Drawing from her 25 years of thinking and writing, the book plots a journey through the works and subjects that have inspired and influenced Jenny Erpenbeck. Written with the same clarity and insight that characterise her fiction, the pieces range from literary criticism and reflections on Germany’s history, to the autobiographical essays where Erpenbeck forgoes the literary cloak to write from a deeply personal perspective about life and politics, hope and despair, and the role of the writer in grappling with these forces. Here we see one of the most searching of European writers reckoning with her country’s divided past in all its complexity, and responding to the world today with insight, intelligence and humanity.