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في خطو السرطان
نبذة النيل والفرات:
تزدحم الرواية بالأحداث والشخصيات، فبطلها، أو أبطالها هم ممن عاشوا في ظروف مضطربة، واضطرتهم الحرب إلى مغادرة أوطانهم، بحثاً عن الآمال والسلام والرواية تعرض لبؤس الفارين الهاربين من جحيم الحرب ومن عنف القوات السوفيتية التي انتصرت على الجيش الألماني. اضطر هؤلاء الفارون إلى مواجهة الموت في العواصف الثلجية والنفوق على حافات الطرق وفي ثقوب الجليد التي تتكون عندما يبدأ الخليج المتجمد بالتكسر بعد القصف وتخت عبء العبرات وقدوم المزيد من البشر هرباً من الانتقام الروسي.
"ربما كان الأمر كذلك، هكذا كان تقريباً عندما استعاد الجيش السوفيتي الثاني منطقة نمرسدورف من قوات الجيش الألماني الرابع... كم من النساء اغتصب الجنود الروس، قتلوهن وصلبوهن على أبواب مخازن الغلال".
تزدحم الرواية بالأحداث والشخصيات، فبطلها، أو أبطالها هم ممن عاشوا في ظروف مضطربة، واضطرتهم الحرب إلى مغادرة أوطانهم، بحثاً عن الآمال والسلام والرواية تعرض لبؤس الفارين الهاربين من جحيم الحرب ومن عنف القوات السوفيتية التي انتصرت على الجيش الألماني. اضطر هؤلاء الفارون إلى مواجهة الموت في العواصف الثلجية والنفوق على حافات الطرق وفي ثقوب الجليد التي تتكون عندما يبدأ الخليج المتجمد بالتكسر بعد القصف وتخت عبء العبرات وقدوم المزيد من البشر هرباً من الانتقام الروسي.
"ربما كان الأمر كذلك، هكذا كان تقريباً عندما استعاد الجيش السوفيتي الثاني منطقة نمرسدورف من قوات الجيش الألماني الرابع... كم من النساء اغتصب الجنود الروس، قتلوهن وصلبوهن على أبواب مخازن الغلال".
207 pages, Paperback
First published April 1, 2002
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About the author
Günter Grass
354books1,758followersNovels, notably
The Tin Drum
(1959) and
Dog Years
(1963), of German writer Günter Wilhelm Grass, who won the Nobel Prize of 1999 for literature, concern the political and social climate of Germany during and after World War II.
This novelist, poet, playwright, illustrator, graphic artist, and sculptor since 1945 lived in West Germany but in his fiction frequently returned to the Danzig of his childhood. He always identified as a Kashubian.
He is best known for his first novel, The Tin Drum (1959), a key text in European magic realism. He named this style “broadened reality.� “Cat and Mouse� (1961) and Dog Years (1963) also succeeded in the period. These three novels make up his “Danzig trilogy.�
Helene Grass (née Knoff, 1898 - 1954), a Roman Catholic of Kashubian-Polish origin, bore Günter Grass to Willy Grass (1899 - 1979), a Protestant ethnic German. Parents reared Grass as a Catholic. The family lived in an apartment, attached to its grocery store in Danzig-Langfuhr (now Gdańsk-Wrzeszcz). He has one sister, born in 1930.
Grass attended the Danzig gymnasium Conradinum. He volunteered for submarine service with the Kriegsmarine "to get out of the confinement he felt as a teenager in his parents' house" which he considered - in a very negative way - civic Catholic lower middle class. In 1943 he became a Luftwaffenhelfer, then he was drafted into the Reichsarbeitsdienst, and in November 1944, shortly after his seventeenth birthday, into the Waffen-Schutzstaffel. The seventeen-year-old Grass saw combat with the 10th Schutzstaffel panzer division Frundsberg from February 1945 until he was wounded on 20 April 1945 and sent to an American prisoner of war camp.
In 1946 and 1947, he worked in a mine and received an education of a stonemason. For many years, he studied sculpture and graphics, first at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf and then at the Universität der Künste Berlin. He also worked as an author and traveled frequently. He married in 1954 and from 1960 lived in Berlin as well as part-time in Schleswig-Holstein. Divorced in 1978, he remarried in 1979. From 1983 to 1986 he held the presidency of the Berlin Akademie der Künste (Berlin Academy of Arts).
During the German unification process in 1989 he argued for separation of the two states, because he thought a unified Germany would resume its past aggression. He moved to the northern German city of Lübeck in 1995. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1999. In 2006, Grass caused controversy with his disclosure of his Waffen-Schutzstaffel service during the final months of World War II, which he had kept a secret until publishing his memoir that year. He died of complications of lung infection on 13th of April, 2015 at a Lübeck hospital. He was 87.
This novelist, poet, playwright, illustrator, graphic artist, and sculptor since 1945 lived in West Germany but in his fiction frequently returned to the Danzig of his childhood. He always identified as a Kashubian.
He is best known for his first novel, The Tin Drum (1959), a key text in European magic realism. He named this style “broadened reality.� “Cat and Mouse� (1961) and Dog Years (1963) also succeeded in the period. These three novels make up his “Danzig trilogy.�
Helene Grass (née Knoff, 1898 - 1954), a Roman Catholic of Kashubian-Polish origin, bore Günter Grass to Willy Grass (1899 - 1979), a Protestant ethnic German. Parents reared Grass as a Catholic. The family lived in an apartment, attached to its grocery store in Danzig-Langfuhr (now Gdańsk-Wrzeszcz). He has one sister, born in 1930.
Grass attended the Danzig gymnasium Conradinum. He volunteered for submarine service with the Kriegsmarine "to get out of the confinement he felt as a teenager in his parents' house" which he considered - in a very negative way - civic Catholic lower middle class. In 1943 he became a Luftwaffenhelfer, then he was drafted into the Reichsarbeitsdienst, and in November 1944, shortly after his seventeenth birthday, into the Waffen-Schutzstaffel. The seventeen-year-old Grass saw combat with the 10th Schutzstaffel panzer division Frundsberg from February 1945 until he was wounded on 20 April 1945 and sent to an American prisoner of war camp.
In 1946 and 1947, he worked in a mine and received an education of a stonemason. For many years, he studied sculpture and graphics, first at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf and then at the Universität der Künste Berlin. He also worked as an author and traveled frequently. He married in 1954 and from 1960 lived in Berlin as well as part-time in Schleswig-Holstein. Divorced in 1978, he remarried in 1979. From 1983 to 1986 he held the presidency of the Berlin Akademie der Künste (Berlin Academy of Arts).
During the German unification process in 1989 he argued for separation of the two states, because he thought a unified Germany would resume its past aggression. He moved to the northern German city of Lübeck in 1995. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1999. In 2006, Grass caused controversy with his disclosure of his Waffen-Schutzstaffel service during the final months of World War II, which he had kept a secret until publishing his memoir that year. He died of complications of lung infection on 13th of April, 2015 at a Lübeck hospital. He was 87.
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February 15, 2020
"Das hört nicht auf. Nie hört das auf."
It never ends. Thus ends the novella - which would be rather funny, if the idea that ends in a nonfinito wasn't fascism.
Apart from meeting some the usual suspects from Grass' early Danzig novels' cast, and moving backwards to the core of German memory and/or amnesia regarding the breakdown of national identity in 1945, this novella opens up a new perspective on old evil: the world of the internet as a perfect place for hatred to spread and develop.
A history lesson, a family saga, a murder in the tradition of Max Frisch' , all combined in the circling, moving thought patterns of Grass' inimitable prose style.
A truly great story, with a new persepctive on Tulla Pokriefke and her dramatic expierences on the Wilhelm Gustloff. Like all rats, she made sure to leave the sinking ship. But at the same time, she kept it in her mind forever, and passed it on to her grandchild, whose task it would be to repeat history while starting a new thread.
It never ends. It circles around its prey.
It never ends. Thus ends the novella - which would be rather funny, if the idea that ends in a nonfinito wasn't fascism.
Apart from meeting some the usual suspects from Grass' early Danzig novels' cast, and moving backwards to the core of German memory and/or amnesia regarding the breakdown of national identity in 1945, this novella opens up a new perspective on old evil: the world of the internet as a perfect place for hatred to spread and develop.
A history lesson, a family saga, a murder in the tradition of Max Frisch' , all combined in the circling, moving thought patterns of Grass' inimitable prose style.
A truly great story, with a new persepctive on Tulla Pokriefke and her dramatic expierences on the Wilhelm Gustloff. Like all rats, she made sure to leave the sinking ship. But at the same time, she kept it in her mind forever, and passed it on to her grandchild, whose task it would be to repeat history while starting a new thread.
It never ends. It circles around its prey.
June 1, 2017
I suspect that most people who read this book in English do so because it’s by Grass, and know nothing of the Wilhelm Gustloff, or the polemic of which this book was part. I’m the other way round; although I do like Grass, I was especially interested in the Gustloff. Were it not for that, I might not have read this book.
If I had, I don’t think I would have understood it, and it wouldn’t have grabbed me the way it has. I doubt if it’s Grass’s best as literature. The characters, though well-drawn, are unattractive and don’t engage you. The structure is complex and confusing. Neither is it especially vivid; despite the drama of its subject, there’s nothing like the revolting and haunting horse’s head scene in The Tin Drum. The critical reception for the English translation was mixed (the Observer, in particular, gave it a good kicking). Yet despite all this, there is good reason to give it five stars.
