'The rediscovery of this lost classic will shift perceptions of German literature in the English speaking world. Mercurial, seductive, smart and startling.' - Megan Nolan
Four office workers, one unforgettable weekend - this shimmering lost German classic unveils the hidden lives inside every employee.
Welcome to the Wellis Corporation. Twenty-three storeys of shimmering glass cubicles, rattling typewriters, spiraling corridors: a corporate kingdom with its own neon light.
Across the glittering panes, the acrobatic window cleaner swoops and dives, or pauses, still as a gargoyle, seeing things that nobody else sees.
Over one weekend, we follow four employees into their private worlds. An ageing secretary; a translator in a mid-life-crisis; a once-glamorous typist; and a lovelorn trainee.
Together, they reveal the illusions we live by - in the workplace, in the home and in our own mind's eye.
Lost for decades since it was first published in Germany in 1959, introduced by Megan Nolan and in a hypnotic new translation by Rob Madole, this crystalline debut novel by a pioneering female writer rewrites German literary history.
Autorentext
Ruth Rehmann (1922-2016) was born in Siegburg, the daughter of a priest. Before writing Illusions, she worked variously as a journalist, violinist, chanson singer, and press officer for the Indian Embassy in Bonn. In the mid-1950s, she quit her job with 3,000 marks saved up and moved to a remote Bavarian farm to write her debut. She wrote four further novels, as well as radio plays and short stories. In 1983, she ran as a Green Party candidate for a seat in the Bundestag.