Preface / Vladimir Nabokov -- The job / Bertolt Brecht -- The Berlin diaries / Marie Vassiltchikov -- Berlin Alexanderplatz / Alfred Doblin -- Gravity's rainbow / Thomas Pynchon -- Picture postcard, Berlin / Franz Kafka -- The lavender lay / Marcellus Schiffer -- The party at the wall / Bennett Owen -- Julia / Lillian Hellman -- Berlin's general aspect / Karl Baedeker -- A Berlin diary / Christopher Isherwood -- From Berlin to the Folies-Bergere / Josephine Baker -- Berlin letter / Rainer Maria Rilke -- Ritter Gluck / E.T.A. Hoffmann -- The quest for Christa T. / Christa Wolf.