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Moss
An aging botanist withdraws to the seclusion of his family's vacation home in the German countryside. In his final days, he realizes that his life's work of scientific classification has led him astray from the hidden secrets of the natural world. As his body slows and his mind expands, he recalls his family's escape from budding fascism in Germany, his father's need to prune and control, and his tender moments with first loves. But as his disintegration into moss begins, his fascination with botany culminates in a profound understanding of life's meaning and his own mortality.
Visionary and poetic, Moss explores our fundamental human desires for both transcendence and connection and serves as a testament to our tenuous and intimate relationship with nature.
Klaus Modick is an award-winning author and translator who has published over a dozen novels as well as short stories, essays, and poetry. His translations into German include work by William Goldman, William Gaddis, and Victor LaValle, and he has taught at Dartmouth College, Middlebury College, and several other universities in the United States, Japan, and Germany. Moss, Modick's debut novel, is his first book to be published in English. He lives in Oldenburg, Germany.
Visionary and poetic, Moss explores our fundamental human desires for both transcendence and connection and serves as a testament to our tenuous and intimate relationship with nature.
Klaus Modick is an award-winning author and translator who has published over a dozen novels as well as short stories, essays, and poetry. His translations into German include work by William Goldman, William Gaddis, and Victor LaValle, and he has taught at Dartmouth College, Middlebury College, and several other universities in the United States, Japan, and Germany. Moss, Modick's debut novel, is his first book to be published in English. He lives in Oldenburg, Germany.
186 pages, Kindle Edition
Published August 1, 2020
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188 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews
March 1, 2025
Bryophyte-phile
This is not for everyone, it is however very much a book for me! During this pandemic I have maintained some sanity by taking daily walks in the woods behind my house. It has been during this time that I developed an obsession with moss and lichen. And I love philosophical rambles given in clumps within the story
So I found the dying professor's narration enchanting and engaging. Some might not, but I did. I seldom give five stars, but for books that I will read again.
Ohlburg, the narrator has retired to his family's cottage in the woods and reviews his life with snippets of botanical wonders. I adore this style of writing.
So I knew this:
Mosses are the first plants to shake off the primordial waters and rootlessly live on land. First cousins to algae and holding the exact genetic code of those oldest of life. Its no wonder that they hold magic albeit a tiny and mostly ignored magic.
I've struggled with my own love of moss; hesitant to become equally obsessed with naming and identification.
Ohlburg the narrator explains why:
"For when I touch the moss with my feet, at the same time the moss also touches my feet. The moss attracts me even as I turn toward it. But the more firmly I renounce an analytic, terminologically driven, category-bound way of seeing, the more I lose the botanist’s penetrating gaze, and the more powerfully I seem to attract the moss. Do you understand what I am saying?"
Yes. Yes I most certainly do.
As I said Moss is not for everyone and there are other reviews that get more into life of this fascinating character.
But I really enjoyed this book very much!!
This is not for everyone, it is however very much a book for me! During this pandemic I have maintained some sanity by taking daily walks in the woods behind my house. It has been during this time that I developed an obsession with moss and lichen. And I love philosophical rambles given in clumps within the story
So I found the dying professor's narration enchanting and engaging. Some might not, but I did. I seldom give five stars, but for books that I will read again.
Ohlburg, the narrator has retired to his family's cottage in the woods and reviews his life with snippets of botanical wonders. I adore this style of writing.
So I knew this:
Mosses are the first plants to shake off the primordial waters and rootlessly live on land. First cousins to algae and holding the exact genetic code of those oldest of life. Its no wonder that they hold magic albeit a tiny and mostly ignored magic.
I've struggled with my own love of moss; hesitant to become equally obsessed with naming and identification.
Ohlburg the narrator explains why:
"For when I touch the moss with my feet, at the same time the moss also touches my feet. The moss attracts me even as I turn toward it. But the more firmly I renounce an analytic, terminologically driven, category-bound way of seeing, the more I lose the botanist’s penetrating gaze, and the more powerfully I seem to attract the moss. Do you understand what I am saying?"