The Wilhelm Gustloff was a German cruise liner that spent much of the war tied up in Gotenhafen (the then German name for the Polish port of Gdynia). At 1pm on January 30 1945, as the Russians approached, she left for western Germany with some U-boat personnel, 300-odd women naval auxiliaries and an unknown but huge number of German civilian refugees. Just after 9pm, she was torpedoed, in extremely bad weather, by a Russian submarine off the coast of Pomerania (again, now part of Poland). She sank within the hour. About 1,250 people were rescued. The dead are now thought to have numbered about 9,400, of which half may have been children. It was the worst maritime disaster in history; to put it in perspective, the death toll on the Titanic was about 1,600. Moreover eyewitness accounts invest the sinking with a horror that reduces the Titanic to farce.
There are two or three books about the sinking in English, the best being Dobson, Payne and Miller’s excellent . In the main, however, few people outside Germany know much about the sinking. But Germans themselves certainly do, and it has become a political football, with right-wing revisionists claiming the disaster as a war crime. Grass said that he wrote Crabwalk at least partly to wrest the Gustloff from the hands of the Right. In fact, the book appeared during a period of debate in Germany after W.G. Sebald’s 1997 warning that Germans' silence about their own suffering had given the Right free rein to use it for its own purposes. Grass clearly agreed.
Briefly summarised, Crabwalk is the story of a fictional German teenager, Tulla, who gives birth to a boy on the ship that has rescued her from the sea. After the war she settles in East Germany, and becomes an enthusiastic Stalinist. But son Paul goes to the West, becomes a journalist and is pressed by his mother to write the story of the sinking, although he does not really wish to. In the meantime, he marries and has a son of his own; the marriage fails, and the son, Konrad, grows up to become an awkward, geeky teenager and starts a revisionist website dedicated to the Gustloff and the Nazi “hero� after whom it was named. But a Jewish boy enters his chatroom, and starts to argue with him.
Who this Jewish boy really turns out to be, and how their dispute ends, shouldn’t be revealed here. But this book is a fascinating allegory for Grass’s view of postwar German history. The wartime generation (Tulla) appears to repent (but does it? � or does it simply adopt new orthodoxies?); the next generation (Paul) is so appalled by their country’s history that they barely speak of it, and so do little to help the third generation (Konrad) come to terms with it. The book ends against a backdrop of skinhead hate crimes in the late 1990s, forging a link between fascists past and present.
If I were German, I’m not sure how I would view this book. If I liked Grass, I might see it as a shrewd warning of the moral time-bombs that still confront my country. If I didn’t, I might see it as a contrived vehicle for Grass’s own view of postwar Germany. Either way, my view would likely be coloured by where I lay to the left or right. I honestly don’t know. Let Germans decide. But this book transcends its German setting and is important for the rest of us.
First, Grass shows us how an insidious revisionism can soften the past by raising matters that are less relevant than they appear, deflecting attention from the real questions. In this case, the revisionist introduces the fact that the Gustloff rescued the crew of a British freighter before the war, as if that were relevant to the German ship's eventual fate; it isn’t. There is also talk about the civilian victims but evasion of the fact that the ship was also evacuating a U-boat depot. Meanwhile it is too easy not to ask who started the conflict from which the civilians were fleeing. But at the same time, Grass also hints that decades of German self-flagellation after the war had brought about a reaction, causing young Konrad to ask whether the Nazis could really have been so evil. Every country that has wielded power to any extent has some questions to answer, so none of this is about German history alone.
Grass offers other, subtler insights. The ship was named after a Nazi organizer called Wilhelm Gustloff who was murdered by a Jewish student in Switzerland in 1936. Gustloff himself appears originally to have identified with the left-wing, populist, part of the Party. The ship itself was built for the Nazi Strength through Joy movement, intended to provide ordinary people with leisure and fresh air. Unusually for its era, it was single-class. Through Gustloff’s story and the liner named after him, Grass reminds the reader that fascist movements often appeal to the masses by appearing to champion them against the rich. This is still so; anti-immigrant parties in Europe can present themselves as defending the working man against a liberal elite.
Last but not least, this book shows a shrewd appreciation of the Internet and the way it can disseminate ideas of every kind, untested and unmoderated. Or, to put it another way, lying to lots of people just got a whole lot easier. Grass clearly understood the new technology and its potential implications for politics, and for our understanding of the past. Not bad for a man who was already in his late sixties when the Net started to spread in earnest, and was 75 by the time the book was published.
By an odd chance I finished this book only a day or two before Grass’s death was announced. It was his last novel, and shouldn’t be the one he is judged by. The Gustloff story could support a much bigger and better book than this. Moreover Crabwalk could have been better planned and better written. The characters, too, could have involved you more. But maybe that’s not the point. Judge the book for what it is, rather than what it might have been, and you’re still left with something quite remarkable; a sharp, shrewd sideways look at history, by a man who, at 75, was still profoundly engaged with the past and future of his country. If he wasn’t a Nobel laureate, we’d settle for that, wouldn’t we?
If I had, I don’t think I would have understood it, and it wouldn’t have grabbed me the way it has. I doubt if it’s Grass’s best as literature. The characters, though well-drawn, are unattractive and don’t engage you. The structure is complex and confusing. Neither is it especially vivid; despite the drama of its subject, there’s nothing like the revolting and haunting horse’s head scene in The Tin Drum. The critical reception for the English translation was mixed (the Observer, in particular, gave it a good kicking). Yet despite all this, there is good reason to give it five stars.
The Wilhelm Gustloff was a German cruise liner that spent much of the war tied up in Gotenhafen (the then German name for the Polish port of Gdynia). At 1pm on January 30 1945, as the Russians approached, she left for western Germany with some U-boat personnel, 300-odd women naval auxiliaries and an unknown but huge number of German civilian refugees. Just after 9pm, she was torpedoed, in extremely bad weather, by a Russian submarine off the coast of Pomerania (again, now part of Poland). She sank within the hour. About 1,250 people were rescued. The dead are now thought to have numbered about 9,400, of which half may have been children. It was the worst maritime disaster in history; to put it in perspective, the death toll on the Titanic was about 1,600. Moreover eyewitness accounts invest the sinking with a horror that reduces the Titanic to farce.
There are two or three books about the sinking in English, the best being Dobson, Payne and Miller’s excellent . In the main, however, few people outside Germany know much about the sinking. But Germans themselves certainly do, and it has become a political football, with right-wing revisionists claiming the disaster as a war crime. Grass said that he wrote Crabwalk at least partly to wrest the Gustloff from the hands of the Right. In fact, the book appeared during a period of debate in Germany after W.G. Sebald’s 1997 warning that Germans' silence about their own suffering had given the Right free rein to use it for its own purposes. Grass clearly agreed.
Briefly summarised, Crabwalk is the story of a fictional German teenager, Tulla, who gives birth to a boy on the ship that has rescued her from the sea. After the war she settles in East Germany, and becomes an enthusiastic Stalinist. But son Paul goes to the West, becomes a journalist and is pressed by his mother to write the story of the sinking, although he does not really wish to. In the meantime, he marries and has a son of his own; the marriage fails, and the son, Konrad, grows up to become an awkward, geeky teenager and starts a revisionist website dedicated to the Gustloff and the Nazi “hero� after whom it was named. But a Jewish boy enters his chatroom, and starts to argue with him.
Who this Jewish boy really turns out to be, and how their dispute ends, shouldn’t be revealed here. But this book is a fascinating allegory for Grass’s view of postwar German history. The wartime generation (Tulla) appears to repent (but does it? � or does it simply adopt new orthodoxies?); the next generation (Paul) is so appalled by their country’s history that they barely speak of it, and so do little to help the third generation (Konrad) come to terms with it. The book ends against a backdrop of skinhead hate crimes in the late 1990s, forging a link between fascists past and present.
If I were German, I’m not sure how I would view this book. If I liked Grass, I might see it as a shrewd warning of the moral time-bombs that still confront my country. If I didn’t, I might see it as a contrived vehicle for Grass’s own view of postwar Germany. Either way, my view would likely be coloured by where I lay to the left or right. I honestly don’t know. Let Germans decide. But this book transcends its German setting and is important for the rest of us.
First, Grass shows us how an insidious revisionism can soften the past by raising matters that are less relevant than they appear, deflecting attention from the real questions. In this case, the revisionist introduces the fact that the Gustloff rescued the crew of a British freighter before the war, as if that were relevant to the German ship's eventual fate; it isn’t. There is also talk about the civilian victims but evasion of the fact that the ship was also evacuating a U-boat depot. Meanwhile it is too easy not to ask who started the conflict from which the civilians were fleeing. But at the same time, Grass also hints that decades of German self-flagellation after the war had brought about a reaction, causing young Konrad to ask whether the Nazis could really have been so evil. Every country that has wielded power to any extent has some questions to answer, so none of this is about German history alone.
