That's no sign of weakness, but a sign you care.

Are bookstore employees like vampires, i.e. they can not be seen on photographs?

Flor

Is your coment a question or a statement?

I guess it's a way of asking why you didn't photograph or rate the bookstore employees. Were they just very uninteresting or was there some kind of restriction on taking photographs? But I guess you could also interpret it as a statement on my views concerning bookstore workers and/or mythological creatures and the connection between those two groups.

Dear Mr. Grünberg, thank you for your answer! But I feel a litte bit blue that you will not be in Berlin. I heard you last november in Potsdam in a bookstore and I thought you will be this year again near here. It is a pity!

Susann, you are so right! Doing a Germany tour and missing Berlin... you better have a very good excuse....

Flor

There were no restrictions -- it was a closed event, open only for book bookstore owners and employees and therefor I decided that the reading was hors concours.

Susann & Elke

Ask Diogenes, my publisher for the German market, why there were no readings in Berlin. Actually the decision to organize a reading is primarily made by the bookstore or "Literaturhaus."
Elke, say hello to your boyfriend from Israel.

I've known an Elke Vermeulen, she lived near to me, sat in the same school, and had her birthday on the same day as me.

Dens Powells

i'm sorry but i must say that your name doesn't ring a bell, are you using a nick-name?
Actually i think you mean some other Elke Vermeulen, since there is a few around (try and google my name: i must be in there somewhere, but couldn't find myself). My parents named me Elke Fleur A. Vermeulen (using a double first name), since i moved to Germany and no German can pronouns that , i decided not to use 'Fleur' anymore, my last name is difficult enough for them.
I'm currious from what school in what country you think to know me!

Why don't you go to Bolivia and write there for a while, instead of smile back at over-appreciative and eager audiences? The dilemma here is not 'friends or customers'. On your deathbed you won't be counting the amount of books you sold (although your heirs may). More likely you'll be wondering whether you managed to get through life without seriously fucking up someone's elses. And if on top of it you've actually succeeded in making someone else happy, (eg your godson) there's a chance you might even feel you've succeeded in life. I'm fully aware -by the way -that you are now going to rip the finger I'm wagging at you off my hand. But hey, for chrissake people, let's start discussing some real issues, okay? I mean books are being banned in Poland and nobody reacted. Arnon, you once said Western culture is in a (I'd like to add the word 'midlife') crisis, This blog is the living proof of that.

Deathbed

Noa, the greatest thing about being death is that you can't worry anymore.

Are you really living up to your own advice? I can't imagine planning my whole life around the guilt I might, or might not feel during my last weeks. It seems rather presumptuous to know what is best in the long run. Personally I do what seems best for today.

Noa

I did mention the situation in Poland, see my post of June 4. Books are not actualy being banned in Poland, the situation there is more complicated and more nuanced, before wagging your finger at me please make sure your information is accurate.
Besides this: if you had listened to my remarks at last Nexus conference last November you would have known that in my opinion the sense of crisis in our culture or civilization is vital for people like you and me. What would we have without a crisis? Emptyness my dear Noa.

@Sander: what you're saying is a no-brainer; nobody ever lives up to their own opinions, judgements and advice now do they? I mean, if we're not allowed to have opinions about anything we don't practice ourselves there wouldn't be writers or journalists.
Of course I don't live up to the standards I depicted, that's not the point. To debate/argue is the point. Sod on't make your reaction about me (easy way out) but about the issue I'm addressing.
@Arnon: yes, I read youre comment on Poland and that's exactly what I was referring to. I didn't mean you, I meant the fact that nobody reacted to the content of your comment. We are lazy and priviliged overconsuming navelgazing individuals. (please note Sander, I said WE, so no I'm not pretending to be anything I'm not).