A Frisch Spring: Rereading Important-to-me Texts

Have lost track of how many times I've read Frisch's Man in the Holocene, but as with all my faves I find something new every time. Liked it so much I've continued on with another Frisch: Montauk. What's below are two "clips" I couldn't resist from Holocene. I have been to Frisch's Berzona, so I could feel it all the more.

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Later in the day there is more thunder; and shortly afterward, hail. The white stones, some of them the size of hazelnuts, dance on the granite table; in a few minutes the lawn is a white sheet, all Geiser can do is stand at the window and watch the vine being torn to shreds, the roses, too— There is nothing to do but read. (Novels are no use at all on days like these, they deal with people and their relationships, with themselves and others, fathers and mothers and daughters or sons, lovers, etc., with individual souls, usually unhappy ones, with society, etc., as if the place for these things were assured, the earth for all time earth, the sea level fixed for all time.)

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Now and again Geiser finds himself wondering what he really wants to know, what he hopes to gain from all this knowledge.