Midsummer Night, by Uwe Timm
translated by Peter Tegel
New Directions Press, 1998
Midsummer Night tries to do for Berlin what A Year in Provence did for, well, Provence. Timm loosely strings a series of vignettes together to give an overall impression of the quirkiness of a city that is rapidly changing.
I was lucky enough to find myself in Berlin just after finishing this novel, and can attest to the overwhelming number of cranes and workers preparing this city for its returned role as Germany's seat of government. The book cover's juxtaposing of cranes behind the chariot atop the Brandenburg Gates is no stretch of the actual view from the roof of the Reichstag.
I, however, did not bump into nearly as many eccentric characters, although I found people to be just as open with me -- a complete stranger -- about their lives as with the main character Timm follows through various anecdotal events. The Russian street vendors, the still-present animosity between the East Berliners and the West Berliners, are there. If I had searched hard enough, I probably could have found a lonely transvestite and some arms dealers as well.
The so-called plot that holds the anecdotes together is all-too-convenient, and I actually would have preferred if Timm had left the novel as just a collection of short takes of the city. As it is, the plot revolves around a writer assigned to a story about rare varieties of potatoes, and who is searching out the archives of a recently deceased potato expert.
The plot really doesn't matter, so long as you read this book with no expectations, except for a quirky, amusing way to pass the time on your flight to . . . you guessed it . . . Berlin.
