In Case of Loss gathers the best of Lutz Seiler’s non-fiction from the last twenty-five years, revealing his essays to be different to, but on a par with, his fiction and poetry. Seiler’s beautifully anecdotal and associative pieces throw fascinating light on literature and his background, not least the environmental and human catastrophe of the Soviet-era mining in the community he grew up in, ‘the tired villages . . . beneath which lay the ore, uranium.’ Other essays focus on poetry, including his discovery of poetry during his military service and pieces on German poets, including Ernst Meister, Jürgen Becker and Peter Huchel, whose former house, outside Berlin, is now home to Lutz Seiler, after he broke and entered it with Huchel’s widow’s blessing. Meanwhile, the title essay – a fascinating insight into creative process – describes Huchel’s notebook, a kind of dictionary of poetic images organised by mood and location.