» The Capital delivers, within a brilliant satirical fiction, thoughtful and instructive analysis of both the weaknesses in the EU that galvanise leavers and the strengths that motivate remainers Readers may understandably feel that a novel about the EU is the last thing they need just now but if so they will miss a first-class read.« The Guardian Menasse writes not about the way things should be but about the way things are, rare enough these days.« Dwight Garner, The New York Times It carries the wisdom and weight and weariness of late middle age. ✽rolly comic A major book about coincidences, of linked and overlapping meanings This is a deeply humane novel, a novel for adults. And yes, there are others who are unhappy as well: the pig farmers who take to the streets with pitchforks in protest of the existing trade restrictions blocking the profitable export of pigs’ ears to China He would rather have become ordained a priest the fact that he had to follow his father’s and grandfather’s footsteps in becoming a »soldier of Christ«, doesn’t really make him happy. But he does know that he shot the wrong guy. Matek, the Polish hitman, knows nothing of this when he makes his escape. But luckily he is friends with the chief computer scientists of the Brussels Police Department, who can gain access to the secret files of the public prosecutor‘s office. He is supposed to leave a murder case covered up at the highest level at rest. Inspector Brunfaut is in a difficult situation as well. What’s more, Fenia can’t count on David de Vriend, one of the last living witnesses, any longer: he runs to the metro station Maalbeek at the wrong time.

Germany: Islam, by now a part of Germany, had nothing to do with Auschwitz. Austria: a Polish camp could not be misused to question the Austrian nation. Fenia is thrilled, but she didn’t take the other European nations into account. Her Austrian personal assistant Martin Susmann suggests proclaiming Auschwitz as the birthplace of the European Commission.

So the ✻ig Jubilee Project« comes just at the right time for her: she is to revamp the boring image of the European Commission. She has been »promoted« to the Department of Culture by the Directorate General – no budget, no power, no reputation. In his new novel, Robert Menasse spans a narrative arc between the times, the nations, the inevitable and the irony of fate, between petty bureaucracy and big emotions.įenia Xenapoulou is facing a career setback.

A panorama of tragic heroes, manipulative losers, involuntary accomplices.

Robert menasse the capital