Yes. Yes I most certainly do.
As I said Moss is not for everyone and there are other reviews that get more into life of this fascinating character.
But I really enjoyed this book very much!!
July 23, 2023
Für Literaturliebhaber, die ein Herz für die Botanik haben.
September 16, 2020
via my blog: https://bookstalkerblog.wordpress.com/
𝐀𝐥𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐠𝐡 𝐈 𝐝𝐢𝐝 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐞 𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐭𝐨 𝐥𝐞𝐭 𝐦𝐲𝐬𝐞𝐥𝐟 𝐠𝐨, 𝐈 𝐝𝐨 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐢𝐬𝐭.
Toted as an eco-fiction work from acclaimed German author Klaus Modick, this is his debut English novel. At his death after living in self-imposed seclusion at his family thatched roof home in the German countryside, it appears botanist Professor Lukas Ohlburg has become one with the natural world. Discovered with moss growing in his beard, he was said to have been planning to combine essays of his work together in his last years, which never happened. Ohlburg’s death at the age of 73 is a great loss to the natural sciences, most especially botany, and it is up to his “long standing assistant” to take on the task of sorting through his unpublished papers. So begins the tale.
In the professor’s slow receding from the world, he is finding himself dizzied by groundlessness, in a manner growing up as a young child in an orderly, disciplined world would never have been tolerated. Is he himself becoming now like the humble moss? Is the science he has adhered to and studied his entire life made the very thing we try to classify less discernible? Has his bright, scientific mind made him miss true knowledge? It appears he has gone astray with his new form of thinking, discoveries of nature that words cannot express, that one instead feels. What does self-sufficient moss have to do with anything? This ancient cushion upon the earth?
His thoughts are full of overgrowth, remembering the past when his father would try to control the wildness of nature by ordering he and his brother to attack the moss growing on their home, “Get after it! The wild growth must be stopped! Duty calls.” His father, disgusted by young Lukas’s admiration for the beauty of moss. There is a line about how if only one allows wild growth in, one can die well, unlike his father in a hospital ward for ‘hopeless cases.” Sterile vs the dirt of nature. His father’s fear, intellect so deeply ingrained that it led to Lukas’s successful career, one demanding classification and order on the natural world.
He remembers his own Professor Mandelbaum ‘the old man’, who was in exodus due to speaking against the ‘backward people’, his voice still carries teachings of ecological cycles, that everything is one. The man, mentor, trying to understanding everything through science, rain a reminder of his words telling Lukas “death is a part of love”.
I expected more writing about the war, and the episode with the hired girl took the story where it didn’t need to go or did I miss something? I gave it four stars because there is intelligent writing about our environment, order, and at times felt like a meditation on nature, which we too are. The professor is merging with the wildness his father so badly wanted to contain. Nature has its place, we are separate from it, that was his father’s view but we are only separate from it because we deem ourselves superior. These lines we draw are illusory. We classify everything by naming it.
But is this alienation, this human need to define? Isn’t there a danger in naming a thing, a sort of imprisonment? Is he losing his mind, wouldn’t his colleagues be alarmed by such nonsense? Or is Professor Ohlburg’s mind awakening to a clarity the rest of the world has muddied? It is about life that we try to control and life we open ourselves to letting happen to us.
This isn’t a book for every reader. It can move far too slowly and again, uncomfortable reflections didn’t sit well with me but I grasped where the author was going most of the time. I think the best of the novel is how he felt as a child, the invasion of scissors during a haircut (lord why did I forget how awful haircuts can be when you are little), the sadness he feels ordered to attack the beautiful moss because it must be controlled, there is more being said beneath the surface of every moment.
Published August 1, 2020 Available Now
Bellevue Literary Press
𝐀𝐥𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐠𝐡 𝐈 𝐝𝐢𝐝 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐞 𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐭𝐨 𝐥𝐞𝐭 𝐦𝐲𝐬𝐞𝐥𝐟 𝐠𝐨, 𝐈 𝐝𝐨 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐢𝐬𝐭.
