Trafika Europe 11 - Swiss Delights

Matteo Terzaghi

FRONT-PAGE ENCOUNTER

On Saturday, December 16, 2006, a racecar driver and writer found themselves sharing the front page of the Neue Zürcher Zeitung newspaper. Under the first portrait was the headline “Clay Regazzoni Dies in Accident.” Under the second, “Robert Walser Died 50 Years Ago Today.” The racecar driver is shown hoisting a cup skyward, a laurel wreath draped across his chest and a Goodyear cap on his head. The writer’s profile stands out against the rural landscape behind him. He’s wearing a suit too broad for his shoulders, gazing off to the horizon, and his mouth is open, in an expression halfway between surprised and dazed, with perhaps a dash of fear. Both men had moustaches: the former’s thick and black; the latter’s somewhat subtler. When I opened the paper to pages 65 (Art and Literature) and 64 (Sports), I was struck: one side showed Walser’s supine body crumpled in the snow, his hat having rolled two yards away; the other showed a Hollywoodesque portrait of Regazzoni, who’d shaved his moustache off in the meantime. Robert Walser, author of The Walk and hundreds of

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