Vertigo

My first encounter with Sebald was this strange, looping semi-fictional travelogue. Prose so simple and clear that sometimes I overlooked its elegance and precision. I knew little going in, and so I didn’t realize the depth of the reflections on time and memory until the final third. Even when I didn’t know where I was being led, it was clear from the deft imagery and wistful melancholy that it was somewhere worth going.

The more images I gathered from the past, I said, the more unlikely it seemed to me that the past had actually happened in this or that way, for nothing about it could be called normal: most of it was absurd, and if not absurd, then appalling.

The staff, remarkably restrained as they appeared, had a way of setting down the glasses, saucers and ashtrays on the marble surface with such vehemence, it seemed they were determined to all but shatter them. My cappuccino was served, and for a moment I felt that having achieved this distinction constituted the supreme victory of my life.