The Assistant
Rights sold to:
English world rights (New Directions), Spanish world rights (Siruela, Paperback Sublicense: Debolsillo, Latin American Sublicense: El Hilo de Ariadna), Catalan rights (Ed. 1984), Portuguese rights (Relogio d’Agua), France (Gallimard; French paperback sublicence: Éditions Zoë), Italy (Einaudi), Netherlands (Koppernik), Sweden (Modernista), Norway (Bokvennen), Finland (Teos), Japan (Choeisha), Poland (PIW), Czech Republic (Opus), Hungary (Scolar), Estonia (Perioodika), Lithuania (Pradai), Slovenia (Mihelač), Turkey (Can), Albania (Asdreni), Georgia (Ibis), Azerbaijan (Alatoran)
Previously published in the respective language / territory; rights available again: Brazilian Portuguese rights (Siciliano de Livros), Bulgaria (G. Danov)The Assistant / Der Gehülfe
Robert Walser is an overwhelmingly original author with many ardent fans: J.M. Coetzee (»dazzling«), Guy Davenport (»a very special kind of whimsical-serious-deep writer«), and Hermann Hesse (»If he had a hundred thousand readers, the world would be a better place«). Charged with compassion, and an utterly unique radiance of vision, Walser is as Susan Sontag exclaimed »a truly wonderful, heart-breaking writer.«
The Assistant is his breathtaking 1908 novel, translated by...
The Assistant is his breathtaking 1908 novel, translated by...
Read more
Robert Walser is an overwhelmingly original author with many ardent fans: J.M. Coetzee (»dazzling«), Guy Davenport (»a very special kind of whimsical-serious-deep writer«), and Hermann Hesse (»If he had a hundred thousand readers, the world would be a better place«). Charged with compassion, and an utterly unique radiance of vision, Walser is as Susan Sontag exclaimed »a truly wonderful, heart-breaking writer.«
The Assistant is his breathtaking 1908 novel, translated by award-winning translator Susan Bernofsky. Joseph, hired to become an inventor's new assistant, arrives one rainy Monday morning at Technical Engineer Karl Tobler's splendid hilltop villa: he is at once pleased and terribly worried, a state soon followed by even stickier psychological complexities. He enjoys the beautiful view over Lake Zurich, in the company of the proud wife, Frau Tobler, and the delicious savory meals. But does he deserve any of these pleasures? The Assistant chronicles Joseph's inner life of cascading emotions as he attempts, both frantically and light-heartedly, to help the Tobler household, even as it slides toward financial ruin. Tobler demands of Joseph, »Do you have your wits about you?!«And Joseph's wits are in fact all around him, trembling like leaves in the breeze – he is full of exuberance and despair, all the raptures and panics of a person »drowning in obedience.« (book description from the English edition by New Directions)
1908, 315 pages
Persons
Robert Walser
Author
Robert Walser was born in Biel/Bienne in Switzerland in 1878 and died on a solitary walk in the snow on Christmas Day 1956, near the Herisau sanitarium.
Robert Walser
Author
Robert Walser was born in Biel/Bienne in Switzerland in 1878 and died on a solitary walk in the snow on Christmas Day 1956, near the Herisau...
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OTHER PUBLICATIONS
Latest first
Year of Publication: 2019
Robert WalserYear of Publication: 2019
A Slap in the Face and Other Matters
Robert Walser has always inspired visual artists all around the world, including Thomas Hirschhorn, one of the most provocative and innovative contemporary artists, to whom Robert Walser is a...
Rights sold to:
Spanish world rights (Siruela)
Year of Publication: 2018
Robert WalserYear of Publication: 2018
Letters 1-3
Robert Walser as a letter-writer is yet to be discovered. His letters are not merely the private backboard to his work, but an integral part of it. Therefore, the Bern Edition of Walser’s Works opens with a new, comprehensive edition of his letters. They provide insight to the existential conditions of Walser’s »life as a poet« between Zurich, Berlin, Biel, Bern and Herisau.
In...
Year of Publication: 2011
Robert WalserYear of Publication: 2011
Microscripts
It is well known that Robert Walser jotted down prose texts, poems and dramatic scenes on more than 500 pieces of paper between 1924 and 1933 in a script that, for decades, was considered...
Rights sold to:
Selections from the Microscripts have been published in several languages. For further information regarding the rights status of individual texts in your territory please contact the respective Rights Manager
Year of Publication: 2011
Robert WalserYear of Publication: 2011
In the Office
Like the office satires of Melville, Gogol, or Kafka, Robert Walser’s short stories about office clerks, collected here for the first time, offer a similarly illuminating and exhilarating light...
Rights sold to:
English world rights (New Directions), Spanish world rights (Siruela), Italy (Adelphi), Bulgaria (Funtasy), Turkey (Profil)
Domestic rights sales: German Audiobook (Diogenes)
Year of Publication: 1972
Robert WalserYear of Publication: 1972
The Robber
»The Robber, Robert Walser’s last novel, tells the story of a dreamer on a journey of self-discovery. It is a hybrid of love story, tragedy, and farce, with a protagonist who sweet-talks...
Rights sold to:
English world rights (University of Nebraska Press), Spanish world rights (Siruela), France (Gallimard), Italy (Adelphi), Netherlands (Koppernik), Sweden (Faethon), Poland (PIW), Czech Republic (Opus), Latvia (Orbita), Turkey (Can), Ukraine (Zhupansky), Azerbaijan (Alatoran)
Previously published in the respective language / territory; rights available again: Portuguese rights (Relogio d'Agua), Denmark (Basilisk), Norway (Bokvennen), Slovenia (Nova Revija)
Year of Publication: 1925
Robert WalserYear of Publication: 1925
The Rose
In The Rose (1925), a collection of short stories, travelogues, fairy tales, dialogues and monologues, literary and humorous observations, the last of the fifteen books that Robert Walser...
