“Where is Burkina Faso?” he wonders, and is surprised to learn that there are 54 African countries. Odysseus had called himself Nobody to escape from the Cyclops’s cave.” From the opening pages, Erpenbeck makes clear that this cultivated academic knows little about Africa. “He’d liked the notion of making oneself visible by publicly refusing to say who one is. “Why didn’t Richard see these men at Alexanderplatz?” When the anonymous protest is ended, he regards it as a pity. It is only when watching the evening news that he realises he had walked by 10 African men staging a hunger strike. The image of it drifting in the water recurs throughout the novel and is a powerful metaphor for the uncertain existence of the asylum seekers suspended by bureaucracy – forbidden to work, to stay, to make a life. “They say the ill-fated swimmer was wearing goggles.”ĭisturbingly, the body remains lost somewhere beneath the placid surface. Only there is a problem: the lake is less appealing these days. There is even his boat, tethered by a picturesque lake. In his case it is a comfortable home complete with a high-maintenance garden. His self-absorption dictates his daily routines he is Everyman minding his patch. As the novel opens, the former classics professor is dealing with the prospect of retirement.
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