Write a story about me
, Agnes says to her lover, "so I know what you think of me." It was true there were no decent photographs of Agnes, so she sat for the writer, as if having a portrait taken - he studying her intently from his computer.
He began to write down everything that had happened to them from the moment they had met at the Chicago Public Library. Now the borders of fiction and non-fiction are beginning to strain as the writer reads each chapter to Agnes and finds that the two of them remember events differently. As the computer story rushes reality's pace and moves into the future, it becomes clear that life will not always lie down and imitate art.
Peter Stamm has created a heady atmosphere in which to investigate human contact and isolation and the act of artistic creativity. The playful and profound twists of his narrative are dexterously negotiated in a limpid transaction by Michael Hofmann.