Rights sold to:
Spanish world rights (Siruela), Portuguese rights (Relogio d’Agua), France (Gallimard), Italy (Adelphi), Sweden (selection; Ariel – pp), Hungary (Napkut)
Previously published in the respective language / territory; rights available again: Slovenia (Serpa)
Year of Publication: 1917
Robert WalserYear of Publication: 1917
The Walk
A pseudo-biographical »stroll« through town and countryside rife with philosophic musings, The Walk has been hailed as the masterpiece of Walser's short prose. Walking features heavily in...
Rights sold to:
USA (New Directions), UK (Serpent’s Tail), Spanish world rights (Siruela), Catalan rights (El Flâneur), Galician rights (Laiovento), Russia (Ad Marginem), Brazilian Portuguese rights (Editora 34), France (Gallimard), Italy (Adelphi), Netherlands (Lebowski/Dutch Media Group), Denmark (Batzer), Sweden (Faethon), Finland (Teos), Czech Republic (Opus), Slovakia (Premedia), Bulgaria (Critique & Humanism), Croatia (Fraktura / Bodoni), Greece (Gavrilidis), Kosovo / Albanian rights (Pa), Ukraine (Meridian Czernowitz Literature Foundation), Georgia (Ibis), Armenia (Antares), Azerbaijan (Alatoran), Iran (Dastan)
Previously published in the respective language / territory; rights available again: Chinese simplex rights (Shanghai Translation), Norway (Bokvennen), Hungary (Magvetö), Romania (Univers), Estonia (Tänapäev), Belorussia (Logvinau)
Domestic Rights Sales: Audiobook rights (Universal Music / Deutsche Grammophon)
Year of Publication: 1914
Robert WalserYear of Publication: 1914
Short Prose
This volume of short prose, published as Kleine Dichtungen in 1914, was written in the years Robert Walser spent in Berlin and Biel; the collection of prose miniatures shows a broad cross...
Rights sold to:
France (Éditions Zoé), Poland (selection; Officyna)
Previously published in the respective language / territory; rights available again: Italy (Einaudi), Slovak Republic (Hronka), Hungary (Napkut)
Year of Publication: 1909
Robert WalserYear of Publication: 1909
Jakob von Gunten
»The Swiss writer Robert Walser is one of the quiet geniuses of twentieth-century literature. Largely self-taught and altogether indifferent to worldly success, Walser wrote a range of short stories,...
Rights sold to:
English world rights (Serpent’s Tail / NYRB), Spanish world rights (Siruela), Catalan rights (Quaderns Crema), Basque rights (Erein), Brazilian Portuguese rights (Companhia das Letras), Portuguese rights (Relogio d’Agua), France (Gallimard), Italy (Adelphi), Netherlands (Lebowski), Denmark (Virkelig), Sweden (Faethon), Norway (Bokvennen), Finland (Teos), Iceland (Translation Centre at the University of Iceland), Japan (Choeisha), Thailand (Lighthouse Publishing), Poland (PIW), Czech Republic (Opus), Hungary (Scolar), Estonia (Tänapäev), Latvia (Mansards), Lithuania (Vaga), Croatia (Naprijed), Serbia (Ultimatum.rs), Slovenia (Beletrina), Bosnia (Gong), Turkey (Dogan), Greece (Printa), Macedonia (Templum), Albania (Pika pa sipërfaqe), Georgia (Ibis)
Domestic Rights Sales: German Audiobook (DAV)
Previously published in the respective language/territory; rights available again: Bulgaria (Narodna Kultura),
Year of Publication: 1907
Robert WalserYear of Publication: 1907
The Tanners
»The Tanners, Robert Walser’s amazing 1907 novel of twenty chapters, is now presented in English for the very first time, by the award-winning translator Susan Bernofsky. Three...
Rights sold to:
English world rights (New Directions), Spanish world rights (Siruela, Paperback Sublicense: Debolsillo), Catalan rights (Proa), Russia (Text), Brazilian Portuguese rights (Companhia das Letras), Portuguese rights (Relogio d’Agua), France (Gallimard), Italy (Adelphi), Netherlands (Koppernik), Sweden (Faethon), Norway (Bokvennen), Japan (Choeisha), Poland (PIW), Czech Republic (Opus), Slovakia (Smena), Hungary (Scolar), Estonia (Loomingu Raamatukogu), Slovenia (Pan), Bosnia (Connectum), Turkey (Can), Greece (Printa), Georgia (Ibis), India (Hindi), Israel (Am Oved)
Previously published in the respective language/territory; rights available again: Bulgaria (Colibri)
Year of Publication: 1904
Robert WalserYear of Publication: 1904
Fritz Kocher’s Essays
These essays, allegedly published from the estate of a deceased schoolboy, mark the beginning of Robert Walser’s literary career.
Rights sold to:
English world rights (NYRB), Russia (Libra), Portuguese rights (Bazarov Edições), France (Gallimard; French paperback sublicence: Éditions Zoë), Italy (Adelphi), Poland (PIW), Hungary (Napkut), Greece (Kritiki), Israel (Hakibbutz Hameuchad)
Previously published in the respective language / territory; rights available again: Spain (Pre-Textos), Latin America (Editorial Universitario), Catalan rights (Acantilado), Netherlands (De Arbeiderspers), Denmark (Arena), Korea (EU), Japan (Choeisha), Slovenia (Serpa)
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