Reading Robert Walser’s books are like looking into a room through a piece of glass that’s tinted and warped. Everything’s in there, but nothing looks quite right. Of Walser’s many skills, his ability to write in a tone that is warm, tender, and utterly disorienting as he plays earnestness against irony in a way that is so seamless it can be impossible to tell where one ends and the other begins. In recent years – thank heaven – there has been a resurgence of Walser reissues and translations, and every publication should be heralded is a literary event, because it is.
