Rolf Lappert’s 2007 novel Nach Hause schwimmen [Swimming Home], seems on the surface to be anything but a Swiss novel. Set in part in rural Ireland and in part in the United States and with a brief interlude in Sweden, it tells the story of „Will McDermott, alias Wilbur Sandberg, verhinderter Selbstmörder mit partiellem Gedächtnisverlust, zwanghafter Trinkhalmbenutzer und traumatageschädigter Nichtschwimmer“.1 Wilbur’s story has a wider resonance, as indicated by Anja Hirsch, who proclaims: „,Nach Hause schwimmen‘ ist nicht nur Wilburs Geschichte, sondern Familien-, Irland-, Amerika-Roman.“2 Lappert’s novel draws on established images of Ireland and America and on cultural representations of the sea and uses these as a springboard to explore issues of belonging and separation, integration and exclusion.