This brief and poignant novel from Germany explores existential questions as its 46-year-old narrator reflects on broken relationships and other failures, and struggles to come to terms with life.

The Shoe Tester of Frankfurt by Wilhelm Genazino, 2004 recipient of the Georg-Büchner-Preis, Germany's highest literary honor, is finally available to English-speaking readers in a pitch-perfect translation by Philip Boehm.

Employed by a high-end shoe manufacturer to test new products, the narrator spends his days wandering through his native city, encountering faces from his past (primarily female) and experiencing anew the many manifestations of the mystery of life. In the grand tradition of literary flâneurs, he takes note of his surroundings, from the significant to the mundane, and assembles them into a sort of mental collage that is at once self-portrait and cityscape.

Most remarkable in Genazino's work is the humor with which he invests this melancholic character. Though at times he fears that he teeters on the brink of insanity, he good-naturedly pursues the strange twists of fate that land him variously behind a table at the flea market, in a newspaper office, by the banks of a flooded river, or in a friend's bed. As Peter von Matt wrote in Der Spiegel, "Indeed, there is hardly a subtler humorist among today's writers than Genazino."

Date of publication: June 26, 2006

Excerpt: from The Shoe Tester of Frankfurt

Shortly after breakfast I leave my apartment, carrying two canvas bags. Each bag contains three pairs of shoes that I have personally tested; the bag in my left hand also holds six evaluation reports, each between two and two-and-a-half pages long. The summer morning is warm and almost excessively bright. The swallows fly straight up the walls of the apartment houses and then either turn sideways over the roofs or soar on into the blue. I'd like to stay right there and at least watch them, if I can't imitate them. But I have an appointment. I'm supposed to meet Habedank at ten. At Ebert Platz I take the number 7 train to Hollenstein, where the Weisshuhn Shoe Factory is located, not far from the station. I'll meet Habedank in the manager's office and give him the shoes along with the reports. We'll chat for about three quarters of an hour—first twenty minutes about the test shoes, and the rest of the time about electric trains. Then Habedank will hand me three or four pairs of new shoes, and I'll go home. I've known this routine for years, but I still get a little nervous every time. It goes back to my particular conceit, which I sense a little more acutely during these expeditions than usual, when I'm just at home. I inherited this conceit from my mother. We both believe that it's not worth looking at the world for an entire lifetime. I used to struggle against the effects of this conceit, but not anymore. Naturally I have to make a special effort when I'm with Habedank. He shouldn't notice my conceit at all. He thinks that I'm an electric train hobbyist just like he is, that to this day I read the same technical magazines that he does, primarily about early Trix and Fleischmann products. He doesn't realize that I'm just drawing on the same store of knowledge frozen from my childhood days, and all just for him, time after time. It's also possible that Habedank will tell me one of his tedious stories, which I listen to with perfunctory sympathy. Three weeks ago he took nearly ten minutes to tell me about the end of his vacation. On the whole trip from Italy to Germany he thought he was about to run out of gas. But then he made it back home without incident. That was/is his entire story. I sat still in front of his desk for ten minutes and laughed with delight when he reached the end and exclaimed: It turned out there was enough gas! Imagine! There was enough gas! My conceit entails a nearly continuous collision of humility and disgust. The two forces are of nearly equal strength. On one hand, I sense my humility admonishing: It's precisely the most idiotic stories of your fellow man that you should listen to! At the same time, however, my disgust taunts me: If you don't escape right away, you'll drown in the vapors of your fellow man. What's infuriating is that this constant colliding never allows either side to win. So the two forces just go on running the same collision course over and over. And those are my feelings as I find myself approaching Habedank's office. I tell myself that I'm prepared for anything and right away I have to laugh at myself. Habedank and Oppau, one of the firm's buyers, succeeded in making the office a no-smoking zone. That's why Frau Fischedick, another buyer who still smokes, paces up and down outside the office, smoking and grinning. She holds up her arms and waves at me. I observe that Frau Fischedick wants to be in the office when I speak with Habedank. She puts out her cigarette and goes in shortly after I do.

     Habedank is sitting at his long black desk; when he sees me he stands up.

     Ah there he is! Our master tester! he calls out.