Grass offers other, subtler insights. The ship was named after a Nazi organizer called Wilhelm Gustloff who was murdered by a Jewish student in Switzerland in 1936. Gustloff himself appears originally to have identified with the left-wing, populist, part of the Party. The ship itself was built for the Nazi Strength through Joy movement, intended to provide ordinary people with leisure and fresh air. Unusually for its era, it was single-class. Through Gustloff’s story and the liner named after him, Grass reminds the reader that fascist movements often appeal to the masses by appearing to champion them against the rich. This is still so; anti-immigrant parties in Europe can present themselves as defending the working man against a liberal elite.
Last but not least, this book shows a shrewd appreciation of the Internet and the way it can disseminate ideas of every kind, untested and unmoderated. Or, to put it another way, lying to lots of people just got a whole lot easier. Grass clearly understood the new technology and its potential implications for politics, and for our understanding of the past. Not bad for a man who was already in his late sixties when the Net started to spread in earnest, and was 75 by the time the book was published.
By an odd chance I finished this book only a day or two before Grass’s death was announced. It was his last novel, and shouldn’t be the one he is judged by. The Gustloff story could support a much bigger and better book than this. Moreover Crabwalk could have been better planned and better written. The characters, too, could have involved you more. But maybe that’s not the point. Judge the book for what it is, rather than what it might have been, and you’re still left with something quite remarkable; a sharp, shrewd sideways look at history, by a man who, at 75, was still profoundly engaged with the past and future of his country. If he wasn’t a Nobel laureate, we’d settle for that, wouldn’t we?
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April 14, 2015
R.I.P. Günter Grass (1927-2015)
Crabwalk, by Günter Grass
Günter Grass' Im Krebsgang appeared in 2002, a late work, but one of the best Grass ever wrote.
The "incident" at the center of this book is not well known - I learned about it only recently in the pages of Max Hastings' excellent Armageddon, The Battle for Germany, 1944-1945. In late January, 1945, the six million man Red Army had finally pushed the Axis armies into Germany, and looting, burning, rape and murder were the payback for years of the same committed by the Axis powers in the Soviet Union. German civilians were desperate to escape to the relative safety of the region soon to be under the boot of the Allies. On January 30 a former cruise ship, the Wilhelm Gustloff, designed for a complement of 1,900, was packed with an estimated 8,000-10,000 persons (civilians and some soldiers, many severely wounded), including some 4,500 children, and set course westward in the frigid Baltic Sea ( -18 degrees Celsius were measured; an icebreaker had to open a passage in the Danzig Bay). A Russian submarine happened upon the vessel and sank it with a loss of all but 949 known survivors (according to Hastings; 1,239 according to Grass), making this the greatest maritime disaster in history. (A week later the same submarine sank another such refugee ship, from which only 300 of a complement of 3,000 survived.)
Grass was born in Danzig, a few miles from the port from which the Wilhelm Gustloff began its last voyage. He may well have known some of the people who disappeared into the Baltic's deathly cold waters. So, how did he choose to write about this horrific incident?
Complexly, with many layers. The narrator is a mediocre journalist whose mother was aboard the Wilhelm Gustloff that fateful evening; he was born that night in the ship that rescued her. He dances around the central incident with fascinated horror and repulsion, approaching it, touching it, and then hastening away. To avoid addressing it he tells the story of his entire family(*) up till the present, as well as those of three outsiders: the Nazi functionary after whom the ship was named, the Jewish student who assassinated him in Switzerland, and the captain of the Soviet submarine that fired three torpedoes into the overfilled ship. He also tells the story of his research about the incident, including the close inspection of Nazi-friendly websites(**), as well as the entire life story of the Wilhelm Gustloff. The narration is a complex simultaneous mixture of all of these and still more elements, jumping about through time and space.
Grass himself appears in the book as an old and "tired" writer who encourages the narrator to finally give expression to the suffering of the east Prussians, instead of leaving it up to the right wing revanchists. Now and again, Grass gives him advice how to proceed.
When the narrator finally brings himself to describe the actual sinking, he tries to remain as reserved, as factual as possible, relying on the reports of the survivors, of the complement of the single accompanying German ship, and of the sailors of the Russian submarine. I won't say anything more about it.
However, 1/4 of the book still remains, because as moving as the history surrounding and the story of the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff are, through the narration of his family's history and of the brown websites Grass has not merely allowed his narrator to avoid describing the traumatic incident but has been, in a completely non-abstract manner, ruminating about mankind's relation to history - what individuals don't know, what they think they know, what they are willing to "modify" or assume, what they are willing to do in the name of their understanding of history. In this final quarter of the text another surprise emerges: another, smaller tragedy occurs which further extends and deepens the book. I won't spoil any surprises.
Grass' prose is neither flashy nor brilliant in this text (though I enjoyed the Danziger dialect the narrator's mother always speaks). The art of this book is manifested in the tightly woven mesh of so many distinct threads. I'm simply amazed at how much Grass could fit into a 216 page text without it seeming to be an overloaded information dump. On the contrary, Im Krebsgang is a rich, harrowing and moving book. It is in every respect the fourth volume of a Danzig
(*) His free spirited mother, Tulla Pokriefke, also made an appearance in Grass' Katz und Maus (Cat and Mouse), the second book in Grass' Danzig Trilogy.
(**) One of which supplied him with a most unpleasant surprise.
July 28, 2022
A crab goes forward by moving backward, or else from side to side � and thus the narrative line of Günter Grass’s 2002 novel Crabwalk (Im Krebsgang) constantly moves back and forth between the Internet age of the early 21st century and the overwhelming tragedy of the Second World War. In the process, the reader gets a disturbing sense that in the modern, democratic Germany of the present day � and in the democratic world generally � forces of cruelty and intolerance still exist, not far below the surface.
Günter Grass won the 1999 Nobel Prize for Literature for a body of work that looked critically at Germany’s modern history. He lived the history of which he later wrote; he was drafted into the Waffen-SS in 1944, and served until he was taken prisoner by U.S. soldiers in 1945. He is probably best-known for his 1959 novel The Tin Drum (Die Blechtrommel), a work that mixed realistic and fantastical elements; and Grass’s novel gained even more attention when the 1979 film adaptation by director Volker Schlondörff won both the Palme d’Or at Cannes and the Academy Award for Best Foreign-Language Film. Crabwalk adopts a more realistic, workaday setting than The Tin Drum, but is no less rigorous in the way it examines the contemporary German soul.
The narrator, Paul Pokriefke, is a reporter whose life is tied closely with the tragic history of what Germans call zweiter Weltkrieg, the Second World War. The reason is that he was born in wartime, in 1945, aboard a ship called the Wilhelm Gustloff � and while many people outside Germany have not heard of the Wilhelm Gustloff, it is a ship whose story is well-known within Germany.
Briefly, then: the Wilhelm Gustloff was a hospital ship turned military transport ship, built in 1937 and named for a Nazi who had assisted in Hitler’s unsuccessful coup attempt against the democratic Weimar Republic in 1923. In January of 1945, the Soviet Army was advancing toward German territory, and many of its soldiers wanted to take full revenge for the 20 million Soviets killed by the Nazis. East Prussia, that now-gone German exclave east of Poland, was the first German territory that the Soviets would reach, and therefore the Gustloff was evacuating desperate civilian refugees as well as military personnel from East Prussia.
And on 30 January 1945, the severely overcrowded ship was torpedoed by the Soviet submarine S-13 and sank within an hour. About 1,000 people were saved, but over 9,000 died � making the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff the deadliest maritime disaster in history.
Paul, whose marriage ended in divorce, and whose relationship with his son Konrad is distant, accepts that the odd circumstances of his birth may not have made it possible for him, or for anyone close to him, to lead a normal or ordinary life. As a journalist who has attended or watched ship christenings in democratic, postwar Germany, he sometimes thinks about the launching of the Wilhelm Gustloff at Hamburg on 5 May 1937, with Hitler present to see the ship formally christened by the real-life Wilhelm Gustloff’s widow Hedwig:
When the widow performed the christening a bit later with the words “I christen you with the name Wilhelm Gustloff,� the cheering of the strong-nerved masses drowned out the sound of the champagne bottle being smashed against the bow of the ship. Both the Horst Wessel and the Deutschland songs were sung as the new vessel glided down the slipway…But whenever I, the survivor of the Gustloff, attend a launching as a reporter, or see one on television, an image steals into the picture: that ship, christened and launched in the most beautiful May weather, sinking in the icy Baltic. (pp. 52-53)
And the narrator makes sure to note that at that same time in early May when the Wilhelm Gustloff was being launched at Hamburg, a Soviet naval officer named Aleksandr Marinesko was undergoing, possibly in Leningrad, the training that would eventually put him in command of the submarine S-13 that would find and sink the Wilhelm Gustloff on that fateful night in January of 1945.
A diligent reporter who knows how to track down a story, Paul eventually finds that his son Konrad has been exploring, and posting to, far-right Internet sites. At some of these sites, Paul learns, the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff becomes a way of denying German war guilt � recasting the Germans of the Third Reich as victims of Soviet cruelty rather than aggressors in war and perpetrators of the Holocaust. Whereas virtually all mainstream Germans of the modern era accept the post-World War II task and responsibility of ձԲԲٲäپܲԲ (“coping with the past�), Konrad and his new online friends seem to want to deny that past, to open old wounds, to speak the old language of anti-Semitism and hatred.
