This novel is the final publication of the Chilean filmmaker and author Raul Ruiz (1941-2011), who died last year, and who put the finishing touches to this book a few days before his death. Here, Ruiz narrates his life not as himself, but as a ghost. The Wit of the Staircase follows his novel In Pursuit of Treasure Island and the two Poetics of Cinema volumes, also published with Dis Voir.