     My conceit triggers a hint of a smile. I walk across a soft gray carpet. The walls are lined with a series of indirect lighting fixtures. The window blinds are closed; the room is cast in gently dimmed light. Herr Oppau's desk is on the left; Frau Fischedick's is on the right, in front of Habedank's. When he opens his jacket I catch sight of a hand-sized bloodstain on the chest of his shirt. I stare at Habedank; Habedank stares at me.

     Unfortunately someone took a shot at me, says Habedank.

     Who? I ask.

     A fired tester.

     Oh, I say.

     Herr Habedank, Herr Habedank, says Frau Fischedick.

     How do you like the bloodbath? asks Habedank and sinks back into his swivel armchair.

     Don't believe a word he says! says Frau Fischedick.

      Herr Habedank is one of the many people who have earned a natural death, says Herr Oppau.

     Savoring that last remark, I sit down in the visitor's chair and place my evaluations on Habedank's table.

     A felt-tip pen happened to leak in my shirt pocket, says Habedank.

     I don't know what to say to that. Habedank leafs through the evaluations. I reach into my bags and take out a pair of hand-stitched wingtip brogues as well as the cordovans, and explain at length why I consider them to be the best of the latest batch. Habedank, Oppau and Frau Fischedick listen to my report. I let myself believe that it's a pleasure hearing me talk about shoes. Presumably it's no accident that I talk about shoes as if they were extensions of my own body. He who is forced to live as I do, without having consented to this life, frequently escapes by wandering around and about and therefore places the highest value on shoes. I could say that my shoes are the best thing about me, but all I do is think that thought. My commentary on the remaining shoes, which strike me as poorly cut, is short. It's always the same thing: the shoes are too narrow, the seams are too stiff, the stitching is in the wrong places, what they gain in elegance they lose in comfort. Habedank runs his fingers over the shoes as I describe them. For a moment I have the impression that my efforts are meaningful and important. I don't know any other work where one individual's sensations (a surrogate for those of others) play such a decisive role. After I finish my commentary, Habedank opens his drawer and pulls out a checkbook. For every evaluation, the Weisshuhn Shoe Company pays me two hundred marks. That means that Habedank shoves a check for twelve hundred marks across his desk. Afterwards he reaches behind him and places four pairs of new shoes on the desktop. I can tell by their form which cutters they come from. I stow the shoes in my canvas bags. Now it can only be a matter of seconds before Habedank asks me to join him for a cup of coffee. Then we'll talk about electric trains from the 1950s.

     Unfortunately the firm has to economize, he says instead.

     I don't know what to say to that, and wait for his next sentence.

     What I mean is, says Habedank, that in the future I'll only be able to pay you fifty marks per walking unit, in other words for every pair of shoes.

     That seems rather drastic, I say.

     The situation has changed.

     So suddenly?

     Yes, says Habedank, we now have some pretty powerful competition. The luxury market is doing very well, and others have caught on.

     Aha, I say.

     To make up for that, you'll be allowed to keep the shoes you test, says Habedank.

     Now the office is quiet. Suddenly it dawns on me why Frau Fischedick and Herr Oppau never left the room. They wanted to hear how Habedank would say this—no, they wanted to see how I would take the demotion. But there's nothing to see. I only wonder if Habedank is really trying to tell me I might as well give up the job. But then why did he hand me four new pairs of shoes? Evidently the firm still values my future work, though only at a quarter of the old price, if I ignore the in-kind gift. But what am I supposed to do with all those new shoes? I'll have to either hoard them or give them away.

     I'm sorry, says Habedank, the pay reduction wasn't my decision, I'm just supposed to tell you.

     I nod. The truth is, I'm not really surprised. This is the kind of situation that has given rise to my sense of living without inner authorization. I've experienced them frequently. I don't even have any desire to repeat the words I've often thought following similar experiences, and which I could think again now. Misfortune is boring. I wait to see if Habedank will ask me to join him for a cup of coffee in the cafeteria. But today there is no invitation—evidently because Habedank has some degree of sympathy for my situation. He scrunches a piece of cellophane and drops it on his desktop. The crumpled ball slowly crackles back open. Just when I'd enjoy listening to the crackling, I stand up and say to Habedank: You'll have the new evaluations in about three weeks.

