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Uli Hoeneß Der Präsident des FC Bayern München am Tisch seines Büros in der Helmut Schmidt Der Bundeskanzler am provisorischen Arbeitstisch im Salonwagen
Geschäftsstelle, Säbener Straße, am 22. Februar 2008. des Wahlkampf-Sonderzugs im Wahljahr 1980.

easily looses the overview. The confusing aspect is that powerful people are not always bed – Albert Einstein described exactly that almost 100 years ago. Many poets composed
lacking intellect, and great minds are not always without will to power. Sometimes, the their best and most constant works in cafés, many thoughts never conceived before took
latter even exercise power – they can be captive, and sometimes they are even more dan- shape on the back of a horse or when walking. Such thoughts will also arrive at a desk,
gerous. Brilliant eloquence can become an advocate of suppression, inventive intelli- but only later. Today there is the possibility to almost unite the place of stimulation with
gence can make evil concepts even more evil. Intellect is not an attitude controlled by the place of writing it down. The brain needs more pictures than the ones that can find
ethics at all times; on the other hand, moral is not always intellect: moral, in particular, a place on the office walls. And it is no cultural break if we are able to write down every-
often comes along with massive insipidness. It’s not the fault of the desk itself. It might thing we think of in the open, via keyboard or by hand, ready to be scanned and printed.
be a breeding ground of ambition, garden of wisdom, fortress of triviality, it certainly is
the traditional place for the fresh look at truths and courageous departures. Maybe we What remains?
soon have to tell ourselves: It once was all that, because now the good old piece has had
its day. Notebook and tablet are almost all in one, they are a writing surface, but can do Nonetheless: The study of the bourgeois and its stately desk will not turn into a museum.
a lot more. They can depict whatever we want, adopt any shape we need at a particular The need to withdraw is rooted too deeply, literally anthropologically. For example, the
moment: post box, map, encyclopaedia, newspaper, book, ticket office, antiquarian retreat to objects that we loved for the sake of their beauty, which we have – very impor-
bookshop, job fair, art gallery, department store – maybe one day soon, it will pour a rea- tant – all to ourselves. From childhood, human beings strive for more independence; in
sonable cappuccino if we turn it into a coffee pot and tilt it – people are already working puberty at the latest, we desperately fight for and defend every centimetre of the gained
on that. Notebook, smartphone and tablet can be taken along anywhere: to the forest, to ground. Is a lot going to change about that in our days? Several things will, but not all.
a sunny place, onboard a ship. Whether mountain or bath, the object remains graspable, One thing will remain: our love for self-created order and for the confidence, in which
without being considerably disturbing. Since the computer with internet access no longer we find refuge before we start out again and respond to the food for thought and impu-
imperiously stands in the living room and one has to rush to it, a lot of things have dence of the outside world. Maybe the stately old desk of the hard-working berserk is in
changed: smart phone and tablet come along to almost every place! This changes all decline and the elegant “top hat office” is returning, the pretty bureau, where the note-
types of work, which were previously exclusively reserved for the office. That does not book and manuscripts can be sufficiently protected behind a hinged rounded top or a
mean that this place could now be completely abandoned, but the room can be aired shutter before leaving the room. What will certainly remain is the room, about which we
more often, even the cleaning woman is occasionally granted access. The constant core can say: Here, I am on my own, here, no one watches me, here I enjoy the dose of soli-
of the prestige the desk has enjoyed was that the important things happened at it: thin- tude and freedom I need. A nest will remain, a nest every bird need even though it does
king and writing thoughts down. If we confirm or cancel appointments on the train these most things somewhere else and catches the worm in other places. A desk will continue
days, write a couple of pages of our essay or “simply” note down ideas concerning the to stand in this room, maybe an elaborate cabinet work, maybe only a door leave on
formation of a company, the question might come up whether the decisive things really trestles with three filing trays. One thing will still be valid in a hundred years: others are
happened at the venerable desk, which we inherited from our grandfather. The answer not allows to “change anithing”.
is no. The desk was necessary for writing things down, for formulating. At all times, the
most important things occurred to us on the bus, over a glass of beer, in the bath or in Auszug aus dem Buch „Über Schreibtische“, Berlin 2015

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