It does not help that Paul’s mother, who gave birth to him on that terrible night, encourages the entire family, including her grandson Konrad, to participate in remembrance ceremonies attended by survivors of the Gustloff’s sinking. Paul recalls how his mother took young Konrad to a survivors� reunion dressed up like “a cross between an archangel and a boy at First Communion�, and Paul remembers getting the sense that “People were placing their hopes in him. Great things were expected of our Konny. He would not let the survivors down� (p. 100).
And it should be no surprise that remembrance, in post-World War II Germany, can be a very complicated thing. Paul recalls how another Gustloff survivor, the purser’s assistant, discovered what can happen when one remembers an historical event in the “wrong� way:
[L]ittle gratitude was expressed to this man who after the disaster had collected and researched almost everything he could track down. At the beginning of the reunion he spoke on the topic “The Sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff on 30 January 1945 from the Russians� Perspective.� In the course of his speech, it became evident that he had visited the Soviet Union often to do his research, had made the acquaintance of a petty officer…and, what is more, had remained in friendly contact with this Vladimir Kourotchkin, who, on his commander’s orders, had sent the three torpedoes speeding on their way, and had even been photographed shaking hands with the old man. With these revelations, he had…”lost some friends.�
After the speech, they cut him dead. From then on, many in the audience labeled him a Russian-lover. For them, the war had not ended. The Russian was still “Ivan,� the three torpedoes murder weapons. (pp. 100-101)
But Paul knows, having listened to the purser’s assistant, that the Soviet petty officer who fired the torpedoes thought he was destroying a military target filled with Nazi personnel and munitions of war� and is forever haunted by what he learned only after the war: that 4,000 children died in the torpedoing of the Wilhelm Gustloff. What really happens at an historical event, it turns out, is more complex than the way some may want to remember that event.
Paul Pokriefke is forever confronting the unknown and unknowable regarding that night � and, by implication, regarding history generally. For instance, he is not even sure whether he was born on the Wilhelm Gustloff or on the öɱ, the torpedo boat that rescued his mother and almost 500 other survivors.
What Paul does know is that he doesn’t even factor in to his son’s online interest in the Wilhelm Gustloff saga: “There were no arguments on the Internet about any of this � my birth and the people who supposedly played a role in it, on one ship or the other; my son’s Web site made no mention of a Paul Pokriefke, not even in abbreviated form. Absolute silence about anything having to do with me. My son simply left me out. I didn’t exist online� (pp. 157-58). And what Paul sees is that the online chat rooms in which Konrad participates are a place where a sense of grievance over the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff has morphed into hatred for Russians, non-Germans generally, and the Jewish people in particular.
Konny’s descent into the dark underbelly of the Internet eventuates in a hideous act of violence, and to a trial where, just as with his early participation in the Wilhelm Gustloff survivor community, Konny seems acutely conscious of playing a role; Paul recalls that his son “obviously enjoyed…his speech to the court�, and “was listening to the applause of an imaginary audience� (pp. 204-05).
And Paul is left to wonder whether all of the “crabwalking� that he has done � back and forth between his own present and past, and between the present and the past of his family and his country � has served any purpose at all. He thinks of his son as the “someone in whose name I have been doing this crabwalk�, thinks of the hateful sentiments that he has seen expressed online, and wonders grimly whether a hideous past may be starting to repeat itself.
In the nearly two decades since Crabwalk was published, the amount of hatred and misinformation on the Internet has only proliferated further. Dictatorships use social-media technology to meddle with the elections of democracies. The “dark web� provides safe places for the most evil impulses of humankind to be given free rein. Far-right political parties in Germany continue with their persistent efforts to reach into the German mainstream. And the problems that Grass describes so eloquently in Crabwalk only seem to be growing worse.
Crabwalk displays in a singularly powerful manner Günter Grass’s gifts as a storyteller and his talent for social criticism. The technology we use to communicate our ideas has changed dramatically, Grass seems to suggest, but human beings must still choose whether to use that technology to communicate ideas that affirm and create � or ideas that negate and destroy.
Günter Grass won the 1999 Nobel Prize for Literature for a body of work that looked critically at Germany’s modern history. He lived the history of which he later wrote; he was drafted into the Waffen-SS in 1944, and served until he was taken prisoner by U.S. soldiers in 1945. He is probably best-known for his 1959 novel The Tin Drum (Die Blechtrommel), a work that mixed realistic and fantastical elements; and Grass’s novel gained even more attention when the 1979 film adaptation by director Volker Schlondörff won both the Palme d’Or at Cannes and the Academy Award for Best Foreign-Language Film. Crabwalk adopts a more realistic, workaday setting than The Tin Drum, but is no less rigorous in the way it examines the contemporary German soul.
The narrator, Paul Pokriefke, is a reporter whose life is tied closely with the tragic history of what Germans call zweiter Weltkrieg, the Second World War. The reason is that he was born in wartime, in 1945, aboard a ship called the Wilhelm Gustloff � and while many people outside Germany have not heard of the Wilhelm Gustloff, it is a ship whose story is well-known within Germany.
Briefly, then: the Wilhelm Gustloff was a hospital ship turned military transport ship, built in 1937 and named for a Nazi who had assisted in Hitler’s unsuccessful coup attempt against the democratic Weimar Republic in 1923. In January of 1945, the Soviet Army was advancing toward German territory, and many of its soldiers wanted to take full revenge for the 20 million Soviets killed by the Nazis. East Prussia, that now-gone German exclave east of Poland, was the first German territory that the Soviets would reach, and therefore the Gustloff was evacuating desperate civilian refugees as well as military personnel from East Prussia.
And on 30 January 1945, the severely overcrowded ship was torpedoed by the Soviet submarine S-13 and sank within an hour. About 1,000 people were saved, but over 9,000 died � making the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff the deadliest maritime disaster in history.
Paul, whose marriage ended in divorce, and whose relationship with his son Konrad is distant, accepts that the odd circumstances of his birth may not have made it possible for him, or for anyone close to him, to lead a normal or ordinary life. As a journalist who has attended or watched ship christenings in democratic, postwar Germany, he sometimes thinks about the launching of the Wilhelm Gustloff at Hamburg on 5 May 1937, with Hitler present to see the ship formally christened by the real-life Wilhelm Gustloff’s widow Hedwig:
When the widow performed the christening a bit later with the words “I christen you with the name Wilhelm Gustloff,� the cheering of the strong-nerved masses drowned out the sound of the champagne bottle being smashed against the bow of the ship. Both the Horst Wessel and the Deutschland songs were sung as the new vessel glided down the slipway…But whenever I, the survivor of the Gustloff, attend a launching as a reporter, or see one on television, an image steals into the picture: that ship, christened and launched in the most beautiful May weather, sinking in the icy Baltic. (pp. 52-53)
And the narrator makes sure to note that at that same time in early May when the Wilhelm Gustloff was being launched at Hamburg, a Soviet naval officer named Aleksandr Marinesko was undergoing, possibly in Leningrad, the training that would eventually put him in command of the submarine S-13 that would find and sink the Wilhelm Gustloff on that fateful night in January of 1945.
A diligent reporter who knows how to track down a story, Paul eventually finds that his son Konrad has been exploring, and posting to, far-right Internet sites. At some of these sites, Paul learns, the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff becomes a way of denying German war guilt � recasting the Germans of the Third Reich as victims of Soviet cruelty rather than aggressors in war and perpetrators of the Holocaust. Whereas virtually all mainstream Germans of the modern era accept the post-World War II task and responsibility of ձԲԲٲäپܲԲ (“coping with the past�), Konrad and his new online friends seem to want to deny that past, to open old wounds, to speak the old language of anti-Semitism and hatred.
It does not help that Paul’s mother, who gave birth to him on that terrible night, encourages the entire family, including her grandson Konrad, to participate in remembrance ceremonies attended by survivors of the Gustloff’s sinking. Paul recalls how his mother took young Konrad to a survivors� reunion dressed up like “a cross between an archangel and a boy at First Communion�, and Paul remembers getting the sense that “People were placing their hopes in him. Great things were expected of our Konny. He would not let the survivors down� (p. 100).
And it should be no surprise that remembrance, in post-World War II Germany, can be a very complicated thing. Paul recalls how another Gustloff survivor, the purser’s assistant, discovered what can happen when one remembers an historical event in the “wrong� way:
[L]ittle gratitude was expressed to this man who after the disaster had collected and researched almost everything he could track down. At the beginning of the reunion he spoke on the topic “The Sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff on 30 January 1945 from the Russians� Perspective.� In the course of his speech, it became evident that he had visited the Soviet Union often to do his research, had made the acquaintance of a petty officer…and, what is more, had remained in friendly contact with this Vladimir Kourotchkin, who, on his commander’s orders, had sent the three torpedoes speeding on their way, and had even been photographed shaking hands with the old man. With these revelations, he had…”lost some friends.�
After the speech, they cut him dead. From then on, many in the audience labeled him a Russian-lover. For them, the war had not ended. The Russian was still “Ivan,� the three torpedoes murder weapons. (pp. 100-101)
But Paul knows, having listened to the purser’s assistant, that the Soviet petty officer who fired the torpedoes thought he was destroying a military target filled with Nazi personnel and munitions of war� and is forever haunted by what he learned only after the war: that 4,000 children died in the torpedoing of the Wilhelm Gustloff. What really happens at an historical event, it turns out, is more complex than the way some may want to remember that event.