Toted as an eco-fiction work from acclaimed German author Klaus Modick, this is his debut English novel. At his death after living in self-imposed seclusion at his family thatched roof home in the German countryside, it appears botanist Professor Lukas Ohlburg has become one with the natural world. Discovered with moss growing in his beard, he was said to have been planning to combine essays of his work together in his last years, which never happened. Ohlburg’s death at the age of 73 is a great loss to the natural sciences, most especially botany, and it is up to his “long standing assistant” to take on the task of sorting through his unpublished papers. So begins the tale.
In the professor’s slow receding from the world, he is finding himself dizzied by groundlessness, in a manner growing up as a young child in an orderly, disciplined world would never have been tolerated. Is he himself becoming now like the humble moss? Is the science he has adhered to and studied his entire life made the very thing we try to classify less discernible? Has his bright, scientific mind made him miss true knowledge? It appears he has gone astray with his new form of thinking, discoveries of nature that words cannot express, that one instead feels. What does self-sufficient moss have to do with anything? This ancient cushion upon the earth?
His thoughts are full of overgrowth, remembering the past when his father would try to control the wildness of nature by ordering he and his brother to attack the moss growing on their home, “Get after it! The wild growth must be stopped! Duty calls.” His father, disgusted by young Lukas’s admiration for the beauty of moss. There is a line about how if only one allows wild growth in, one can die well, unlike his father in a hospital ward for ‘hopeless cases.” Sterile vs the dirt of nature. His father’s fear, intellect so deeply ingrained that it led to Lukas’s successful career, one demanding classification and order on the natural world.
He remembers his own Professor Mandelbaum ‘the old man’, who was in exodus due to speaking against the ‘backward people’, his voice still carries teachings of ecological cycles, that everything is one. The man, mentor, trying to understanding everything through science, rain a reminder of his words telling Lukas “death is a part of love”.
I expected more writing about the war, and the episode with the hired girl took the story where it didn’t need to go or did I miss something? I gave it four stars because there is intelligent writing about our environment, order, and at times felt like a meditation on nature, which we too are. The professor is merging with the wildness his father so badly wanted to contain. Nature has its place, we are separate from it, that was his father’s view but we are only separate from it because we deem ourselves superior. These lines we draw are illusory. We classify everything by naming it.
But is this alienation, this human need to define? Isn’t there a danger in naming a thing, a sort of imprisonment? Is he losing his mind, wouldn’t his colleagues be alarmed by such nonsense? Or is Professor Ohlburg’s mind awakening to a clarity the rest of the world has muddied? It is about life that we try to control and life we open ourselves to letting happen to us.
This isn’t a book for every reader. It can move far too slowly and again, uncomfortable reflections didn’t sit well with me but I grasped where the author was going most of the time. I think the best of the novel is how he felt as a child, the invasion of scissors during a haircut (lord why did I forget how awful haircuts can be when you are little), the sadness he feels ordered to attack the beautiful moss because it must be controlled, there is more being said beneath the surface of every moment.
Published August 1, 2020 Available Now
Bellevue Literary Press
December 8, 2022
Wow, I am astounded at how much this book managed to fall off a cliff after such a great introduction. I read the first 25 pages and was prepared for an intriguing albeit fictional look into a botanist reimagining scientific classification/taxonomy and how it relates to us/the world and vice-versa. That first part sets up such a book perfectly. Then you get into the meat of the matter and find, absolutely nothing of value. It's as though the author had an interesting idea for a book and started writing it only to completely lose interest after a bit but by that point he was too invested in the projected to stop. He had to submit something to a publisher to make ends meet so we end up with the last 75% of this book. Nothing but endless mediocre descriptions of nature mixed together with clunky nonsense platitudes which desperately try to appear meaningful and deep but fail horribly because the author clearly never actually had anything to say. One would be forgiven for thinking many of the chapters in this book were written as some sort of practical joke which gets funnier and funnier each time another praise gets showered upon them. It was also pretty weird seeing a supposed scientist refer to the Green party's hatred of nuclear energy as "all well and good". What a uniquely German contradiction.
