In "Other Days," the more robust yet sensitive younger sister of Eugen Rapp, the alter ego of Hermann Lenz, observes the individuals in her bourgeois social circle and learns how the political developments of the late Weimar period and the Nazi takeover strain the unity of the family. This choice of perspective—an artistic device by the author, who perceives and vividly describes his own sensitivity—makes it clear how the son's inclination, noted with concern by the energetic father to not participate in life but rather to watch and observe, leads to a moral-aesthetic necessity. The unsuccessful theology and art student from Tübingen, Munich, and Heidelberg embarks on a quest for a realm that suits him; he has recognized poetry as the form of evasion and preservation that aligns with him.