The Compost Heap

A decade or more ago when I first came across the reviews of W. G. Sebald’s (1944 – 2001), “The Emigrants,” the book seemed precisely the kind of writing I’d instinctively take a pass on; plotless obscurantism, the smell of academia, slow, heavy-going introspective stuff. As an unreconstructed literalist, I thought, “nah, not for me.”

In 2004, The New Yorker published Sebald’s essay on postwar Germany’s literary and collective blocking-out of the Allied bombing campaign that destroyed so many German cities. A month later, the magazine ran his address, “An Attempt At Restitution: A Memory of a German City” presented at a literary event in Stuttgart. Both pieces were unlike any interpretations I’d read on the Second World War. I was impressed.

A few years later, in the Musuem shop of Manhattan’s Neue Museum, I came across a selection of Sebald paperbacks. After just a moment or two of browsing “The Emigrants,” I purchased the book. “The Emigrants,” like a gateway drug, led me quickly to the rest of Sebald’s translated works. I read them one after another, tripping as it were on the slow, sad and beautiful meanderings of his writing.

Just last week, randomly Googling, I punched in “Sebald” and discovered a wonderful blog site “Vertigo: Collecting And Reading W. G. Sebald,” the work of a gifted and passionate fan, Terry Pitts. The site, http://sebald.wordpress.com, I quickly realized is like a black hole, swallowing up hour upon hour to the detriment of my other responsibilities. In plunging into the pleasures of things Sebald, I realized that despite it being just a few years since reading most of his work, I had almost totally forgotten the specifics of the books. What I do remember vividly is the experience of the reading itself, of being carried along on the drifting flow of his words, of his reflections and his thinking. Reading his stuff has been compared to finding yourself on a very slow train moving through a misty and tragic dreamscape of twentieth century European history.

I’ve gathered all my remaining Sebald paperbacks. I’ve ordered several volumes of interviews and commenteries on his writing, and just as soon as I’ve exhausted the archived postings on Terry Pitts’ “Vertigo” site, I’ll indulge myself with a leisurely project, an unhurried rereading of each of Sebald’s books.