It reminds me of the vitalistic theory of life, that even if we could assemble a human body perfectly down to its elements and start the heart to bring it to life it would likely be nothing more than a braindead body lacking all qualities of life beyond a heartbeat. That's what the author did with this book. Instead of taking a small unformed idea with great potential and nurturing it until it's fully formed into an engrossing narrative this book is like a Frankenstein creation of sorts. All the parts of a literary masterpiece are here and its heart was kickstarted by the publication of the work yet it does not live, there is no soul to be found here. Just a shell of words masquerading as meaning.
Even its descriptions of nature are infuriatingly useless. I can feel the author reaching through the page with a sort of manic look in his eyes as he grabs me by the collar and asks in a mad sort of way "it's deep right? its meaningful right? surely I managed to write at least one line of greatness right??" but with lines like these I can't help but remain unconvinced.
"Death is a rich green country, through which a moist wind blows. Deep in that country stands a thatched house. Perhaps it is half-decayed or burned down. The rain affects the flow of my thoughts and colors their greenness a watery blue. There are branches on the old trees up whose bark mosses climb. The wind makes the branches sound out, musical instruments of a universal murmuring."
It's not so obvious from just a single paragraph but when you're reading and desperately hoping for anything of value and you get the tenth paragraph in a row describing trees and moss which then leads to...the end of the chapter it begins to feel quite pointless. This book is the perfect example of why I'm so disinterested most modern Western literature. It all feels absolutely soulless, like the only reason its been written is to add another title to your bibliography.
I almost never have this feeling when reading western works written before the 21st century yet I almost always feel like this about books western works written after the turn of the century. Notice I said western. Not sure why but I never have this issue with modern lit written outside of America/ Europe. A culture's media reflects its soul and I don't see any soul in modern Western media.
It reminds me of the vitalistic theory of life, that even if we could assemble a human body perfectly down to its elements and start the heart to bring it to life it would likely be nothing more than a braindead body lacking all qualities of life beyond a heartbeat. That's what the author did with this book. Instead of taking a small unformed idea with great potential and nurturing it until it's fully formed into an engrossing narrative this book is like a Frankenstein creation of sorts. All the parts of a literary masterpiece are here and its heart was kickstarted by the publication of the work yet it does not live, there is no soul to be found here. Just a shell of words masquerading as meaning.
Even its descriptions of nature are infuriatingly useless. I can feel the author reaching through the page with a sort of manic look in his eyes as he grabs me by the collar and asks in a mad sort of way "it's deep right? its meaningful right? surely I managed to write at least one line of greatness right??" but with lines like these I can't help but remain unconvinced.
"Death is a rich green country, through which a moist wind blows. Deep in that country stands a thatched house. Perhaps it is half-decayed or burned down. The rain affects the flow of my thoughts and colors their greenness a watery blue. There are branches on the old trees up whose bark mosses climb. The wind makes the branches sound out, musical instruments of a universal murmuring."
It's not so obvious from just a single paragraph but when you're reading and desperately hoping for anything of value and you get the tenth paragraph in a row describing trees and moss which then leads to...the end of the chapter it begins to feel quite pointless. This book is the perfect example of why I'm so disinterested most modern Western literature. It all feels absolutely soulless, like the only reason its been written is to add another title to your bibliography.
I almost never have this feeling when reading western works written before the 21st century yet I almost always feel like this about books western works written after the turn of the century. Notice I said western. Not sure why but I never have this issue with modern lit written outside of America/ Europe. A culture's media reflects its soul and I don't see any soul in modern Western media.
April 13, 2021
Bei dieser Neuauflage handelt es sich um Klaus Modicks Debüt-Novelle aus dem Jahr 1984.
