Bis ich dich finde

Until I Find You is one of John Irving's most ambitious and intimate novels. The story follows the life of Jack Burns, who grows up to be a successful Hollywood actor and screenwriter, but whose entire identity is shaped by an unusual childhood. As a boy, Jack travels with his mother Alice, a tattoo artist, to European port cities in search of his father William, a runaway church organist and passionate tattoo lover.

This bizarre journey through tattoo parlors leaves an indelible mark on the boy's soul. As he grows up and pursues an acting career, Jack continues to be haunted by restlessness, failed love affairs, and a sense of emptiness. It is only in adulthood, through psychotherapy and returning to places from his childhood, that Jack begins to realize that his memories have been distorted. By uncovering family secrets and repressed traumas from the past, he finally pieces together the mosaic of his own life and seeks a path to healing.

In this novel, John Irving masterfully combines dark humor, tragedy, and recognizable eccentric characters. Through the motif of tattoos as permanent scars on the body and soul, the author questions the unreliability of human memory, the influence of childhood trauma, and the search for harsh truth and one's own identity.