Of Walking in Ice

Of walking in ice : Munich -Paris, 11/23 to 12/14, 1974 is the diary Werner Herzog kept as he walked from Munich to Paris in 1974 as a sort of self-created pilgrimage to save the life of his seriously ill friend, writer and film critic Lotte Eisner. It was published in German in 1978, and then translated and published in English in 1980.

If you have ever heard Herzog speak, or listened to one of his DVD commentaries, it is impossible to read this book and not have his dead-pan German accent echoing through your head. This has the effect of making many passages seem a little more funny than they were probably intended to be, but that isn't a bad thing. I read this documentation of Herzog's tough journey through the wintery German and French countryside during our recent never-ending spell of rain, and since it pretty much never stops raining on him through the entire journey (seriously, in the three weeks there are maybe two hours where he isn't freezing, soaked, and depressed by the grayness of nature and the suspicion of the people), I kind of felt like I was right there with Herzog on his journey.

And apparently it worked, because Eisner didn't die for another nine years...

[Back cover here.]