The Questionable Ones (Swiss List)

A brilliant collection of micro-fiction, reflecting our fragmented times.
 
With quirky humor and wry insight, Swiss author Judith Keller’s micro-fictions unravel the fabric of daily life. She delves into the aporia of language by taking idiomatic expressions literally, unpacking the multiple meanings of words, and confounding expectations. Seven Zurich tram stops provide the framework for these familiar yet absurd portraits of passers-by, fellow passengers on the tram, the unemployed and the overemployed, the innocent and the suspicious, young mothers and confused elderly. The reader is taken on a journey through the city and offered glimpses of people going more or less successfully about their lives. These deceptively banal glimpses, however, show us more than we expect—they turn the lens back on us, puncture our complacency and ask, "Who are you to judge?"

The characters are hapless and far-fetched, trying to find their footing on shifting ground and grateful for what happiness they can find. In just a sentence or two, Keller unlocks metaphysical trapdoors. The Questionable Ones offers a collection of snapshots that reveal the extraordinary lurking inside the ordinary and the ordinary at the core of the extraordinary.
 

 

Judith Keller studied German language and literature in Zurich as well as literary writing at the Swiss Literature Institute in Biel and the German Literature Institute in Leipzig. The German original of The Questionable Ones won awards from both the City of Zurich and the Canton of Zurich, and was also performed as a theater production and featured as an audio play for Swiss radio.

Tess Lewis’s numerous translations from French and German include works by Peter Handke, Jean-Luc Benoziglio, Klaus Merz, Hans Magnus Enzensberger, and Pascal Bruckner.