Dear Joseph, I’ve just finished two of your nonfiction books, What I Saw: Reports from Berlin, 1920–1933, and The Wandering Jews: The Classic Portrait of a Vanished People, both translated…… Read more “Farewell to Berlin”
Month: November 2014
Joseph Roth
Joseph Roth (1894 – 1939), was an Austrian-Jewish journalist and novelist. He was born and grew up in Brody, a small town near Lemberg (now Lviv) in East Galicia, in what…… Read more “Joseph Roth”
Falling from grace
Dear Ingo, Your novel Adam and Evelyn (Alfred A. Knopf, 2011. 304 p. Translator: John E. Woods) takes place in the Summer of 1989 and centers around a…… Read more “Falling from grace”
Ingo Schulze
Ingo Schulze (15 December 1962) is a German writer born in Dresden in former East Germany. He studied classical philology at the University of Jena, and was an… Read more "Ingo Schulze"
Alone among human beings
Dear Stefan, I just finished reading three books of yours. I’ll give a brief account of each book, and then write about my general view of them.…… Read more “Alone among human beings”
Stefan Zweig
Stefan Zweig (November 28, 1881 in Vienna – February 22, 1942 in Petrópolis) was an Austrian novelist, playwright, journalist and biographer. Zweig was born in Vienna, which… Read more "Stefan Zweig"
Under the skin of others
Dear Doris, In Japanese, the words for skin and clothing are identical. In yoursecond novel Das blaue Kleid (The blue dress), published in 2002 and winner…… Read more “Under the skin of others”
Doris Dörrie
Doris Dörrie (1955) is a German writer. She studied cinema and filmmaking at the University of the Pacific in Stockton, California, and social sciences at the New… Read more "Doris Dörrie"
Words as pistols
Dear Heinrich, I’ve just read your book The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum (transl. Leila vennewitz), and I believe it is better understood when we remember…… Read more “Words as pistols”
Heinrich Böll
Heinrich Böll (21 December 1917 – 16 July 1985) studied German at the University of Cologne and worked, for one year, in a municipal statistical bureau. He left the… Read more "Heinrich Böll"
All the stories within
Dear Ali, If you remove a fresco, you see the drawing underneath, like a story within another story. Your new novel, How to be both, resembles a painting,…… Read more “All the stories within”
Ali Smith
Ali Smith was born in 1962 in Scotland. She studied at the University of Aberdeen and began a PhD at Newnham College, Cambridge, but never completed it.…… Read more “Ali Smith”