     A minute later I'm waiting for the train that will take me home. A disabled man is buying a can of beer at a french fry stand. The man has no arms, only hands attached to his shoulders. Four steps away, two crows are trying to peck open a plastic bag full of garbage. Using his right shoulder-hand (or should I say hand-shoulder?), the disabled man presses the can against his neck and opens it with his teeth. The crows manage to open the plastic bag, immediately sending orange peels, yogurt cartons and pizza boxes flying around the train platform. The public display of misery is disgusting, but it gives expression to my own horror as well. Is there a general decline or isn't there? I can see several valid arguments on both sides. I stare at the trash and decide: there is a general decline. I await the day when all living things will confess their embarrassment. A mother with a stroller appears at the foot of the stairs leading up to the train platform. The child is gnawing on a balloon with his sharp little teeth. The teeth slide off the rubber and make a kind of gnashing creak—a sound I couldn't stand just a few years ago. Then the train comes humming along. The mother with the stroller waits for me to open the doors to the car for her. I don't know how it happened that I'm no longer bothered by the sound of teeth rubbing against rubber. I see it as a sign of hope. Evidently some forms of opposition occasionally dissolve of their own accord. That could mean that I'm getting closer to the day when I will live with inner authorization. I retract my finding and come to a new conclusion: there is no general decline. I don't dare alert the mother to the potential fright that threatens her child should the balloon pop. An observation like that would have to be delivered both jokingly and admonishingly. But I can't find the right words to elegantly combine jest and warning and at the same time conceal my own anxiety. Just last night in bed, shortly before falling asleep, I knew I had two train tickets left in my wallet; I now remove the second one and insert it into the ticket validator. How carefully we prepare the ground for major misfortune! Presumably I'll have to give up the job with Weisshuhn. The humiliation of working for only a quarter of the old honorarium is too much even for a tolerant man like me. Presumably I won't be meeting Habedank anymore. I'll put the four pairs of shoes he gave me through the usual paces and send them back in the mail, together with the evaluations. At Ebert Platz I get off the train with the intention of quickly vanishing into Gutleut Strasse, when suddenly I see Regine heading my way. She holds out her hand and kisses my cheek. Regine is only a little younger than I am. I'm amazed at her youthfulness. She asks what I'm doing these days and I give an evasive answer, which she notices right away.

     You don't have to pretend with me, she says.

     Fine, I say.

     You still don't want to tell me what you're up to?

     I just lost a job, I say.

     Oh, says Regine.

     Years ago Regine and I both worked as interviewers; for a while we even worked together. I remember one afternoon when she spent a whole hour asking me all about facial tissues, and afterward I quizzed her on plastic suitcases. Unfortunately the agency did away with the long interviews and replaced them with street polls. We were expected to stand outside schools, department stores, and government offices and survey people about tax policy and TV guides. Neither of us wanted to do that, and so we went our separate ways.

     Are you working these days? I ask.

     I'm taking a course to be a death companion, says Regine.

     Oh, I say, unable to suppress a laugh.

     It's a serious matter, says Regine.

     I'd like to ask her what they teach in such a course, but don't dare.

     Is it going well? I ask instead.

     Recently they wanted to send me out for the first time to accompany a woman who was ninety-one years old, but she sent me away after half an hour.

     Now we both laugh, avoiding each other's eyes.

     She probably thought you were death in person come to take her away, I say.

     I didn't see it that way.

     After all, someone who's dying resents everybody who's going on living, I say.

     You talk, says Regine, as if you'd already died once.

     Of course I have, many times, haven't you?

     We laugh, and I don't know if Regine fully understands my last remark. She holds out her hand and says goodbye.

     Give me a call, she says in parting.

     I don't need a death companion, I want to call out after her, but at the last moment I hold my tongue.

