First published 2011
Jenny Erpenbeck moves through her world watching things slip away. The Palace of the Republic vanishes from Berlin. Cheese spoils in forgotten corners. Socks disappear between washing and wearing. Coal stoves give way to central heating. Men leave. Years pass without notice. Friendships fade into memory. Erpenbeck captures each loss in brief, precise sketches that reveal how disappearance shapes daily existence. She mourns some vanished things, laughs at others, feels relief when certain elements finally go. Her observations range from massive political structures to intimate personal objects. Each miniature portrait connects to larger patterns of change sweeping through contemporary Germany. The accumulated losses form an unexpected map of modern life, where what goes missing defines what remains.
Genres: literary-fiction, contemporary, non-fiction, 21st-century
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: slice-of-life
Setting: Berlin
Period: Contemporary
94 pages · Paperback · btb