Conjure this
The New York Review of Books, showing a lordly disregard for those rags of time we call months and years, includes in its February 11, 2010, issue a review of Walser’s The Assistant. Written by Christian Caryl, the review is entitled, “The Conjurer.”
The Assistant came out (wait a minute, let me look) on July 27, 2007. I expected reviews to appear in both the NYRB and the TLS right about now, but I thought they would cover both of the recently translated novels, The Assistant and The Tanners, not just the former. Shows what I know.
I guess we can look forward to a review of The Tanners in 2011 and The Microscripts in 2013, the last of which we might enjoy as we dine on our breakfast capsules in our sub-orbital tract homes.
Caryl’s pilgrimage visits the usual stations (the poverty, the illness, the tiny script, the madhouse, the snow), eventually to arrive at one of my favorite themes—crazy boss meets crazy employee:
The farther we read, the less we can avoid asking the question: Why is Marti still sticking around? To be sure, he certainly doesn’t want to end up on the street again. But there’s a better answer, one that comes far into the narrative, almost near the end—at which point Marti is still waiting for a salary that will never be paid:
What was prompting him to continue on as this man’s employee? The salary outstanding? Yes, among other things. But there was something quite different as well, something more important: he loved this man with all his heart…. For it was inevitable that something a person was fond of, something he felt bound and conjoined to, would cause him distress as well: he would have to struggle with it, there would be much about it that displeased him, and at times he would even hate it because he had always felt so powerfully drawn to it.
This “love” is not sexual. Nor is it even a longing for friendship. It is, rather, atavistically hierarchical—a paternal relationship, a low-ranker’s affection for his natural superior. This motive of love—a love that isn’t even really interested in being requited—goes a long way toward framing the novel’s essential, exquisitely poised absurdity: the vexed legal and moral relationship between the assistant and his employer, neither one of whom is in a position to live up to the contract they have entered into. The employer—if Tobler can be dignified by the term—has no money to pay Marti, and the assistant is performing tasks that have been rendered meaningless by the boss’s failure to build a legitimate business. The narrative draws much of its dark comic impetus from the tension between the two men’s roles in this strange embrace—Marti’s fecklessness perfectly complementing Tobler’s aggressive vacuity.
Caryl goes on to note that “some readers—like the Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben—have seen in Tobler something like a parody of the monotheistic God of the Abrahamic religions.”
All in all—good stuff.
(Thanks to Dave Lull for the tip.)
Sam :: Jan.23.2010 :: Review, The Assistant :: 8 Comments »
Hi,
Just discovered your site, and find it fascinating. I’m a big Walser fan, and am looking forward to hearing Susan Bernofsky speak about her translations in S.F. next month.
Thank you for such a great blog!
I found your great website by the pic of Robert Walser dead on the snow. It’s the first time I see it and I was almost moved to tears. Since I red Carl Seelig’s book, I’ve thought about that scene many times, fancying Robert Walser would have chosen that sort of death.
My compliments for your website about a writer and a man I admire so much.
Best Regards
p.s. Just letting you know there’a also an italian translation of the beautiful Carl Seelig’s book:
http://www.adelphi.it/catalogo/risposta.asp
Thanks for the good words, Jill. I’m actually in the Bay Area this week but wasn’t able to get over to the event. Killed me! But I’m sure it was great. If you made it, I’d love to hear about it.
Silvano, thank you as well! I’ll add the Adelphi edition to my list of links. It’s great to see in how many languages WWRW is available. In the description of the book on the site, I loved: “vi troveremo, con quasi dolorosa intensità, la presenza fisica di Robert Walser.”
The photo is quite affecting, isn’t it? Some people feel that the circulation of these photos (there is more than one) is disrespectful of Walser and perhaps even a little shameful. At the same time, many artists have found them inspiring and have created their own works in tribute.
Sam, the Carl Seelig’s book inspired me for a short tribute to Robert Walser I wrote few years ago. If you can read italian maybe you don’t mind taking a look:
http://www.simonel.com/bacheca04.html
Sam, I’m on the late train and just noticed your response to my post. Just wanted to give you a link to the Bernofsky reading in S.F. — The Center For The Art Of Translation has an audio page, and they archived her talk from a few weeks ago. It’s about an hour, but well worth it, although you can’t hear my pithy question at the end
Susan is an excellent speaker and a very nice person — I got to speak with her briefly after the talk. Here’s the link: http://catranslation.org/blog/susan-bernofsky-rediscovering-a-lost-genius/
P.S. After Susan’s talk, I went to an antiquarian bookseller’s shop and got to look at two beautiful first German edition copies of books by Walser: “Geschichten” (this was untranslatable when I put it into Babel Fish on Yahoo, but may mean “history”?), and “Poetenleben”, which I think means “saunterer” or “walker”. They are both illustrated by Walser’s brother Karl. I covet these books. Oh, when will I win the lottery?
Jill -
Thanks for the report. I did notice that one of the people who rsvp’d was a local rare book dealer. I’m in San Francisco almost every month, so I’ll have to look him up.
By the way, as a Bay Area resident you might be interested to know that the Legion of Honor museum in SF has a nice collection of Karl Walser drawings. Check it out:
http://search.famsf.org:8080/search.shtml?keywords=karl%20walser
I doubt that any are on show, but they might give you a look if you asked nicely.
Visiting the website, I see they also have a Kenneth Patchen exhibition running until the end of March, which I’d also like to see. So maybe I’ll try to get out there sometime in March myself.
Sam
Sam, I had no idea about the Karl Walser drawings — thank you! I will check it out. The Kenneth Patchen exhibition sounds wonderful, too. The weather should be great for you in March — kind of rain-y now. Would be fantastic if you put on a Walser event here sometime — would be nice to get the chance to say hello.