Es geht um die seltsame Metamorphose des Naturwissenschaftlers und Botanikers Prof. Dr. Lukas Ohlberg. Nach seinem Tod werden Aufzeichnungen dazu von seinem Assistenten veröffentlicht. Ich liebe solche Konstrukte und bin gleich Feuer und Flamme. Doch das Buch ist nicht ganz einfach zu lesen, es gibt mit vielen Fachbegriffen durchsetzte Passagen - stilistisch ist das gut, es stärkt die 'Glaubwürdigkeit' des herausgegebenen Manuskripts, erschwert aber auch den Lesefluss.
Gegen Ende seines Lebens erkennt der Professor die falsche Herangehensweise seiner Forschung, denn durch die abgehobene und wertende lateinische Nomenklatur kommt es zu einer Entfremdung von den Pflanzen. Und "die Vermehrung des Wissens vermindert nicht die Rätsel, sondern vermehrt sie….". In einer Art freien Assoziation erklärt Ohlberg nicht nur die Änderung seiner wissenschaftlichen Sichtweise, er reminisziert auch Kindheit und Ausbildung: der strikte Vater, die Flucht nach England, Schule und Freundschaften.
Aber wirklich wichtig ist das alles nicht mehr, der Forscher nimmt zunehmend einen Zug nach unten wahr - hin zum Moos, zur Erde drängt es ihn. Moos macht sich auch in seinem Haus breit, ja es wächst sogar in seinem Bart. Und manchmal weiß er nicht mehr, was ist Traum und was ist Wirklichkeit. Er notiert: " Da kommt es mir vor, als schriebe nicht ich, sondern …. als ließe ein Anderes in mir und durch mich schreiben".
In kurzen Kapiteln beschreibt Klaus Modick diese wunderliche Lebensveränderung - die Sprache dabei oft poetisch, der Inhalt philosophisch. Diese ruhige Novelle ist lesenswert und regt zur Selbstreflexion an. Denn "das was immer war und ist und sein wird" – ist das Moos, nicht der Mensch.
August 6, 2020
Order, control, separation from nature. That is what his father had taught. Upon arriving at their woodland cabin, as a child his duty had been to scrub the moss from the stone pathway. The child objected, "But the moss is so lovely."
Now, he is old and endeavoring to form a lifetime of insight into his final paper critiquing nomenclature. He questions his father's teaching and the science of his academic career as a biologist.
Why do we divide ourselves from nature? What can we learn from moss? Shouldn't our goal be wonder and joy of beauty, not arcane facts and artificial categories?
Returning to that family cabin, surrounded by the forest, he embraces death as part of life, the natural cycle.
Science gives way to connection.
When his manuscript is found after his death, it was not what people expected. He renamed it "Moss."
Oh, I thought, another novel about age and death! I am already too aware of the passing years, how I have outlived so many family members! And with a pandemic, every one of us is faced with our mortality and aware of the uncertainty of life.
I feel the depth of this story eludes me, calling me to reread and grapple with all that lies beneath it's misleading simplicity and the beauty of its poetry.
I received a free book from the publisher through LibraryThing. My review is fair and unbiased.
Now, he is old and endeavoring to form a lifetime of insight into his final paper critiquing nomenclature. He questions his father's teaching and the science of his academic career as a biologist.
Why do we divide ourselves from nature? What can we learn from moss? Shouldn't our goal be wonder and joy of beauty, not arcane facts and artificial categories?
Returning to that family cabin, surrounded by the forest, he embraces death as part of life, the natural cycle.
Science gives way to connection.
When his manuscript is found after his death, it was not what people expected. He renamed it "Moss."
Oh, I thought, another novel about age and death! I am already too aware of the passing years, how I have outlived so many family members! And with a pandemic, every one of us is faced with our mortality and aware of the uncertainty of life.
I feel the depth of this story eludes me, calling me to reread and grapple with all that lies beneath it's misleading simplicity and the beauty of its poetry.
I received a free book from the publisher through LibraryThing. My review is fair and unbiased.