Paul Pokriefke is forever confronting the unknown and unknowable regarding that night � and, by implication, regarding history generally. For instance, he is not even sure whether he was born on the Wilhelm Gustloff or on the öɱ, the torpedo boat that rescued his mother and almost 500 other survivors.
What Paul does know is that he doesn’t even factor in to his son’s online interest in the Wilhelm Gustloff saga: “There were no arguments on the Internet about any of this � my birth and the people who supposedly played a role in it, on one ship or the other; my son’s Web site made no mention of a Paul Pokriefke, not even in abbreviated form. Absolute silence about anything having to do with me. My son simply left me out. I didn’t exist online� (pp. 157-58). And what Paul sees is that the online chat rooms in which Konrad participates are a place where a sense of grievance over the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff has morphed into hatred for Russians, non-Germans generally, and the Jewish people in particular.
Konny’s descent into the dark underbelly of the Internet eventuates in a hideous act of violence, and to a trial where, just as with his early participation in the Wilhelm Gustloff survivor community, Konny seems acutely conscious of playing a role; Paul recalls that his son “obviously enjoyed…his speech to the court�, and “was listening to the applause of an imaginary audience� (pp. 204-05).
And Paul is left to wonder whether all of the “crabwalking� that he has done � back and forth between his own present and past, and between the present and the past of his family and his country � has served any purpose at all. He thinks of his son as the “someone in whose name I have been doing this crabwalk�, thinks of the hateful sentiments that he has seen expressed online, and wonders grimly whether a hideous past may be starting to repeat itself.
In the nearly two decades since Crabwalk was published, the amount of hatred and misinformation on the Internet has only proliferated further. Dictatorships use social-media technology to meddle with the elections of democracies. The “dark web� provides safe places for the most evil impulses of humankind to be given free rein. Far-right political parties in Germany continue with their persistent efforts to reach into the German mainstream. And the problems that Grass describes so eloquently in Crabwalk only seem to be growing worse.
Crabwalk displays in a singularly powerful manner Günter Grass’s gifts as a storyteller and his talent for social criticism. The technology we use to communicate our ideas has changed dramatically, Grass seems to suggest, but human beings must still choose whether to use that technology to communicate ideas that affirm and create � or ideas that negate and destroy.
October 17, 2012
The events surrounding the biggest naval disaster in history and its tragic outcome are not an easy topic to bring to the attention of the reader of fifty-some years later. "Why only now?" is a good question and one that starts CRABWALK. The Wilhelm Gustloff, a "Strength through Joy" cruise ship turned refugee carrier, sank after a Soviet submarine attack on January 30 1945 leading to the death of more than 9,000 people, half of them children and infants. Although the details of the sinking have been known since then, there has been reluctance to publicize them. Grass has found a way to break the silence. At least one aspect of his motivation for doing so revolves around the disaster's aftermath in today's society and emerges very clearly towards the end of the book.
Tulla Pokriefke, one of the survivors of the tragedy, cannot find words to describe what she saw on the ship as the torpedoes hit: "There's no notes in the scale for it..." Nevertheless, for years she has been insisting that her son write it all down - the way she remembers it. Paul Pokriefke, a second-rate middle-aged journalist, born on one of the rescue ships at the time of the sinking, reluctantly takes on the "job". He's pressured into it by the major background player, Grass himself. Paul timidly argues with Him about the format, scope and depth of his book. He is in favour of a neutral documentary on the ship, its history and its namesake, a Nazi "martyr" and hero. His disinclination to take on this project at all speaks volumes about his generation's reluctance to relive and confront all aspects of the German past. Paul is typical in other ways too... But He nags and guides Paul through the details: take the central theme of the sinking of the ship and trace its history; bring out the lives of the people directly connected with it; don't forget Tulla, yourself and your son - make it personal. The outcome is a description of historical characters like Wilhelm Gustloff, the Nazi activist, David Frankfurter, the German Jew who killed him in 1936, and Alexandr Marinesko, the submarine captain who sank the vessel, interwoven with Paul's and his family's life, from then to now. Three generations of Pokriefkes, deeply influenced by the disaster, have to deal with it and the wider Nazi history in their individual way. None of them is comfortable with their present-day life.
It takes a specially gifted writer and authoritative critic like Gunter Grass to make this tragedy public in a format that is meaningful today. Having referred to the sinking of the Gustloff in previous novels, "it seems that He knew Tulla when she was young", he had been reluctant to expand on it until he had identified the right fictional frame in which to embed the facts. He found it in the strong character of Tulla, 18 at the time of the disaster, who epitomizes the successful survivor and practical realist of her generation. She remains in the East, seemingly switching allegiances without effort to the Stalinist regime, defending it long after the Wall has crumbled.
Gunter Grass' language and literary skills are undeniable; but his often difficult language (at least in German) and his complex imagery and use of metaphor have brought him admirers as well as critics. In Crabwalk, both the language and the imagery do not present any difficulty for the reader. In fact, the text flows relatively smoothly: it reads fast despite the subject matter. Walking sideways like a crab and "scuttling backwards" to move forward describes the flow of the story. Slowly the characters come into view and the different strands merge to form a comprehensive picture. Paul's more or less ongoing commentary about his writing efforts, his reactions to family and Him, his jumping back and forth in the story, results, at times, in a somewhat lighter, more conversational tone.
Grass deliberately uses the structure of a traditional `novella' (not specified in the English version) to convey the historical events and their impact on his group of Germans. An addition to being a `short novel', a novella is usually more tightly structured and focused on a single major event. It often comprises a didactic angle or moral message. All of these elements can be found in Crabwalk. Grass' message in particular addresses the after-war generation(s). He integrates into the story the recurrent problem of young neo-nazis, skinheads and the danger of hate websites on the Internet characterized through Paul's son Konny. He reflects on the inability of the parent generation to come to terms with the children as well as their own reality. He criticizes the lukewarm attitudes towards politics and history by many Germans of Paul's generation. He is concerned with what the future holds. The German word `Krebs' - CRAB also means cancer. Although not stated directly the reader of German cannot avoid reflecting on this connotation. Like cancers, totalitarian and fascist systems infect society, then go into remission, come and go. Can we be wholly cured of them? Crabwalk is on many levels an important book, which leaves you with ample food for thought.
Tulla Pokriefke, one of the survivors of the tragedy, cannot find words to describe what she saw on the ship as the torpedoes hit: "There's no notes in the scale for it..." Nevertheless, for years she has been insisting that her son write it all down - the way she remembers it. Paul Pokriefke, a second-rate middle-aged journalist, born on one of the rescue ships at the time of the sinking, reluctantly takes on the "job". He's pressured into it by the major background player, Grass himself. Paul timidly argues with Him about the format, scope and depth of his book. He is in favour of a neutral documentary on the ship, its history and its namesake, a Nazi "martyr" and hero. His disinclination to take on this project at all speaks volumes about his generation's reluctance to relive and confront all aspects of the German past. Paul is typical in other ways too... But He nags and guides Paul through the details: take the central theme of the sinking of the ship and trace its history; bring out the lives of the people directly connected with it; don't forget Tulla, yourself and your son - make it personal. The outcome is a description of historical characters like Wilhelm Gustloff, the Nazi activist, David Frankfurter, the German Jew who killed him in 1936, and Alexandr Marinesko, the submarine captain who sank the vessel, interwoven with Paul's and his family's life, from then to now. Three generations of Pokriefkes, deeply influenced by the disaster, have to deal with it and the wider Nazi history in their individual way. None of them is comfortable with their present-day life.
It takes a specially gifted writer and authoritative critic like Gunter Grass to make this tragedy public in a format that is meaningful today. Having referred to the sinking of the Gustloff in previous novels, "it seems that He knew Tulla when she was young", he had been reluctant to expand on it until he had identified the right fictional frame in which to embed the facts. He found it in the strong character of Tulla, 18 at the time of the disaster, who epitomizes the successful survivor and practical realist of her generation. She remains in the East, seemingly switching allegiances without effort to the Stalinist regime, defending it long after the Wall has crumbled.
Gunter Grass' language and literary skills are undeniable; but his often difficult language (at least in German) and his complex imagery and use of metaphor have brought him admirers as well as critics. In Crabwalk, both the language and the imagery do not present any difficulty for the reader. In fact, the text flows relatively smoothly: it reads fast despite the subject matter. Walking sideways like a crab and "scuttling backwards" to move forward describes the flow of the story. Slowly the characters come into view and the different strands merge to form a comprehensive picture. Paul's more or less ongoing commentary about his writing efforts, his reactions to family and Him, his jumping back and forth in the story, results, at times, in a somewhat lighter, more conversational tone.
