Let me tell you about my study, here in Berlin. It is not yet fully equipped, yet it remains beautiful and livable. My books are all here, and even in these harsh times they have increased over the years from twelve hundred to more than two thousand—and I have not kept many old ones. The room has its peculiarities, I will admit. For one thing, it has no desk; in the course of time, and partly because of circumstances—not only my habit of working a good deal in cafés but also various associations that haunt my memory of the old writing-desk ways—I have reached the point of writing only while lying down. From my predecessor in this flat, I have inherited a sofa that is wonderfully adequate for my purposes, although for sleeping it seems useless.