November 8, 2024
This book was such a treat. It felt so impactful in ways that exceed language itself. It brought me a sense of peace about the cyclical nature of life itself, and how there is so much certainty in all of it that humans lose sight of. I’ve always felt scared of death, but now… now I see the beauty in it. Definitely a worthwhile read for anyone looking to think deeper about things in ways they never imagined before.
February 18, 2021
Unique approach to the universality of life. Really liked this book.
April 15, 2021
Eine kleine Warnung direkt vorab. Dieses Buch ist nicht für jedermann geschrieben und wird auch nicht die breite Masse ansprechen. “Moos” ist kein Buch für den Massenmarkt, sondern für Leser, die gerne Texte lesen, die einen zum Nachdenken anregen.
Die Rahmenhandlung des Buchs ist denkbar einfach. Der (für alle, die den Namen im echten Leben finden möchten) fiktive Botaniker Lukas Ohlburg zieht sich in das Landhaus seiner Familie zurück und verbringt dort seinen Lebensabend. Dabei verfasst er einige Notizen, die der Leser nun in den Händen hält.
Diese beginnen recht sonderbar mit der Auseinandersetzung zur wissenschaftlichen Terminologie, der er kritisch gegenüber steht. Aber auch dies ist nur der Aufhänger, um sich zu erinnern. Die Erinnerungen reichen zurück in die Jugend und Kindheit des (bekanntlich immer noch fiktiven) Autors und schlagen einen Bogen in die Gegenwart und bilden so eine Art Kreislauf, in dem das Moos immer wieder eine zentrale Rolle einnimmt.
Zusammenhänge sind in diesem Buch sehr schwer auszumachen und erst am Ende nimmt der Leser den roten Faden auf, der zu Beginn ausgelegt wurde und sieht die Methamorphose des Autors bis zu seiner Verschmelzung mit dem Moos.
Fazit
Ein sehr ungewöhnliches Buch, das sich nur sehr schwer einordnen lässt. Ich wüsste noch nicht mal, wem ich ein solches Buch empfehlen könnte. Auf jeden Fall dem experimentierfreudigen Leser, der gerne abseits des Mainstreams offen für ungewöhnliche Texte ist und keine Probleme damit hat, auch mal um die Ecke zu denken.
Die Rahmenhandlung des Buchs ist denkbar einfach. Der (für alle, die den Namen im echten Leben finden möchten) fiktive Botaniker Lukas Ohlburg zieht sich in das Landhaus seiner Familie zurück und verbringt dort seinen Lebensabend. Dabei verfasst er einige Notizen, die der Leser nun in den Händen hält.
Diese beginnen recht sonderbar mit der Auseinandersetzung zur wissenschaftlichen Terminologie, der er kritisch gegenüber steht. Aber auch dies ist nur der Aufhänger, um sich zu erinnern. Die Erinnerungen reichen zurück in die Jugend und Kindheit des (bekanntlich immer noch fiktiven) Autors und schlagen einen Bogen in die Gegenwart und bilden so eine Art Kreislauf, in dem das Moos immer wieder eine zentrale Rolle einnimmt.
Zusammenhänge sind in diesem Buch sehr schwer auszumachen und erst am Ende nimmt der Leser den roten Faden auf, der zu Beginn ausgelegt wurde und sieht die Methamorphose des Autors bis zu seiner Verschmelzung mit dem Moos.
Fazit
Ein sehr ungewöhnliches Buch, das sich nur sehr schwer einordnen lässt. Ich wüsste noch nicht mal, wem ich ein solches Buch empfehlen könnte. Auf jeden Fall dem experimentierfreudigen Leser, der gerne abseits des Mainstreams offen für ungewöhnliche Texte ist und keine Probleme damit hat, auch mal um die Ecke zu denken.
