So the nondescript, enigmatic mister Utz is a somewhat-obsessed collector of antique porcelain, which is to say he suffers from Porzellankrankheit, and is a sort of a Bartleby the Scrivener in Communist Prague, and we and the narrator visit him and learn a bit about his whys and wherefores (such as they are, and they are indeed, as we slowly discover and come to understand, though Utz remains essentially ungraspable throughout) including his living situation: If this were so: if, to the eighteenth-century imagination, porcelain was not just another exotic, but a magical and talismanic substance- the substance of longevity, of potency, of invulnerability- then it was easier to understand why the King would stuff a palace with forty thousand pieces. Or guard the 'arcanum' like a secret weapon. Or swap the six hundred giants. Orlìk, studioso di arte rinascimentale, sulle tracce dell'Imperatore Rodolfo II viene a contatto con Utz; ed è Orlìk a raccontarci dunque la vita solitaria dell'appassionato e maniacale collezionista sempre in fuga tra Praga, Dresda, Vichy per riuscire a conservare intatto il suo fragile tesoro; finché situazioni varie lo portano a una decisione drastica. Peccato che Chatwin non abbia mai saputo del ritorno "in circolazione" della collezione Meissen di Just, il tesoro che sembrava svanito nel nulla...

The room, to my surprise, was decorated in the 'modern style': almost devoid of furniture apart from a daybed, a glass-topped table and a pair of Barcelona chairs upholstered in dark green leather. Utz had 'rescued' these in Moravia, from a house built by Mies van der Rohe. Un'ultima annotazione va alla scrittura colta e raffinata di Chatwin: amo i libri che fanno conoscere nuovi mondi e insegnare nuove cose; amo ancor di più i libri che sanno stimolare il lettore ad affrontare nuove letture: La montagna incantata di Thomas Mann, La signora col cagnolino di Cechov, e ancora Zweig, Schnitzler, e per finire L'immoralista di André Gide: la mia piccola collezione dopo la lettura di questo romanzo. Sakyčiau itin nišinė knyga, kuri patiks sofistikuotam skaitytojui. Maloniai jaučiasi Mariaus Buroko braižas. Juntamas britiškas lakoniškumas ir tam tikras savotiškas humoras (scena restorane su neteisingai parašytu žodžiu privertė kvatotis balsu). Keistai nustebino brito autoriaus puikus išmanymas ir pajautimas Rytų Europos realybės. Puikiai pavyko atskleisti atsmosferą ir to laikotarpio išskirtinumus. A very peculiar, fine-and-fragile narrative that is equal parts emotionally and intellectually stimulating, wonderfully witty, by turns profoundly philosophical and satirical. One by one, he lifted the characters of the Commedia from the shelves, and placed them in the pool of light where they appeared to skate over the glass of the table, pioting on their bases of gilded foam, as if they would forever go on laughing, whirling, improvising.Utz is impeccably written and descriptive. The scene in the apartment with Utz and those scenes secretly discussing art in the shadows of St Vitus Cathedral are so vivid. Utz alla fine si rovina la vita rimanendo aggrappato ed intrappolato dalla meravigliosa collezione che non si sente di abbandonare; è come se fosse la collezione a possedere lui, piuttosto che il viceversa. Even more, the pieces act much as the Golem in the Jewish legends of Prague - to protect, if not one’s body, at least one’s mind from the threats of power which abound in life. So, for Utz, “this world of little figures was the real world.” And like the Golem, and for that matter Adam himself, isn’t porcelain created from clay and water? These precisely crafted fragments of clay are our links to the supernatural which permit us to ignore the minor irritations of bureaucrats and customs officials no matter how expertly applied. “‘So you see,' said Utz, 'not only was Adam the first human person. He was also the first ceramic sculpture’.” Porcelain is a philosophy of primal mankind, of freedom. The narrator first came to Prague to research a book about the psychology of collectors - which drew him to Utz, a Jewish man possibly descended from some minor Saxon nobility, and his passion for collecting porcelain. His devotion to Meissen porcelains is without parallel - during the war, he gave away all his other earthly belongings to secure a Czechoslovak passport and residence in Prague. The narrator meets with Utz, who talks with him about porcelain, alchemy and golems; much of the book is satire on the absurdity of totalitarian regimes of the 20th century, one of which Utz had to live in. This is best seen in the opening scene of the book - which, by the nature of being a funeral, should have been sad; but because the funeral takes place in 1974 in Czechoslovakia, it's darkly humorous. A man asks the narrator if he can play the organ, and upon hearing a negation he admits that he can't either, and resignedly goes to do exactly that. A cleaning woman refuses to move for the coffin bearers, and they have to go around her - and they have to hurry, as the state has ruled that all Christian rituals have to be done by 8.30 AM. There are many more such examples in the book, but I'll leave the fun of discovering to prospective readers. Perché come Utz sosteneva, un oggetto chiuso nella teca di un museo deve patire l'innaturale esistenza di un animale in uno zoo. In ogni museo l'oggetto muore - di soffocamento e degli sguardi del pubblico -, mentre il possesso privato conferisce al proprietario il bisogno di toccare. Come un bimbo allunga la mano per toccare ciò di cui pronuncia il nome, così il collezionista appassionato restituisce all'oggetto, gli occhi in armonia con la mano, il tocco vivificante del suo artefice. Il nemico del collezionista è il conservatore del museo. In teoria, i musei dovrebbero essere saccheggiati ogni cinquant'anni e le loro collezioni dovrebbero tornare in circolazione...

