SOURCE: "A Poet Beyond the Pale: Some Notes on the Shorter Works of Robert Walser," in Modern Language Quarterly, Vol. XXIV, No. 2, June, 1963, pp. 181-90.

Avery is a professor of German who has written several works on German literature, including Inquiry and Testament: A Study of the Novels and Short Prose of Robert Walser. In the following excerpt, he discusses Walser's experimentation with a wide variety of forms, which the critic views as a disavowal of literary convention and an attempt to both redefine literature and define the role of an artist isolated from both his society and the traditions of art.

Distrustful, perhaps fearful of fame, jealously insistent on his prerogative of freedom of movement and freedom of spirit, Walser was outwardly disinterested—and artistically too uncompromising—to attempt to secure his own literary fortunes. Throughout his career he refused to align himself with a school or...