October 18, 2024
It’s funny some of the below reviews mention the book really fell off. I personally started enjoying it in the last 1/3 of pages, starting with the historical references and mythological connections to trees. It’s a bit of a meandering reflection on life and aging through the lens of a botanist preoccupied with moss. I’m not really sure that the beginning questions were resolved or why it ended where it did, but I generally enjoyed it.
October 17, 2021
The way memories transition so smoothly from one to another in this novella was my favourite part; everything blends effortlessly and beautifully. I suppose that itself has its cognate with the ending, where one becomes all, and the constant meditations on terminology and its meaninglessness. Very good.
July 14, 2020
An ageing botanist returns to his family’s countryside home to reflect on his life and career. Though the novel promises to explore our bond with the natural world, for me it lacked direction, never managing to transcend psychobabble to find any emotional core, thematic resonance, or narrative intrigue. Presented as though our narrator’s diary, the book reads largely like scientific nonfiction, and sadly this didn’t help with the already dry tone. There is also a frankly bizarre scene involving child molestation towards the end that felt completely unearned and unnecessary.
On a more positive note, I did like the notion that language will never do justice to the beauty of nature, and that pursuing exhaustive understanding of something can lessen our appreciation for its simple wonder. There are a few nicely written passages peppered throughout, but unfortunately, I just couldn’t connect to this in any meaningful way.
Thank you to the publisher for a free advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.
On a more positive note, I did like the notion that language will never do justice to the beauty of nature, and that pursuing exhaustive understanding of something can lessen our appreciation for its simple wonder. There are a few nicely written passages peppered throughout, but unfortunately, I just couldn’t connect to this in any meaningful way.
Thank you to the publisher for a free advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.
November 16, 2020
This book felt like it was written for me personally. I was surprised to see it was originally published (in German) in 1984, because it has so much to say to our current time. I wish I had had the opportunity to read it sooner, and hope to see many more of Modick’s works made accessible in English in the near future.
Moss is layered and subtle, with beautifully-written prose. Hidden throughout are many literary treasures (“wrapped up, onionlike, in many layers of blankets” particularly delighted me). I found the narrator really relatable, from the way he described feeling physically assaulted by unwanted noise, to his deepening relationship with the natural world, to his views on death and decay. It was clear to me from the introductory framing story that I was going to connect with this man and his experiences with nature and with being regarded as psychologically unsound because of them. When your priorities radically change, people don’t really know what to do with you anymore.
Moss is layered and subtle, with beautifully-written prose. Hidden throughout are many literary treasures (“wrapped up, onionlike, in many layers of blankets” particularly delighted me). I found the narrator really relatable, from the way he described feeling physically assaulted by unwanted noise, to his deepening relationship with the natural world, to his views on death and decay. It was clear to me from the introductory framing story that I was going to connect with this man and his experiences with nature and with being regarded as psychologically unsound because of them. When your priorities radically change, people don’t really know what to do with you anymore.
August 22, 2021
I like books like this. A narrator holes up in a cabin alone and thinks about things. It's inquisitive and relaxing...probably more relaxing than me going to a cabin alone because I'd still be thinking about my life. Books like this focus you on the simplicity of the setting and philosophical ramblings.
Moss is a clever idea, a lifelong botanist who renounces categorization and reductionism for holistic experience. It's philosophical and gets into cognitive science briefly, the consequences of labeling things. It's a logical thought - a name doesn't describe fully the thing you're naming, and scientific rigor isn't what life is all about.
But it's not really that clever. Do you need a whole book to keep repeating it? Also, the constant talk about moss is symbolic...but like most symbolism it gets trite the more you highlight it.
It was okay. Maybe good light reading.
Moss is a clever idea, a lifelong botanist who renounces categorization and reductionism for holistic experience. It's philosophical and gets into cognitive science briefly, the consequences of labeling things. It's a logical thought - a name doesn't describe fully the thing you're naming, and scientific rigor isn't what life is all about.
But it's not really that clever. Do you need a whole book to keep repeating it? Also, the constant talk about moss is symbolic...but like most symbolism it gets trite the more you highlight it.
It was okay. Maybe good light reading.
