Freiburg's a terrible place, we agree. But what is it that makes it so terrible? We muse on this for a time. – 'It was rebuilt to look exactly like it was after the war, that's the problem', W. decides, and compares it unfavourably to Plymouth, which was rebuilt in an entirely different style.
W. reminds me of Abercrombie's Plan for Plymouth, published during the war, which saw the city organised in long boulevards, transected by the avenue that runs from the train station to the Hoe. Modernism at its finest, we agree.
But Freiburg's fake. I remind W. of Warsaw, the central part of which was built in an exact replica of what was therefore before the bombing – weren't we at our happiest eating out with our guide in the old square? - 'That's because it was obviously fake', W. says. And then there was the warmth and conviviality of the Poles. – 'The Freiburgers are cold!
Nothing here is historical; nothing has any historical weight. They've lost the past, though they've no idea they've lost it, nor what it might mean to have lost the past. They don't miss it. It's gone the way of its intellectual life: it's a relic, its roots have been entirely cut away.
But what of us, who are likewise without roots? What of us who drift in a haze through European cities. We recognise ourselves here, that's the trouble. Freiburg confirms us in what we are.
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