     A little later it occurs to me that Regine and I actually died once together. First I had interviewed her about vacations and long distance travel, then she interviewed me about canned food and ready-made dinners. After that we were completely exhausted and lay down on her carpet. We drank half a bottle of wine and goofed around until our eyelids started to droop. When we woke up we undressed and slept together. Then a strange thing happened. Regine was lying next to me, studying her naked torso. She'd turned quiet and sad, but it took me a while to catch on. She asked me to look at her breasts. That's all I've been doing the whole time, is what I think I replied. Well evidently you weren't paying enough attention, she said. What are you getting at? I asked. Didn't you notice that my nipples aren't doing what they're supposed to? Regine was proud of her big long nipples. During erotic interludes they would grow erect, which she always considered to be a sign of her vitality. Now they were bent to the side or folded over or pressed into her areolas. I had noticed the change but didn't think it meant anything. Only gradually did it dawn on me that Regine was physically distressed. I went so far as to say she shouldn't take her nipples so seriously. And at that point we first fell silent and then died together as a couple.

     Inside my apartment I open the windows, lie down on the floor and switch on the TV. I catch a film about blue-footed boobies in the Galapagos Islands. These are large, white-feathered birds with blue feet. They resemble geese and move in a similarly clumsy manner. On the Galapagos Islands they find ideal breeding grounds, says the speaker. The birds nest on the ground, the surrounding water is clean and rich in fish. The birds are called boobies because of how they have to move their luxurious bodies during the long run-up required for takeoff. The blue-footed boobies appeal to me; at the moment I'd like to be one myself. I wouldn't mind being called a booby on TV, either, since as a blue-footed booby I'd finally have nothing more to do with words and their meanings. Or perhaps the animals' amazing white bodies make me think of Margot's little white body. It could also be that running into Regine is to blame for my sudden desire for a woman. I turn off the TV. A button pops off my shirt and rolls a ways on the floor. I watch it until it flips over and stops moving. Through the walls I hear the children in the apartment next door calling each other asshole and dumb jerk. They must be more or less like the children that made Lisa sick. I'd like to call Lisa and ask her how she's doing, but I wouldn't like for Renate to pick up and for me to have to talk with her. I don't move, listening to asshole, asshole shouted next door. Among the new shoes Habedank gave me is a pair of barely affordable hand-welted loafers made of genuine kidskin. They feel fantastic. It's a little after 3 p.m. Presumably Margot doesn't have any customers now and is eating a bowl of soup in the middle sink. The cat will be curled up sleeping in the sink on the left. I leave the apartment and head to Margot's. She'll probably be surprised to see me again so soon. I follow a Japanese woman who's eating a peach as she walks. The peach is small, it fits the Japanese woman's hands, which are also small, and it fits her mouth, which is so small that it hardly even strikes you as a mouth. After a short while the peach is eaten up; the Japanese woman is holding the pit in her small hands. Or is it called a stone? If I'm not mistaken when I was little I used to call it a stone, but then I started calling it a pit more and more often. Or was it the other way around? Why did I change from stone to pit, when from today's perspective there was absolutely no need to do that? The Japanese woman wraps her peach pit in a tissue. I have to turn left, but because I want to see what the Japanese woman will do with the peach pit (stone), I act a little like I'm just loafing and looking around. O wondrous awe for that which is foreign! The Japanese lady doesn't have the courage to simply toss the peach pit (stone) onto the street or into some garden. She stashes what's left in her tiny purse, which could just as well be called a peach pit pursette. I'm only a few steps away from Margot's. I can't hide my excitement—a silent twitch in my knees gives it away. In the display window of Margot's salon, all three neon tubes are lit. I see the door open and out steps Himmelsbach. That wasn't supposed to happen. Himmelsbach walks off to the right, so he doesn't notice me. In one fell swoop it's clear I can't go see Margot now, too. I probably won't ever be able to again. I can't tell whether Himmelsbach had his hair cut or not. Quietly and fruitlessly I rail against the furtiveness of life. One corner later it occurs to me that without this furtiveness I would have been dead a long time ago. This contradiction leads me to a momentary insight into the stuff of my insanity. If you go crazy someday, I think, it will mean that you've finally been cut by these constantly opening and closing shears. Himmelsbach is wearing a dark slouch hat with a wide brim. Playing the artiste—what ridiculous affectation! Unfortunately I get jealous, right here on the street. At the same time I feel sorry for Himmelsbach. He looks more down and out than in recent days. For a while I follow him aimlessly. Maybe he'll off take his hat, then I'd know for certain. Under no circumstances is he allowed to see me. And I have no desire to talk with him either. I can't let him see that I'm brooding over him and Margot. The best thing would be if he sat down somewhere, took off his hat, and mulled and meditated for a bit. But Himmelsbach doesn't rest and doesn't mull: those are my habits, not his. His pants look as if he'd borrowed them. Himmelsbach reaches into his jacket pocket and takes out a few sunflower seeds. He breaks them one by one with his incisors, using his fingernails to extract the white kernels. Regrettably, I ask myself if Margot is a woman who augments her income with occasional prostitution. But to tell the truth, I don't want to think about problems at all. I've already done that too often in my life, I feel too old for it now. I look for some distraction. I'd like to at least wander around the embankment and look up at the occasional tree and observe the light among the leaves. But the embankment isn't readily available, so I have to content myself with ordinary neighborhood streets. Under no circumstances may I let things get to the point where the only