It begins after a while to resemble a book of motettes and anecdotes like the report of a long bibulous lunch of some affable, upper-class, well-educated friends - interesting and at the same time both tiresome and tedious. How can one INVENT porcelain!!!!! (should that be RE-INVENT at least). One can rediscover the method of manufacture of porcelain but it's not something you invent ferfuxache. And Porcelain as the Body of Christ!!!! Jesus wept!!!! It is worth reading the wiki on the history of porcelain. Utz is no avaricious materialist. Collecting is a spiritual endeavour that involves treating individual pieces as if they were icons that promote entry into another world. Such appreciation is impossible in a museum or public gallery where the pieces “must suffer the de-natured existence of an animal in the zoo. In any museum the object dies —of suffocation and the public gaze -whereas private ownership confers on the owner the right and the need to touch.” His obsession with porcelain is a quest “to find the substance of immortality.” But a collection of such objects is also a constant reminder of one’s own mortality: “These things are the changeless mirror in which we watch ourselves disintegrate. Nothing is more ageing than a collection of works of art.” The collection presents both concrete reality and existential hope for the one oppressed by power.. I'm savoring it and am trying to finish it with a suitable mindset- hushed, receptive and open. Like...I don't know...a collector of antique porcelain might be. (Sorry if you already know what I'm talking about, I had to do it)Man leidyklos "Lapas" knygos kaip gurmaniškas skanėstas - visad žinai, kad bus kažkas neeilinio, kitokio, įdomaus. Paskutinė skaityta "Šaltinis" iki šiol į mane žvelgia iš lentynos ir primena su kokiu didžiuliu malonumu ją suskaičiau. "Lapas" leidėjai patikino, kad ir "Utzas" turėtų patikti. Buvo teisūs.

In un lungo ricordo, l'io narrante del romanzo, lo stesso Chatwin appunto, cerca di scoprire che fine abbia fatto la preziosa collezione dopo la morte di Utz: quella stessa collezione che l'eccentrico protagonista aveva difeso con grande forza e determinazione, dal nazismo e dalla guerra prima e dal comunismo e dal marxismo poi, che sembra ora essersi volatilizzata o addirittura, nonostante le fitte maglie della burocrazia comunista, andata distrutta. I’ve read a lot of Bruce Chatwin and enjoyed all of it, but I’ve so far limited myself to his ostensibly non-fiction works. (Admittedly, the line between fiction and non-fiction is a hazy one with Chatwin, but I’m thinking here of his travelogues like In Patagonia.) Curiously, then, it was a work of non-fiction, Frederik Sjoberg’s The Fly Trap, that sparked my interest in Utz as an example of Chatwin-the-novel-writer. No. He was not a spy. As he explained to me in the course of our afternoon stroll, Czechoslovakia was a pleasant place to live, providing one had the possibility of leaving. At the same time he admitted, with a self-deprecating smile, that his severe case of Porzellankheit prevented him from leaving for good. The collection held him prisoner.Kartais ekscentriškumas pašvinksta, esu tai patyrus gyvenime. Bet šitoj knygoj viskas labai šviežia ir gaivu. Das kleine Büchlein hat mich mit Chatwin versöhnt, dessen Traumpfade ich als Teenager vergeblich versuchte zu lesen. Utzas bjaurėjosi smurtu, tačiau džiaugėsi visais kataklizmais, dėl kurių į rinką plūstelėdavo naujų meno kūrinių." (23p.)