Walking in Berlin

‘Like a private invitation back to the city’s most beguiling era …  Irreverent and yet always enthusiastic, [Hessel’s] 88-year-old love letter to this city is a true map of the traces of a bygone world.’

-- Vanessa Thorpe * The Observer Magazine *

‘Captures a portrait of a city on the brink of irrevocable change … Hessel was both detailed chronicler of the present, and a man keenly aware of the city’s history … Apt then that Walking in Berlin now joins this historical hall of fame.’

-- Lucy Scholes * The Independent *

‘[Walking in Berlin] is not only an important record of old Berlin; it is a testimony to its enduring spirit.’

-- Harry Strawson * TLS *

‘An absolutely epic book, a walking remembrance.’

* Walter Benjamin *

‘Hessel’s conversational style and subtle insights evoke Weimar Berlin and reveal a great deal about the Germany of his days.’

-- Eileen Battersby * The Irish Times *

‘Walking in Berlin is a magical mystery tour of a city on the brink of upheaval. Hessel may have wandered haphazardly but he wrote with purpose, never once losing his way.’

-- Malcolm Forbes * Sunday Herald *

‘Hessel is a modest master of spontaneous observation.’

-- Sabine Vogel * Berliner Zeitung *

‘Hessel’s warm enthusiasm for his home town informs every page, and provides the reader with a geographical guide that still holds value, despite the enormous changes in the city. More than that, though, it evokes a time that, although just about within living memory, seems almost as remote as the nineteenth-century Berlin of Schinkel.’

* Shiny New Books *

'A newly rediscovered treasure.’

* Die Welt *

‘To this day, there is no better Berlin travel guide.’

-- Peter von Becker * Tagesspiegel *

‘Beautiful … a classic observation of the German city in the late 1920s that illuminates many of the historic shadows and provides a wonderful map for modern-day wanderings.’

* Sydney Morning Herald *

‘When you think of Berlin in the 1920s, you cannot avoid thinking of the storyteller, critic and translator Franz Hessel.’

* Manfred Papst recommends Spazieren in Berlin in the Neue Züricher Zeitung *

‘Walking in Berlin can be read lightly as a postcard from the past; it should be read seriously as an inexhaustible record of all that Berlin was and might have been, as an enthralling guide to a wealth of references, sidetracks, lost paths … This is a first encounter with the myth and the reality of that intangible fantastic beast of a city.’

Mika Provata-Carlone, Bookanista -- Mika Provata-Carlone * Bookanista *

‘Hessel is a feisty, clever, and witty guide to Berlin; his prose is animated and sumptuous and his perceptions glamorously lyrical. For anyone who knows the geography of Berlin, this book is an especial treat.’

-- Sail Jones * Saturday Age *

‘A timely ode to a good meander and [Hessel’s] home city [Berlin].’

* Wanderlust *

‘Hessel’s wanderings in the Weimar-era German capital mix social commentary with artistic and architectural analysis … his musings offer a fresh set of eyes.’

* GQ *

‘[A] sprawling panorama of cultural memory and miscellany, a vibrant catalog of metropolitan life, and a seismograph of a city on the verge of disaster.’

* Los Angeles Review of Boo