Grass deliberately uses the structure of a traditional `novella' (not specified in the English version) to convey the historical events and their impact on his group of Germans. An addition to being a `short novel', a novella is usually more tightly structured and focused on a single major event. It often comprises a didactic angle or moral message. All of these elements can be found in Crabwalk. Grass' message in particular addresses the after-war generation(s). He integrates into the story the recurrent problem of young neo-nazis, skinheads and the danger of hate websites on the Internet characterized through Paul's son Konny. He reflects on the inability of the parent generation to come to terms with the children as well as their own reality. He criticizes the lukewarm attitudes towards politics and history by many Germans of Paul's generation. He is concerned with what the future holds. The German word `Krebs' - CRAB also means cancer. Although not stated directly the reader of German cannot avoid reflecting on this connotation. Like cancers, totalitarian and fascist systems infect society, then go into remission, come and go. Can we be wholly cured of them? Crabwalk is on many levels an important book, which leaves you with ample food for thought.
March 1, 2021
Since no wind was blowing, the Baltic lapped the shore listlessly, bearing no message.
2.27.2021
This second reading was likely a more gradual affair than the first one. It was also tempered by a topical revelation. The dubious idea of alternative epistemology has moved into a prominent public discussion in recent years. I am not sure such a development was a consideration during my first exposure to this provocative work. The premise of the novel could lazily be surmised: should the Germans be allowed to proclaim their own mourning for the Second World War? Of course, this question is a trick of perception, an optical distortion across the choppy water of both narrative but also biological time.
A journalist finds himself at close to my age and lacking a keel. He was born during an unfortunate event, the 1945 sinking of the MV Wilhelm Gustloff by a Soviet U-boat. The casualties likely make the incident the worst maritime disaster in history. Here come the "yets" -- though whether the ship was merely evacuating civilians from the advances of the Red Army or had a military function is endlessly caveated. Grass understood this, he also feared the cyber-possibilities for counternarratives, dog whistles which would avoid the trappings of the far right but would offer accord with such an ideology even if in terms of abeyance. This journalist discovers that his son has constructed a website to this national tragedy, one which can't properly say its name in fear of being of being viewed as revisionist, extremist or anti-Semitic. The father waxes (or shuffles -- in tandem with the novel's title) on the concurrent narratives of a reunified Germany and the plastic landscape of internet chatrooms. This is classic Grass, leery of Great Leaps Forward, championing the Snail and pondering whether these technological advances in discussion and dissemination will ultimately serve darker purposes?
2.27.2021
This second reading was likely a more gradual affair than the first one. It was also tempered by a topical revelation. The dubious idea of alternative epistemology has moved into a prominent public discussion in recent years. I am not sure such a development was a consideration during my first exposure to this provocative work. The premise of the novel could lazily be surmised: should the Germans be allowed to proclaim their own mourning for the Second World War? Of course, this question is a trick of perception, an optical distortion across the choppy water of both narrative but also biological time.
A journalist finds himself at close to my age and lacking a keel. He was born during an unfortunate event, the 1945 sinking of the MV Wilhelm Gustloff by a Soviet U-boat. The casualties likely make the incident the worst maritime disaster in history. Here come the "yets" -- though whether the ship was merely evacuating civilians from the advances of the Red Army or had a military function is endlessly caveated. Grass understood this, he also feared the cyber-possibilities for counternarratives, dog whistles which would avoid the trappings of the far right but would offer accord with such an ideology even if in terms of abeyance. This journalist discovers that his son has constructed a website to this national tragedy, one which can't properly say its name in fear of being of being viewed as revisionist, extremist or anti-Semitic. The father waxes (or shuffles -- in tandem with the novel's title) on the concurrent narratives of a reunified Germany and the plastic landscape of internet chatrooms. This is classic Grass, leery of Great Leaps Forward, championing the Snail and pondering whether these technological advances in discussion and dissemination will ultimately serve darker purposes?
July 14, 2007
It took me nearly ten days to read this not-too-long book. It was intentional. I think each and every sentence of the book is there for some reason, although I could not get the reason to some!
The story revolves around a silly happening in today's world where the Internet exists and is a common modality for communication. The happening is simple when you get it , but getting it is not so simple! The writer himself claims in one of the beginning pages that he is going to narrate in a manner that resembles the way a crab walks; going forward and backward in a way that the overall result is a slow forward movement . So, the whole story is a continuous movement between memories and present realities. This is very innovative to write a novel in such a method, isn't it?!
The way he builds the characters gradually is quite artistic. It gave me a good sense of the people who had been zealous , rather overzealous, about their ideas before , during and after the second world war, and how they used to think and act.
Moreover , his presentation of the war is fair and not too much pro-jew, which is the case with so many famous art pieces about the war. Despite the fact that , at the end you start to think negatively about Nazis, new or old, you get to consider the dogmatic approach taken by the jews, which is not noticeably more civilized than the Nazis'.
The book looks at the world war from a different angle.
It is worth mentioning that I read the Persian translation of the book and it was quite satisfactory.
Overall, I recommend everybody, specifically those who do not like to read very clearly cut stories, to go for this read. I really learned to look at modern story telling from a better , more advanced point of view.
Cheers!
Farzin
The story revolves around a silly happening in today's world where the Internet exists and is a common modality for communication. The happening is simple when you get it , but getting it is not so simple! The writer himself claims in one of the beginning pages that he is going to narrate in a manner that resembles the way a crab walks; going forward and backward in a way that the overall result is a slow forward movement . So, the whole story is a continuous movement between memories and present realities. This is very innovative to write a novel in such a method, isn't it?!
The way he builds the characters gradually is quite artistic. It gave me a good sense of the people who had been zealous , rather overzealous, about their ideas before , during and after the second world war, and how they used to think and act.
Moreover , his presentation of the war is fair and not too much pro-jew, which is the case with so many famous art pieces about the war. Despite the fact that , at the end you start to think negatively about Nazis, new or old, you get to consider the dogmatic approach taken by the jews, which is not noticeably more civilized than the Nazis'.
The book looks at the world war from a different angle.
It is worth mentioning that I read the Persian translation of the book and it was quite satisfactory.
Overall, I recommend everybody, specifically those who do not like to read very clearly cut stories, to go for this read. I really learned to look at modern story telling from a better , more advanced point of view.
Cheers!
Farzin
March 13, 2022
2.38 rounded to 5 because I don't give one-stars and I can't give my lowest rating to a winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature. I picked up this book because I wanted to read more about the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff by a Russian submarine near the end of WWII. If you have read 'Salt to the Sea' you are somewhat familiar with the situation; if not, you should because it is an excellent read.
he
Germans and Poles were trying to escape West due to the advance of the Russian Army (sounds a bit familiar unless you live on Mars).The Gustloff sinking is the worst maritime loss of life in naval history, more than the Titanic or the Lusitania. Unfortunately the book deals less with that event than the angst of a middle-age journalist and his problematic past and present. Read it if your interest lies in that realm, but not for the history lesson I was looking for.
he
Germans and Poles were trying to escape West due to the advance of the Russian Army (sounds a bit familiar unless you live on Mars).The Gustloff sinking is the worst maritime loss of life in naval history, more than the Titanic or the Lusitania. Unfortunately the book deals less with that event than the angst of a middle-age journalist and his problematic past and present. Read it if your interest lies in that realm, but not for the history lesson I was looking for.
June 2, 2020
Ödülü ve ismini sonuna dek hak eden bir kitap.
Dünya üzerinde mülteci olmak, iltica etmek ve bu kimliklerin hayattaki etkileri üzerine etkileyici bir eser!
Tavsiye ediyorum!
Dünya üzerinde mülteci olmak, iltica etmek ve bu kimliklerin hayattaki etkileri üzerine etkileyici bir eser!
Tavsiye ediyorum!
June 11, 2024
TITANIC VERSUS WILHELM GUSTLOFF
No, non fu il Titanic il più grande naufragio della storia recente, lo fu il siluramento della Wilhelm Gustloff, nave passeggeri di una compagnia tedesca, nell'inverno del 1945.
Quasi 10.000 morti, non militari bensì, oltre l'equipaggio, civili, donne e anziani ma soprattutto quasi 4500, tra lattanti bambini e ragazzini.
Bambini "protetti" in giubbotti salvagente che erano troppo grandi per loro, per quei corpicini che come tanti piccoli turaccioli galleggiarono nelle acque gelide del Baltico ma nel verso contrario alla vita cioè a testa in giù e con le magre gambette in alto come fossero braccia protese verso il cielo.
Quasi 10.000 profughi in fuga innanzi la disfatta del Reich che cercavano salvezza e invece incrociarano tre siluri sganciati da un sommergibile russo in una gelida notte del 1945, poco meno di un anno prima della fine della guerra.
Gunter Grass con il suo cipiglio sarcastico, rievoca un fatto reale in maniera personalissima attraverso una voce narrante dove il tema delle colpe individuali e collettive si intreccia con i destini del comandante sovietico responsabile della strage Alexandr Marinesko, con il destino di Wilhelm Gustloff cui fu intitolata la nave - il cosiddetto martire del Reich - e con quello di un giovane ebreo che lo assassinò nel tentativo di sollevare e scuotere gli ebrei contro il nazismo.
Grass scrittore scomodissimo dalla penna affilata e grottesca e molto discusso che si inserisce nella scia dei vilain della letteratura che stanno dalla parte sbagliata o, dalla parte equivoca della storia ma che scrivono come Dei, i Celine, i Malaparte i D'Annunzio.
Soprattutto gli stette a cuore descrivere la condizione mentale tedesca durante gli anni del totalitarismo evidenziando come il comportamento di molti (tutti) i tedeschi non poteva fare a meno di sottostare a "quelle" regole, le uniche conosciute e conoscibili, e a quel pensiero influenzato da schemi culturali, familiari, identitari.
