes, and the value of such contemplation; it's final sentence reminds us of the dangers in over–thinking, and the spiritual spiral one descends whilst doing so: A pity that his long reflection made him lose so many things.

But as far as I'm aware, Walser is not so much interested in ideas as he is with aesthetics & feeling. As a corollary, the reader can lose themselves in Walser's world. Yet these worlds never fully subsume his sprightly style – plangent narratorial intrusions and poetic asides remind the reader of his attention to artifice:

She thought she was ridiculous. What a bold beginning! My intention is to dance with words.

Personally, I'd suggest reading these as a masterclass on writing: keep an attentive eye to how Walser conjures tone, avoids distancing himself as a narrator, and instead embraces the vulnerable and honest quality of his writing through self–reflexively calling attention to it. All within the space of a few pages.

TLDR; As the blurb rightly puts it: Walser's stories are small nut-shells of consciousness. Albeit ones that are as instructional in the art of writing as they are delicate in the life–lessons they propound.

[Von Kriege · Rating 4 out of 5]

O Walser, your Daseinslust (pleasure-in-being) is infectious as ever. How you discuss ash or a Monday morning with such light-as-a-feather poignancy! These scribblings, like your cupboards of wine, need not be the best since they are surely the most agreeable. I swoon at your friendship with loneliness, your "wish to go unnoticed", your wandering apartness. These little nothings are a home for all Forsaken Ones—a home where we share in the "delightful dreamy melancholia" and "enchanting hopelessness"—but always from behind the closed door of our very own room.

[Jeremy · Rating 4 out of 5]

As delightful and strange as all his other work I've come across, though not as through-and-through flawless as the best collections (original FSG Selected Works, Schoolboy's Diary, Microscripts).

[Taylor Lee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Walser is magisterial, witty, and, like all great artists upon whom winged flight has been gifted, playfully inscrutable. Peer into these texts, and note the bottomless depths whence they sing.

[Melora · Rating 3 out of 5]

Odd. No, really odd. Really short essays, which might now be blog posts, but then (early 20th century) were published as little pieces in newspapers. Many of these little portraits of scenes, experiences, moods, and ideas have a sort of stream of consciousness feel to them, and others are just whimsical or weird (or both). There are some really beautiful passages – descriptions of lovely moments and images – and also some clever, funny bits. By turns ironic, understated, romantic, outrageous, Walser leaps, sometimes disconcertingly, from one thought to the next. Two and a half stars, generously rounded up (and despite the fact that two star essays predominated) because, as Walser reminds us, we need to be kind.

A couple samples from some of the better essays will give you the flavor...

The first essay, “A Morning,” is about an agonizingly long Monday morning, as experienced by a spectacularly reluctant bank employee (arriving at work, late, he is “totally be-Mondayed, his face pale and bewildered”)

”Eight thirty, Helbling pulls out his pocket watch to compare its face with the face of the big office clock. He sighs; only ten little, tiny, thin, delicate, spiky minutes have trickled past, and before him loom fat, indifferent hours. He tries to see if it's possible to grasp the idea that now he must work. The effort fails, but at least it's shifted the face of the clock a little. Five more dear, dainty minutes have slipped away. Helbling loves the minutes that have passed, but hates the ones still to come and those that appear unwilling to move forward. He would like to clobber each and every one of these lazy minutes. In his mind he beats the minute hand to death. The hour hand he doesn't dare look at, for he has good reason to fear that would make him faint.”

This, from “Autumn Afternoon,” is about a walk in the country.

”It's delightful to walk quietly and leisurely over the land and be greeted friendlily by solemn, sturdy country women. Such a greeting does one good, like the thought of immortality. A heaven opens when people are kind to one another. The afternoon and soon evening sun strew liquid love and fantasy gold over the road and it glowed reddish. On everything was a touch of violet, but only a delicate, barely visible tint...”

Finally, from “Toothache”...

”Finally I went to the dentist, that is, for the sake of sweet frugality, to a dental clinic, where I gladly handed myself over for purposes of study. My mouth was diligently examined by the hand of a young lady apprentice, and, after that the procedures began. I may say with some authority that I placidly endured a tremendous amount and accepted with considerable composure all sorts of things.

Much I patiently suffered, but from time to time I found it apt to utter a rather loud scream, which I did on purpose because by so doing I succeeded in causing the master to rush up and intervene, helping with his masterly skills, which for me was no insignificant relief. In such moments, of course, the young lady became annoyed with me; she thought it very naughty of me to emit such a forceful sound. I allowed myself to say I would be willing to scream even more often whenever unnecessary pain was inflicted upon me. It was not at all nice of me to speak like that, she responded. Gradually I came to have a fairly delightful intercourse with her, and once she had the idea to ask me what I was. I was a sort of writer, I said modestly. She called loudly into the dentist's room, “I've got a writer,” whereupon all the gentlemen and ladies, among them the master, came running up to engage in a cozy study of the peculiar patient...”

