This is another posthumous, thematically-linked collection of writings by the great Swiss eccentric, in this case picking up on his fascination with winter, snow, and Christmas, which runs right through from his early lyric poems to the micrograms of his later years. The editors make much of the way the romantic death of the poet Sebastian in Geschwister Tanner seems to prefigure Walser's own death on a solitary Christmas walk in the snow fifty years later: however, common-sense suggests that we shouldn't read any more into that than the fact that Walser still took the same pleasure in winter weather that he had as a young man.

What shines out of all the pieces is Walser's unique ability, under the cover of a layer of deprecating irony, to capture naive, childlike reactions to the things he experiences. He seems to work rather like a post-impressionist painter, simplifying and universalising what he sees (and hears, and smells, and feels) without losing sight of the essential details that help us to keep a hold of it imaginatively.

Possibly it is a bit cruel to pack together a writer's descriptions of the same things, published in quite different contexts over a period of some forty years, into such a compact mass, where we can't help seeing certain images and descriptive quirks coming back over and over again. But this would be a great little book for dipping into, and it would certainly make an excellent "Christmas book". ( )