[ book tip by Literatur Schweiz ] «Some things are not allowed to be thought», writes Matthias Zschokke in «Max», his debut novel. He continues: «Otherwise the whole world falls apart, and we who have thought these things, we stand at the bottom, and the whole world falls on top of us.» The ‹we› in this book is an apocalyptically challenged one that includes both writer and reader. With corresponding caution, the author constructs a protagonist as insignificant as possible while fitting out the narrative with incidental events.
The eponymous Max, 23, has left Switzerland and is struggling along in the German metropolis. A seemingly exotic laggard, who tends to look at the world with critical eyes and occasionally cannot help but laugh about his preoccupation with his own self. In this novel, the everyday is provoked using idiosyncratic punctuation, ‘Swissisms’, linguistic ellipses and relentlessly sharp observation skills as well as irony. This results in a sort of «courageous documentary poem critical of the contemporary» in which the protagonist perishes on the quiet while at the same time managing to sustainably – and sympathetically – poeticise the world. The great empathy that develops for Max on both the part of the author and reader prolongs the end in yet another «last chapter» further and further.

(Severin Perrig, trans. by Simon Froehling)

[ Favourite quote ] «Max ... besass unerlaubterweise kein Geld. Und er trug den Kopf nicht mehr auf Verbotshöhe. Und er ging langsamer durch die Strassen, als man geht.»

[ book info ] Zschokke, Matthias: Max. (original language: Deutsch) List, München, 1982 . ISBN: 3-471-79131-0.