So. These are quirky, and there were quite a few I didn't enjoy, but if your library has this it's worth a look.

[Dan Plonsey · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was my introduction to Robert Walser – well, actually “The Job Application,” which Nell Zink translates in her “Private Novelist” novel was. Zink has been critical of translations of Walser, going so far as to say that those who read the English translations aren't reading Walser at all. I don't know – after all, I did read something, and I really enjoyed it. (For those who wish to consider Zink's point, one might carefully compare her translation with the one online – I made a quick comparison, noted many differences, and found I preferred Zink's ~half the time. Of course, I ought to have been comparing to the German, but my two years of German are not enough for these subtleties. So, okay, it's an issue, but one I'm going to ignore.)

These pieces are all very short – mostly feuilletons, published in newspapers. There are certain patterns: many tell of Walser (or a narrator) walking through the countryside, or through small country villages. The narrator encounters people who demonstrate great benevolence, leaving the narrator in an exalted state – if we are to believe him. He takes on a variety of types of people, revering one, criticizing another – unless it's sarcasm. Sometimes there's a reversal of opinion midway through. Many pieces end with the narrator revealing himself to be the self-effacing author, e.g., “Once again I have only been sketching here, when in fact I was obliged to do more” – unless, this is false modesty, or not yet truly Walser. In other words, there is always a sense that Walser may be mocking the whole enterprise of writing: it may all be about the art of construction of a fictional scene, a fictional analysis, and of the (fictional) narrator himself. A precursor to AI writing. Kafka, Musil, Zweig, Benjamin, etc., are all said to have appreciated Walser, and I suspect that this may be for Walser's calling our attention to the gap between that which is written, and that which the writing is ostensibly about, accomplished entirely obliquely.

To be explored further!

[Janet · Rating 4 out of 5]

Robert Walser was a modernist master of the short form and Girlfriends, Ghosts, and Other Stories is a collection of over 80 pieces, most shorter than two pages, translated from the German into English by Tom Whalen and published by NYRB in 2016. These sketches are arranged chronologically, but the reader can wander at will to discover comic pieces like “A Morning” which perfectly captures the tedium of working in a soul-crushing office with a petty tyrant supervisor, and the games slackers play to subvert the boss; nature observations; reviews; the occasional ghost story; and observations on human behavior. Some of my favorites are the ones where Walser writes of everyday objects, as in “Porcelain” where he points his lens at two porcelain figures in a trinket shop, a gentleman and a lady, and tells us who they really are; and “The Goddess” where a cloud in the sky forms, for just a few minutes, the shape of a Greek goddess, to the astonishment of those who see her, showing us how Walser could, in a few words, reveal “the uniqueness of insignificant things.”

[Brian · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Under certain circumstances to be insignificant is a blessing.”

Much of the Walser I’ve read thus far has been in the form of his (very) short fiction, a kind of “insignificant” form of writing that still feels peerless even 100 years later. While I loved his novel Jakob von Gunten, there is something about this form- something between short story and a prose poem- that entirely suits his skittering, nervous, utterly charming and neurotic voice. This collection in particular is an especially wonderful group of these pieces.

[Brian · Rating 3 out of 5]

This collects 81 examples of a genre we don't really have in English: the feueilleton. So "stories" is a bit of a misnomer. They are taken from the Swiss writer Robert Walser's whole literary life (1907 to 1933) and cover a huge variety of subjects. I'm glad I've read the book, but I'm not sure who I could really recommend it to. I read one of his novels, Jakob von Gunten (1909) a couple of years ago and got on with it far better. A rattling good Bildungsroman, in fact.

[Lauren · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don’t think there’s a story in this collection that’s over two pages long. Walser sometimes fills the brief space of these “sketches” so fully that time seems to go out of whack.

Sometimes I flew through twenty stories at a time, sometimes reading a paragraph seemed to take an hour.

Pretty rare, strange, frustrating and rewarding reading experience here.

It’s really 3.5 stars, I think?

[Sunjay · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some absorbing vignettes in here, and others rather off the cuff and easily forgettable. Overall it left me wanting to read something a bit more substantial from Walser and his enigmatic style. Jakob van Gunten is definitely on the radar for the future.

[Rupert · Rating 5 out of 5]

I already loved Walser, but this is possibly my favorite collection of his at this point. Which I guess could be due to strong translations. Sublime turns of phrase and so many pieces that capture the transcendence that can be found in the ordinary. Step out the door and absorb the world.

[Tom Wascoe · Rating 3 out of 5]

A series of essays. These essays are not stories but rather reflections on feelings, people, scenery, etc.
Most are, at maximum two pages. Somewhat interesting but no continuity.

[Gal · Rating 4 out of 5]

Master of adjectives and cognitive dissonance