time I find my life bearable is when I'm wandering around. From the way Himmelsbach is walking, I can't tell whether he's just slept with someone or not. For the time being I try to split myself into two people, into a sober rambler who's lost both his work and his woman on the same day, and an active dreamer who doesn't want to hear anything about that. The split succeeds, at least for a while. Already I'm struck by the strong smell of the linden blossoms that must be around here somewhere. Shortly after that a cockeyed dog comes up between two parked cars. I didn't know that cockeyed animals even existed. The dog trots up to me; I can no more look him in the eye than I could a cockeyed human. I'm very grateful to him for the distraction he's providing me. I'm also grateful to a schoolteacher, for the same reason. She's standing at a streetcar stop with a dozen children. Suddenly the teacher says to her pupils: Don't take up so much room, line up more economically! That remark immediately predisposes me against the teacher. I manage to work up an inner indignation such as I haven't had in a long time. Line up more economically, I mumble to myself, words like that are the foundation of misery. The teacher is treating the children like umbrellas or folding chairs that can be stowed here or stashed there as needed. Is it any wonder that people refuse to consent to life from childhood on? Then the split in my consciousness starts to wear off. The experiences I have disowned come back bit by bit. Now my rambling about is no more than a bizarre play of melancholy and numb rigidity. I admit it would be painful if I couldn't see Margot again. I curse her, but that doesn't help. Dear Margot, did you have to hurt me with Himmelsbach of all people? I remember a saying I used to think when I was sixteen years old about nurses, secretaries and hairdressers: Dumb girls fuck good. I didn't come up with it, I was only parroting it, at that time I had no idea about nurses, secretaries, hairdressers or any other women. I try to foist the memory of this saying onto my split doppelgänger, unfortunately without success. The saying only causes me to groan; no one else knows. What I'd like most of all is to go straight to Margot and tell her what an indescribable simpleton I was when I was sixteen. And now I've lost sight of Himmelsbach in the whole mess. I ask myself whether the moods that pass through me are part of my life or not. I'm so dazed and feeble that I run into a parked car with my right knee. I'm put off by two children who cross my path saying choc instead of chocolate. Could this be the beginning of insanity? All the same, I don't want to complain or admonish. Complaining and admonishing are the favorite occupations of ninety-five percent of humanity, and my conceit wants nothing to do with them. I only want to give brief expression to my daily damnation and then go on living. No, it's not the damnation; it's the day's peculiarity I want to get rid of. Just how is it possible that I'm longing for a hairdresser I've met at most a half dozen times and whom I hardly know beyond her first name, that I'm jealous of a photographer who's half on the skids, and that I'm mourning for a job that didn't keep me fed anyway, and all that on a single day? It seems to me I can't go home under the influence of this peculiarity. I sit down on a wooden bench and stare at the nearby brambles, which I admire because they convey nothing except their own enduring. I'd like to be like these brambles. They're there every day, they resist by not disappearing, they don't complain, don't speak, they don't need anything, they're practically invincible. I feel a yearning to take off my jacket and toss it in a high arc into the brambles. Perhaps that way I might connect with some part of their enduring strength. Even the word brambles impresses me. Maybe that is the word for the collective peculiarity of all life, the word I've been searching for all this time. The brambles express my pain without putting any strain on me. I look at the dusty tangle of their leaves, flecked with bird droppings that are either running down or have already hardened, I look at the many branches that have been knocked or torn off by children but persevere undiscouraged, and at the nerve-racking litter that collects around the roots but still doesn't diminish the shrub. When the daily peculiarity starts to get the better of me, I'll come here and toss my jacket into the brambles. I'd like to see the jacket lying among the branches as a sign. A completely clear image and still no one will recognize it. I'll stroll past my jacket whenever I want and be able to marvel at how it remains as invincible as the brambles, despite the fact that it grows older and less handsome with every new pain it absorbs. And I will admire the jacket as my surviving doppelgänger and so free myself from pain, at least for the time being. I can't fully rule out the possibility that I might be going crazy at this moment. What's clear in any case is that if I ever really throw my jacket into the brambles I will have gone crazy for sure. I haven't reached that point yet. I enjoy imagining a play-craziness designed to help me live unperturbed. Now and then the pretend craziness should pass over into a genuine one—just for a few moments—and amplify my distance from reality. Naturally I'd have to be able to return to the game at any time, as soon as the genuine craziness stopped. Presumably this will prove that people can only be happy if they can choose between pretend craziness and genuine craziness whenever they want. In any case I've frequently observed that people are naturally predisposed to mental illness. I'm surprised so few people admit that their normalcy is merely feigned. Even the family walking past me right now is collectively crazy. A husband, wife, and grandma are making fun of a child. The child is still a baby; he's sitting in his carriage and can't do a thing. He can't hold his head up, can't grab things, can't really open his mouth right, can't swallow. Every time the child can't do something (right now he's drooling), the husband, wife or grandma squeals with pleasure. They don't realize that the delight they take in the child is really mocking and crude, though if they looked they might see that the child's fleeting gaze is searching for a faraway refuge. Strangely, my observation of the family lets me find my way back to reality. Only the child sinks deeper into his carriage, one millimeter at a time. I close my jacket and head home. The crazy family walks away, giggling.