Fare i conti con il passato cercando di rimuovere il complesso di colpa della Germania post bellica, smacchiando il giaguaro (cit.) per riprendere il corso dell'esistenza, con una presa di coscienza che può avere i suoi tempi.
Gunter Grass, tra l'altro un Nobel.
Libro che consiglio così come consiglio Il suo capolavoro, letto decenni fa che rileggerei subito: Il tamburo di latta.
No, non fu il Titanic il più grande naufragio della storia recente, lo fu il siluramento della Wilhelm Gustloff, nave passeggeri di una compagnia tedesca, nell'inverno del 1945.
Quasi 10.000 morti, non militari bensì, oltre l'equipaggio, civili, donne e anziani ma soprattutto quasi 4500, tra lattanti bambini e ragazzini.
Bambini "protetti" in giubbotti salvagente che erano troppo grandi per loro, per quei corpicini che come tanti piccoli turaccioli galleggiarono nelle acque gelide del Baltico ma nel verso contrario alla vita cioè a testa in giù e con le magre gambette in alto come fossero braccia protese verso il cielo.
Quasi 10.000 profughi in fuga innanzi la disfatta del Reich che cercavano salvezza e invece incrociarano tre siluri sganciati da un sommergibile russo in una gelida notte del 1945, poco meno di un anno prima della fine della guerra.
Gunter Grass con il suo cipiglio sarcastico, rievoca un fatto reale in maniera personalissima attraverso una voce narrante dove il tema delle colpe individuali e collettive si intreccia con i destini del comandante sovietico responsabile della strage Alexandr Marinesko, con il destino di Wilhelm Gustloff cui fu intitolata la nave - il cosiddetto martire del Reich - e con quello di un giovane ebreo che lo assassinò nel tentativo di sollevare e scuotere gli ebrei contro il nazismo.
Grass scrittore scomodissimo dalla penna affilata e grottesca e molto discusso che si inserisce nella scia dei vilain della letteratura che stanno dalla parte sbagliata o, dalla parte equivoca della storia ma che scrivono come Dei, i Celine, i Malaparte i D'Annunzio.
Soprattutto gli stette a cuore descrivere la condizione mentale tedesca durante gli anni del totalitarismo evidenziando come il comportamento di molti (tutti) i tedeschi non poteva fare a meno di sottostare a "quelle" regole, le uniche conosciute e conoscibili, e a quel pensiero influenzato da schemi culturali, familiari, identitari.
Fare i conti con il passato cercando di rimuovere il complesso di colpa della Germania post bellica, smacchiando il giaguaro (cit.) per riprendere il corso dell'esistenza, con una presa di coscienza che può avere i suoi tempi.
Gunter Grass, tra l'altro un Nobel.
Libro che consiglio così come consiglio Il suo capolavoro, letto decenni fa che rileggerei subito: Il tamburo di latta.
February 14, 2024
Come tutti i libri di Grass che ho letto, anche questo ha un forte impatto emotivo ed e' costruito su 3 storie diverse: Wilhelm Gustloff, il nazista da cui prese il nome la nave che affondo' tragicamente, David Frankfurter, l'ebreo che nel 1936 assassinò Gustloff, e Alexandr Marinesko, il comandante sovietico del sottomarino che lanciando 3 siluri provoco' la morte di 9000 persone, tra cui piu' della meta' donne e bambini.
Ma la storia piu' interessante e' quella del protagonista del libro, di sua madre Tulla e di suo figlio Konrad, tutti legati al naufragio della Gustloff, tutti descritti magistralmente dalla penna di Grass, che ha ancora una volta il pregio di portare alla luce una tragica storia che non si e' mai voluto ricordare.
Inquietante la frase finale del libro.
P.S. Un appunto alla casa editrice (Einaudi): per favore, digitalizzate almeno tutti i libri degli autori famosi! Questo era scritto piccolo, ma per fortuna non pesantissimo, ma avrei voluto il supporto di Wikipedia per tutte le cose che volevo approfondire!
Ma la storia piu' interessante e' quella del protagonista del libro, di sua madre Tulla e di suo figlio Konrad, tutti legati al naufragio della Gustloff, tutti descritti magistralmente dalla penna di Grass, che ha ancora una volta il pregio di portare alla luce una tragica storia che non si e' mai voluto ricordare.
Inquietante la frase finale del libro.
P.S. Un appunto alla casa editrice (Einaudi): per favore, digitalizzate almeno tutti i libri degli autori famosi! Questo era scritto piccolo, ma per fortuna non pesantissimo, ma avrei voluto il supporto di Wikipedia per tutte le cose che volevo approfondire!
May 30, 2019
The Tin Drum by Günter Grass made a big impression on me when I first read it 20 years ago and it’s high on my list of books to reread. Crabwalk is not as good, but is much shorter and plays on familiar Grass themes, namely post war German society and its attitudes. Grass uses the little-know worst maritime disaster in history, the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff by a Russian submarine in January 1945, with the loss of over 9,000 lives, as the fulcrum for his story. The narrator is Paul Pokriefke, a washed up writer whose patron pushes him to write a book about the disaster, mainly because Paul was born on the Gustloff the night it sank, before being rescued with his mother Tulla. During the course of his research, Paul comes across a website that glorifies the person for whom the ship was named, a staunch Nazi who was assassinated by a Jewish student in 1936. It turns out the website is run by Paul’s teenage son, Konrad, heavily influenced by grandmother Tulla, who thinks the Gustloff story should be widely told and reminisces about the happy days when it was a cruise ship subsidized by the Nazis. Konrad’s right wing dogma is opposed by the arguments of his chat room rival, a Jew. Their back and forth arguments and interaction contrast the scenes describing the real Gustloff and his Jewish assassin, David Frankfurter.
Grass uses three generations of characters to skillfully paint a picture of German attitudes and where they are going since the war ended. There is Paul’s mother Tulla and his mysterious patron who could be Paul’s father or Grass himself. This generation that lived through the war recognizes the suffering of the German people and want their story told, rather than dwelling on a guilty past and keeping quiet. There is Paul’s generation who have an overwhelming sense of guilt and never want to talk about the war. And there is the next generation who are starting to ask questions, who want to know more. This latter generation’s opinions are driven in two very different directions, fueled by the silence of their parents; the right wing using past guilt and non-recognition of German suffering as a platform for Neo-Nazi doctrine and the left wing who want to take responsibility for Germany’s past and speak openly about it. The two viewpoints are represented by young Konrad and his opponent, who expound both sides of the Gustloff sinking story to further their arguments (the Gustloff was also carrying hundreds of German auxiliary naval personnel, although their numbers were dwarfed by the overwhelming number of civilian refugees on board).
While probably not Grass’s best work, Crabwalk does paint a realistic picture of the gamut of German attitudes towards the war. I've heard the same arguments from German friends. It still remains relevant today 20 years after its publication, even more so with the rise of the political right and anti-immigration movement not only in Germany but in Europe as a whole.
Grass uses three generations of characters to skillfully paint a picture of German attitudes and where they are going since the war ended. There is Paul’s mother Tulla and his mysterious patron who could be Paul’s father or Grass himself. This generation that lived through the war recognizes the suffering of the German people and want their story told, rather than dwelling on a guilty past and keeping quiet. There is Paul’s generation who have an overwhelming sense of guilt and never want to talk about the war. And there is the next generation who are starting to ask questions, who want to know more. This latter generation’s opinions are driven in two very different directions, fueled by the silence of their parents; the right wing using past guilt and non-recognition of German suffering as a platform for Neo-Nazi doctrine and the left wing who want to take responsibility for Germany’s past and speak openly about it. The two viewpoints are represented by young Konrad and his opponent, who expound both sides of the Gustloff sinking story to further their arguments (the Gustloff was also carrying hundreds of German auxiliary naval personnel, although their numbers were dwarfed by the overwhelming number of civilian refugees on board).
While probably not Grass’s best work, Crabwalk does paint a realistic picture of the gamut of German attitudes towards the war. I've heard the same arguments from German friends. It still remains relevant today 20 years after its publication, even more so with the rise of the political right and anti-immigration movement not only in Germany but in Europe as a whole.
November 20, 2013
Grass's novel is about the deadliest marine disaster in history, but few have ever heard of it. In January 1945, a cruise ship which had been reconfigured to transport German refugees, the Wilhelm Gustloff, was sunk by a Soviet submarine in icy Baltic waters. More than 9,000 German refugees died, about 5,000 of them children. 1,252 were rescued and survived. (By comparison, about 1,500 people died on the Titanic.) Germany apparently tried to keep the disaster under wraps so as not to demoralize the German populace.
Grass creates a fictional survivor, a teenage girl who is 8 months pregnant and gives birth right after being rescued by another ship. Her son Paul is the first person narrator of the novel. He now has a teenage son, Konrad. All three of them are obsessed with the story of the Gustloff. Paul goes back and forth from the present to the past (this is the 'crabwalk' of the title) to tell the stories of himself, his mother, and his son. Meantime Konrad argues with another young man in a chatroom devoted to the disaster, making anti-Semitic comments. (The namesake of the ship was a Swiss Nazi who had been assassinated by a Jew in 1936.)
