If Only We Were Animals

Life is hard and can easily be too much for even the toughest of individuals to cope with. The world we live in makes excessive demands on us: turning up at work every day with a beaming smile that exudes commitment, struggling with the vicissitudes of public transport and supermarkets. And then, on top of it all, there's our private life to contend with. Even if the whole thing runs more or less smoothly, even with a life that may be deemed halfway successful, there comes a time when a man has had enough. He is a longstanding freelance partner in an architectural office and longstanding boyfriend of Maria. But when he takes on permanent employment, the precarious balance of his life tips out of kilter and before he knows it he has three women on his hands instead of just the one. Oh, if only we were animals! A duck in the park, a friendly dog on the sofa! If only we could just blithely ignore all life's daily impositions! Wilhelm Genazino describes a here-and-now in which we are all out of our depth, and he describes a man who can only withstand the pressure by transgressing the stifling regulatory system. But, inevitably, he is soon found out, and finds himself in prison. Things won't be any easier there … Ironic, funny, incisive - this is Genazino at his best.