     My apartment is sitting there quiet and clueless. I don't feel miserable when I enter the kitchen. The telephone rings, I won't pick up. I take off my jacket and cut a slice of bread. I very much like the way the bread tastes. I take off my glasses and rub my eyes. Just as I'm about to put them back on, my glasses slip out of my hand onto the stone tile of the floor. The edge of the left lens is chipped. I put on my glasses and look at myself in the mirror. It's instantly clear that I won't be getting any new glasses, and that the little chip will become a sign. I go to the telephone and pick up after all. It's Susanne.

     I found a letter from you, she exclaims, that you wrote me eighteen years ago.

     Eighteen years ago? I ask tonelessly.

     Yes, she says, eighteen years ago in August this is how you addressed me: Dearest Susanne…

     But we weren't involved eighteen years ago, were we?

     No, says Susanne, at least nothing happened.

     So what does the letter say? Is it embarrassing?

     No, says Susanne, love is embarrassing for you, but not for me.

     Her answer perplexes me; I say nothing.

     Shall I read it to you?

     No, I say, it's enough for me to read it later.

     You'll soon have a chance to do that, says Susanne, because I want to invite you to a little dinner party I'm having for a few friends and colleagues.

     Do I know them too?

     One or two of them, says Susanne, for example Himmelsbach.

     Oh God, I say, that old stuffed shirt.

     You can't call him that, says Susanne, laughing. Someone I used to work with will be there, too. She's now a sales manager for an upscale retirement home, that must be a dreadful job.

     Susanne lists who else is coming. As I listen to her I sink into a kind of internal numbness. I wonder whether I was with Susanne eighteen years ago or if I only wrote her letters. I can't remember.

     Do you prefer red wine or white? Asks Susanne.

     Red, I say.

     Susanne repeats the time and date of the dinner several times. I write them both down on the edge of a newspaper. I'm sure that I don't want to read the letter I wrote her eighteen years ago. Now Susanne is talking about what she's going to cook. I listen to her and chew on my bread without making any noise. The taste of the rye softens the peculiarity of the fact that I will soon be sharing a table with Himmelsbach.