November 16, 2022
Só peca por ser tão curto. De uma delicadeza excecional na sua temporalidade difusa — e por isso tão similar à Natureza que reverencia.
"I ask myself whether there is any difference between sinking and rising, between the development of roots and the evolution of wings, between knowledge and wonder, between being and consciousness. I find no answers precisely because I am looking."
"In the natural course of things, the complete loss of a name, of form, occurs only in death, in which beings decay and enter into a great formlessness, just as brooks, rivers, and streams [...] In the same way, when in the past prisoners were identified with numbers, they were stricken from the list of persons, and exiled to a space devoid of memory."
"I ask myself whether there is any difference between sinking and rising, between the development of roots and the evolution of wings, between knowledge and wonder, between being and consciousness. I find no answers precisely because I am looking."
"In the natural course of things, the complete loss of a name, of form, occurs only in death, in which beings decay and enter into a great formlessness, just as brooks, rivers, and streams [...] In the same way, when in the past prisoners were identified with numbers, they were stricken from the list of persons, and exiled to a space devoid of memory."
June 15, 2024
"One will have gotten used to considering death as the best thing that can happen to Homo sapiens. Plants always knew that and still know it better than we humans. There is an indefinable and, for that reason, true way of perceiving plants-- a basic or primary awareness of individual plants as well as larger plant cultures. The dying out of a human being's animal life influences and stimulates this perceptual capacity enormously. What a person can learn if he or she becomes indifferent is immeasurable."
December 26, 2023
Disconcerting book. At first, I felt uneasy with the narrative. An old man, stuck in a shack in the woods, looking at moss as his kin and feature, as he will decay. You slowly understand that there is some kind of meaning to all that. We may be closer to moss than we think.
My appreciation of the book may have been lowered by the fact that I am reading a translation from German to French, even though "mousse" in the text is a French word.
My appreciation of the book may have been lowered by the fact that I am reading a translation from German to French, even though "mousse" in the text is a French word.
August 24, 2025
Dem Buch wohnt eine zarte Schönheit inne, sprachlich wie auch inhaltlich. Es ist eine Auseinandersetzung mit der Natur und Sprache und der eigenen Vergänglichkeit, die mich nachdenklich-bewegt hinterlässt.
November 25, 2020
Read if you want to reestablish your connection with nature and the simple beauty that it holds.
November 8, 2021
J'ai eu cet ouvrage comme "livre dodo" pendant presque 2 mois. Je n'ai pas beaucoup apprécié ma lecture mais elle m'a fait beaucoup dormir. Un mal pour un bien.
December 28, 2021
Very complex writing. Too heavy for me.
February 2, 2024
In his letter, Franz said that he worried for the mental faculties of his brother while he wrote these pages, but I would argue that Lukas saw more clearly in his final days than most of us ever do.
December 23, 2020
There's a beautiful story in here, but what a job extracting it from what felt like a philosophy textbook. The narrator's thinking back over his life as a botanist specializing in moss, along with his experiences as a young boy and an old man removed from most people are coupled with various species of plants. He comes to realize as he confronts his own mortality that knowledge of the natural world comes not from studying it, but from a simple sense of wonder. Don't always ask why things are the way they are, the answer will always be they are just because. And yet in spite of the truth in that I came away feeling he never took those ideas to heart himself.
December 12, 2021
Hemingway meets botany with a Tonglen meditation via botany.
A beautiful book, with some deep and interesting insights to our existence as homo sapiens but ultimately, this was not the right time for me to read this book. I'll come back to it as my retirement plan.
A beautiful book, with some deep and interesting insights to our existence as homo sapiens but ultimately, this was not the right time for me to read this book. I'll come back to it as my retirement plan.
December 2, 2018
Für mich ziemlich schwer geschrieben. Aber sehr philosophisch und auch ich konnte einige spannende Gedanken mitnehmen.
December 3, 2019
Beautiful, natural, pulsating, pensive. Translation by David Herman is stunning.
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