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Available
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Publication
New Directions (2009), Edition: 1, Paperback, 360 pages
User reviews
LibraryThing member GuttersnipeDas
Robert Walser, The Tanners
The Tanners is the last novel Robert Walser published before entering the madhouse -- and we waited a century for this translation. This is the last of Walser's novels to be translated, which leads one to think it must be the bottom of the barrel somehow, like the last of
The Tanners is the story of five siblings and focuses on Simon, who explains, "I am the youngest and the one who occasions the fewest hopes." Like every Walser protagonist, he wanders around dreaming, walking, losing jobs, renting rooms, and praising women without actually getting involved with them. He moves from misfortune to misfortune, and praises them all.
The translation, by Susan Bernofsky, reads so beautifully. Can she be enticed to do more? How about a fresh selection of stories? Can we take up a collection?
This book is full of all the strange things only Walser can do -- the peculiar storm light of mania, the special cheerfulness of extremely depressed people, the vast detached love of which they are capable. Magic is spun from the most pedestrian adjectives. So much that is dreamy, disappointing, unfathomable -- it's so nearly weightless and at the same time succeeds in catching so many extraordinary moments and feelings.
There's something so exhilarating about Walser's protagonist, an eternal zero, who never succeeds at anything -- but also never seems to fail in any way that matters. (I love the way people fail in this novel. Money is lost, wives are abandoned, people freeze to death in the forest -- but no one ever seems to mind.) It's exhilarating to read about someone who isn't interested in success, power, importance, travel or sexual conquest -- I feel myself in the presence of a man who has stumbled upon real life.
The Tanners is the last novel Robert Walser published before entering the madhouse -- and we waited a century for this translation. This is the last of Walser's novels to be translated, which leads one to think it must be the bottom of the barrel somehow, like the last of
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Hemingway. But no, not at all! It's as lovely as anything Walser wrote. I can't believe my good fortune, finding this now, after re-reading the NYRB Walser Selected Stories so many times it may qualify as a personal tic.The Tanners is the story of five siblings and focuses on Simon, who explains, "I am the youngest and the one who occasions the fewest hopes." Like every Walser protagonist, he wanders around dreaming, walking, losing jobs, renting rooms, and praising women without actually getting involved with them. He moves from misfortune to misfortune, and praises them all.
The translation, by Susan Bernofsky, reads so beautifully. Can she be enticed to do more? How about a fresh selection of stories? Can we take up a collection?
This book is full of all the strange things only Walser can do -- the peculiar storm light of mania, the special cheerfulness of extremely depressed people, the vast detached love of which they are capable. Magic is spun from the most pedestrian adjectives. So much that is dreamy, disappointing, unfathomable -- it's so nearly weightless and at the same time succeeds in catching so many extraordinary moments and feelings.
There's something so exhilarating about Walser's protagonist, an eternal zero, who never succeeds at anything -- but also never seems to fail in any way that matters. (I love the way people fail in this novel. Money is lost, wives are abandoned, people freeze to death in the forest -- but no one ever seems to mind.) It's exhilarating to read about someone who isn't interested in success, power, importance, travel or sexual conquest -- I feel myself in the presence of a man who has stumbled upon real life.
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LibraryThing member AliceKathleen
I found Simon, the main character and youngest brother of the Tanner siblings, to be an intriguing character. He is the antithesis a man with the kind of ambition we are taught to admire. In this so-called modern world we try to inhabit these days, a life of wandering, subsistence jobs, ragged
There is no real plot which is also a mirror of a life lived without ambition to be something. This sounds depressing and horrible to the modern ear, but there is no pretense in either the book or Simon. We all meet people or have family members who don't quite fit with what is expected of them, but what they and Simon bring to life is an alternative to the well trod path of respectability and repression. It struck me that Simon could have been very much at home in San Francisco in the 1960s. The book ends when Simon is only 21 leaving much to the reader's imagination as to what happens to him. This is a book I would like to read again. It is a coming of age story of a man who will never really come of age or perhaps a story of nothing at all.
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clothing, fleeting acquaintances, and few ties to people or things is what we associate with the homeless. They are to be shunned or pitied. Walser as Simon offered gems of a life philosophy throughtout the book which seems to be quite autobiographical. Walser lived over half his life in a mental institution yet still wrote with much difficulty on tiny scraps of paper. There is no real plot which is also a mirror of a life lived without ambition to be something. This sounds depressing and horrible to the modern ear, but there is no pretense in either the book or Simon. We all meet people or have family members who don't quite fit with what is expected of them, but what they and Simon bring to life is an alternative to the well trod path of respectability and repression. It struck me that Simon could have been very much at home in San Francisco in the 1960s. The book ends when Simon is only 21 leaving much to the reader's imagination as to what happens to him. This is a book I would like to read again. It is a coming of age story of a man who will never really come of age or perhaps a story of nothing at all.
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LibraryThing member William345
The Tanners has a wonderful lightness of tone that is vivid and delivers rich insights. The novel moves quickly along delighting the reader. The theme seems to be about the inability of conformity to make us happy; it is also a meditation on work and idleness, self-exile and esthetic
The novel was written by Walser when he was in his twenties yet there can be no question of its maturity. Walser was greatly admired by Franz Kafka and his work at times seems a crisper, less cluttered version of the more famous writer's; though it should be stressed that Walser's is a unique voice in fiction. The best thing one can say about a writer is that there's is no one quite like him or her, and this very much applies to Walser. In the late 1920s Walser began to hear voices and in 1929 was consigned to Waldau, an asylum near Bern. He was discharged in 1933 but never again took up the pen with alacrity. The many years of eight-to-ten hour writing days were over. The book includes a major essay by W.G. Sebald that I have not come across elsewhere. It's mostly about Walser's The Robber but it addresses his work in general terms as well. Recommended with great brio.
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joy—especially of the natural world but also of artistic expression. Protagonist Simon Tanner is one of the great free spirits of literature. His speeches are a delight and at times quite funny. He speaks to authority with all the headstrong yet polite resolve we usually fail to muster in life. The central concern of the characters seems to be one of ecstatic engagement with the world, which they achieve with a giddy ebullience. I am reminded of Lacan's "scopophilia" in the very conscious way Simon casts his gaze about—and exults in—his surroundings. The novel's key device seems to be longish first-person monologues. Be advised, however, there's not much of a plot, which will be an obstacle for some readers. The novel was written by Walser when he was in his twenties yet there can be no question of its maturity. Walser was greatly admired by Franz Kafka and his work at times seems a crisper, less cluttered version of the more famous writer's; though it should be stressed that Walser's is a unique voice in fiction. The best thing one can say about a writer is that there's is no one quite like him or her, and this very much applies to Walser. In the late 1920s Walser began to hear voices and in 1929 was consigned to Waldau, an asylum near Bern. He was discharged in 1933 but never again took up the pen with alacrity. The many years of eight-to-ten hour writing days were over. The book includes a major essay by W.G. Sebald that I have not come across elsewhere. It's mostly about Walser's The Robber but it addresses his work in general terms as well. Recommended with great brio.
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Awards
Best Translated Book Award (Shortlist — Fiction — 2010)
Language
Original language
German
Original publication date
1907
1985 (française)
2009 (English: Bernofsky)
Physical description
360 p.; 7.1 inches
ISBN
081121589X / 9780811215893
Other editions
De Tanners : roman by Robert Walser (Paperback)