Commissioner Bärlach, an aging Swiss police inspector, is recovering from surgery in a Bern hospital when he sees a photograph in a magazine of a doctor who, in a concentration camp, operated on prisoners without anesthesia. He suspects that the man is now running a private clinic in Zurich under a new name: Dr. Emmenberger. Bärlach has himself admitted as a patient to find out, and a former prisoner, Gulliver, helps him. Friedrich Dürrenmatt writes a crime novel that turns into a nightmarish confrontation with evil and postwar complacency.
Readers who like crime fiction with philosophical weight, and those interested in how Switzerland and Germany faced the aftermath of Nazi crimes, will find a tense, short novel. It rewards anyone who likes a thriller in which the moral questions matter as much as the plot.
Balanced in tone; a moderate read.
Best for readers like The Story Seeker. Which reader are you?
- Published
- 2004
- Publisher
- Diogenes Verlag
- Language
- DE
