From Germany to Germany
Diary 1990
-
- $19.99
-
- $19.99
Publisher Description
In 1990, Günter Grass - a reluctant diarist - felt compelled to make a record of the interesting times through which he was living.
Following the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989 and the collapse of Communism, Germany and Europe were enduring a period of immense upheaval. Grass resolved to immerse himself in these political debates: he travelled widely throughout both Germanys, the former East and the former West, conducting a lively exchange with political enemies, friends and his own children about all the questions posed by reunification.
His account gives the reader an unparalleled insight into a key moment in the life of modern Europe, seen through the eyes of one of its most acclaimed writers. It also provides a startling insight into the creative process as the reader witnesses ideas for novels occurring and then taking shape.
From Germany to Germany is both a personal journal by a great creative artist and a penetrating commentary on recent European history by someone who was simultaneously an acute observer and a highly engaged participant.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
With many period-specific references to modern German culture, most explained in useful identifying endnotes (presumably supplied by supple translator Winston), this memoir, covering 13 months of the key period of German unification, knowingly re-creates an era of doubts and hopes. Grass, Nobel Prize winning author of The Tin Drum, finds himself engaged and coming to grips with well-known themes, such as the legacy of the Holocaust, as well as with contemporary events, such as the Persian Gulf War. Grass sensitively yet realistically contemplates the fate of the GDR citizen, this time set up to be duped by the instruments of West German capitalism. Election day , happens to be the first day of Advent, a time for sober reflection a capper on a guilt-swept century. Drawings by the author are help to ground him, as does verbal creation. As Grass writes, "I am positively itching for the imponderable process of writing, a process with laws all its own that I am glad to submit to, though not without anxiety." Drawings.
