A G U I D E T O B E R L I N

Transcription

1 A G U I D E T O B E R L I N

2 Also by Gail Jones Sixty Lights Dreams of Speaking Sorry Five Bells

3 A G U I D E T O B E R L I N GAIL JONES H a r v i l l S e c k e r L O N D O N

4 Harvill Secker, an imprint of Vintage, 20 Vauxhall Bridge Road, London SW1V 2SA A Vintage book Published Harvill by Secker Random is House part Australia of the Pty Penguin Ltd Random House Level group 3, 100 of Pacific companies Highway, North whose Sydney addresses NSW 2060can be found at global.penguinrandomhouse.com. First published by Vintage in 2015 Copyright Gail Jones 2015 Copyright Gail Jones 2015 The moral right of the author has been asserted. Gail Jones has asserted her right to be identified All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted by any person as the or author entity, including of this internet Work search in accordance engines retailers, with in any the form or by any Copyright, means, electronic Designs or mechanical, and Patents including Act photocopying 1988 (except under the statutory exceptions provisions of the Australian Copyright Act 1968), recording, scanning or by any information storage and retrieval system without the prior Quotation written permission from of Random A Busy House Man Australia. by Vladimir Nabokov. Copyright Article 3C under the Will of Vladimir Nabokov Random House 1965, Books 1966, is part of used the Penguin by permission Random House of group of companies whose addresses can be found at global.penguinrandomhouse.com. The Wylie Agency (UK) Limited. National Library of Australia First Cataloguing-in-Publication published by Harvill entry Secker in 2016 First Jones, Gail, published 1955 author in Australia by Vintage, Penguin A guide to Berlin/Gail Random Jones House Australia in 2015 ISBN (paperback) Interpersonal relations Fiction A Interpersonal CIP catalogue communication record Fiction for this book Berlin (Germany) Fiction is available from the British Library A823.3 ISBN Front cover image Gail Jones Cover design by Sandy Cull, gogogingko Printed Typeset 12.5/16.5 and bound pt Fairfield by by Clays Midland Ltd, Typesetters, St Ives Australia plc Printed in Australia by Griffin Press, an accredited ISO AS/NZS 14001:2004 Environmental Management System printer Penguin Random House is committed to a sustainable Random House Australia future uses for papers our business, that are natural, our renewable readers and recyclable and products our and planet. made from This wood book grown is in made sustainable from forests. The logging and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental Forest regulations Stewardship of the country of Council origin. certified paper.

5 (What I hate) Folding an umbrella, not finding its secret button. Vladimir Nabokov, Interview, 1970

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7 1 It was Marco Gianelli who spoke in the darkness. When they were all standing together, shocked and numb, when they saw each other s faces remade as rogues, pinched, white, shrivelled inwards with guilt, dull with logistics and the banal business of dragging dead weight, he was the only one among them who was able to speak. He raised his arm in the snowy air and with this gesture assembled them. He asked them to pause. There was a moment in which all they did was wait. Snowfall enshrouded them. A feeble wind spun the flakes. They heard traffic in the night, muffled and distant, they heard the heave of each other s raspy breath. It was a formal speech, really, absurd in the circumstances. Marco said that the death of any human was without metaphor or likeness. The death of any human was incomparable. It was not a writerly event. It was not contained within sentences. It was not to be described in the same way as the beauty of an icicle, or three wrinkles parallel on the forehead of a remembered governess, or the play of shadow 1

8 and light on a swimming body, or the random harmony of trifles that was a parking meter, a fluffy cloud and a tiny pair of boots with felt spats. 2