Susan Bernofsky writes in her introductory essay "Secrets, Not Code: On Robert Susan Bernofsky writes in "Secrets, Not Code: On Robert Walser's Microscripts" that Walser's "writing that initially looked like secret code...turned out to be a radically miniturized Kurrent script, the form of handwriting favored in German-speaking countries until the mid-twentieth century, when it was replaced by a Latinate form similar to that used in English." The recently published "Red Book" by Carl Jung contains many examples of this calligraphic script. Walter Benjamin contribted an essay about Walser's life and work that was first published in 1929.Amazon.com reviews: W. G. Sebald called Robert Walser "a clairvoyant of the small," and nowhere is the phrase more apt than in his "microscripts." Robert Walser wrote many of his manuscripts in a highly enigmatic, shrunken-down form. These narrow strips of paper (many of them written during his hospitalization in the Waldau sanatorium) covered with tiny ant-like markings only a millimeter or two high, came to light only after the author's death in 1956. At first considered a secret code, the microscripts were eventually discovered to be a radically miniaturized form of a German script: a whole story could fit on the back of a business card. Selected from the six-volume German transcriptions from the original microscripts, these 25 short pieces are gathered in this gorgeously illustrated co-publication with the Christine Burgin Gallery. Each microscript is reproduced in full color in its original form: the detached cover of a trashy crime novel, a disappointing letter, a receipt of payment. Sometimes Walser used the pages of small tear-off calendars (but only after cutting them lengthwise and filling up each half with text). Schnapps, rotten husbands, small town life, the radio, pigs (and how none of us can deny being one), jealousy, Van Gogh and marriage proposals are some of Walser's subjects. These texts take strength from Walser's motto: "To be small and to stay small."Ivar Zeile: This is a publishing event to be celebrated for the ages, not only is Walser one of the most unique figures in contemporary thought and literature, but a writer of such worldly knowing his work is simply in a class of its own. The package is elegant, a perfect complement and homage to an underground artist whose understood the complexities of life and was driven to stand outside them in all facets. His reflections are sublime, and the context of the microscripts will bring joy to existing fans of his work while potentially gaining more who I only hope will read the translations of his full-length novels. His work makes more sense now than it ever could have while he wrote. -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.