While the history lesson is horrible, tragic, and fascinating, Grass's story and characters are unappealing. The novel ends with an unpleasant twist which feels cheap and exploitative.
July 5, 2015
Günter Grass, the Nobel laureate and brilliant chronicler of Germany's tortured relationship to its past, died in April 2015. This short novel, published in 2002 ("Im Krebsgang"), was his last work of fiction. Its narrator tells his story by sidling up to the historical event at its core, then scuttling back, crablike, then approaching it again. And in this way we gradually move forward.
On January 30, 1945, a Russian submarine fired three torpedoes at the MV Wilhelm Gustloff, a passenger ship built to hold 1,900 people that had more than 10,000 aboard, most of them German refugees fleeing the advancing Red Army. The ship sank in the icy Baltic within an hour. Only about 1,200 were rescued; among the dead were as many as 4,000 children. It was the worst loss at sea in history (1,600 went down on the Titanic), although neither the Germans or Soviets were inclined to publicize it, either at the time or since. This is the historical event around which Grass's fictional narrator crabwalks.
As he has in much of his work, Grass examines the consequences of generations of Germans failing to confront the past. In the fictional family in this book, three generations are marked by the suppression of the story of the Wilhelm Gustloff. Tulla Pokriefke, a survivor, was eighteen and eight months pregnant when she boarded the ship. She went into labor after the first torpedo struck and gave birth aboard a rescue ship as the Wilhelm Gustloff sank. She has pressed her son, Paul, now a middle-aged hack journalist, to write about the ship and its fate, to reclaim a place in history for the Germans as victims. When he finally does so, it is at the behest of an older author, presumably Grass himself. As Paul works his way around the story, his Internet research leads him to a neo-Nazi site that glorifies the ship and its namesake. He realizes that the site is maintained by his teenage son Konny who, influenced by his grandmother, has found in right-wing extremism the appetite to acknowledge the suffering of Germans during the war.
Grass's many-layered telling includes the back story of the ship and its namesake, a martyred Nazi functionary; the assassin, a Jewish medical student who killed Gustloff in Switzerland in 1936; the Russian submarine commander; and more. It is a well-told, gripping story, short on moralizing but with an unmistakable message that is stated by the Grass figure:
Actually, he says, his generation should have been the one. It should have found words for the hardships endured by the Germans fleeing East Prussia.... Never, he said, should his generation have kept silent about such misery, merely because its own sense of guilt was so overwhelming, merely because for years the need to accept responsibility and show remorse took precedence, with the result that they abandoned the topic to the right wing. This failure, he says, was staggering.
The novel is yet another powerful reminder of the ways in which failing to honestly confront the lessons and symbols of the past continue to bedevil us. As I write this, the bandwagon to finally acknowledge the meaning of the Confederate flag is gaining steam. As Grass writes: It doesn't end. Never will it end.
On January 30, 1945, a Russian submarine fired three torpedoes at the MV Wilhelm Gustloff, a passenger ship built to hold 1,900 people that had more than 10,000 aboard, most of them German refugees fleeing the advancing Red Army. The ship sank in the icy Baltic within an hour. Only about 1,200 were rescued; among the dead were as many as 4,000 children. It was the worst loss at sea in history (1,600 went down on the Titanic), although neither the Germans or Soviets were inclined to publicize it, either at the time or since. This is the historical event around which Grass's fictional narrator crabwalks.
As he has in much of his work, Grass examines the consequences of generations of Germans failing to confront the past. In the fictional family in this book, three generations are marked by the suppression of the story of the Wilhelm Gustloff. Tulla Pokriefke, a survivor, was eighteen and eight months pregnant when she boarded the ship. She went into labor after the first torpedo struck and gave birth aboard a rescue ship as the Wilhelm Gustloff sank. She has pressed her son, Paul, now a middle-aged hack journalist, to write about the ship and its fate, to reclaim a place in history for the Germans as victims. When he finally does so, it is at the behest of an older author, presumably Grass himself. As Paul works his way around the story, his Internet research leads him to a neo-Nazi site that glorifies the ship and its namesake. He realizes that the site is maintained by his teenage son Konny who, influenced by his grandmother, has found in right-wing extremism the appetite to acknowledge the suffering of Germans during the war.
Grass's many-layered telling includes the back story of the ship and its namesake, a martyred Nazi functionary; the assassin, a Jewish medical student who killed Gustloff in Switzerland in 1936; the Russian submarine commander; and more. It is a well-told, gripping story, short on moralizing but with an unmistakable message that is stated by the Grass figure:
Actually, he says, his generation should have been the one. It should have found words for the hardships endured by the Germans fleeing East Prussia.... Never, he said, should his generation have kept silent about such misery, merely because its own sense of guilt was so overwhelming, merely because for years the need to accept responsibility and show remorse took precedence, with the result that they abandoned the topic to the right wing. This failure, he says, was staggering.
The novel is yet another powerful reminder of the ways in which failing to honestly confront the lessons and symbols of the past continue to bedevil us. As I write this, the bandwagon to finally acknowledge the meaning of the Confederate flag is gaining steam. As Grass writes: It doesn't end. Never will it end.
June 2, 2017
Já li alguns livros de Günter Grass (talvez quase, senão mesmo, metade daqueles que publicou) e confesso que nunca fui muito sua fã. Parece-me que tem muito ódio, raiva e outros sentimentos mal resolvidos. E sempre fiquei com a sensação de que a sua relação com a Alemanha está envolta em grande ressentimento. Mas que a Alemanha? Pois, a actual.
Então e que problema tem isso? O problema é que Grass tem um passado nas SS, ou seja, participou na Alemanha de Hitler, essa Alemanha do passado, de que ainda há culpa e medo. Daí que eu sinta uma certa contrariedade em Günter Grass. Aliás, isso encontra-se igualmente presente em "A Passo de Caranguejo", obra que ultrapassou as minhas expectativas de forma positiva.
A história concentra-se no afundamento do navio, "Wilhelm Gustloff", por um submarino russo em 1945, ainda na Segunda Guerra Mundial, e na vida de Paul (um jornalista e o narrador da história que nasce no mesmo dia em que Adolf Hitler subiu ao poder, em 1933, sentindo-se muito mal com isso), cuja mãe viajava neste navio e que, segundo percebi, nasceu aquando deste naufrágio, que terá levado à morte cerca de 10.000 passageiros. Melhor dizendo: concentra-se em Paul, na sua mãe e no filho de Paul.
A obra leva-nos a pensar também na questão judaica, na culpa por inevitabilidade, na situação da Polónia "ensanduichada" entre a Alemanha e a Rússia, entre o Nacional-Socialismo e o Comunismo, ...
É uma leitura interessante. Deixa-nos a pensar no passado recente da História europeia. E ajudou-me, de algum modo, a reconciliar-me, por um lado, com Günter Grass (estou a ler a sua auto-biografia, "Descascando a cebola" e ainda estou a gostar mais) e a sua obra e, pelo outro, com o próprio acto de ler como um acto de gostar, que com o cansaço, saturação e alguma desmotivação, me visitou umas quantas vezes no passado mês de Maio...! Por isso, valeu a pena a sua espera prolongada, desde 2013, na minha estante. Chegou a altura certa. Chegou a altura dele (para mim).
Então e que problema tem isso? O problema é que Grass tem um passado nas SS, ou seja, participou na Alemanha de Hitler, essa Alemanha do passado, de que ainda há culpa e medo. Daí que eu sinta uma certa contrariedade em Günter Grass. Aliás, isso encontra-se igualmente presente em "A Passo de Caranguejo", obra que ultrapassou as minhas expectativas de forma positiva.
A história concentra-se no afundamento do navio, "Wilhelm Gustloff", por um submarino russo em 1945, ainda na Segunda Guerra Mundial, e na vida de Paul (um jornalista e o narrador da história que nasce no mesmo dia em que Adolf Hitler subiu ao poder, em 1933, sentindo-se muito mal com isso), cuja mãe viajava neste navio e que, segundo percebi, nasceu aquando deste naufrágio, que terá levado à morte cerca de 10.000 passageiros. Melhor dizendo: concentra-se em Paul, na sua mãe e no filho de Paul.
A obra leva-nos a pensar também na questão judaica, na culpa por inevitabilidade, na situação da Polónia "ensanduichada" entre a Alemanha e a Rússia, entre o Nacional-Socialismo e o Comunismo, ...
É uma leitura interessante. Deixa-nos a pensar no passado recente da História europeia. E ajudou-me, de algum modo, a reconciliar-me, por um lado, com Günter Grass (estou a ler a sua auto-biografia, "Descascando a cebola" e ainda estou a gostar mais) e a sua obra e, pelo outro, com o próprio acto de ler como um acto de gostar, que com o cansaço, saturação e alguma desmotivação, me visitou umas quantas vezes no passado mês de Maio...! Por isso, valeu a pena a sua espera prolongada, desde 2013, na minha estante. Chegou a altura certa. Chegou a altura dele (para mim).
October 28, 2020
3 1/2, rounded up to 4. Not as smashing as Tin Drum but still pretty good and a bit weird. Since listening to this audiobook I have been trying to find a good book on the sinking of the German cruise ship Wilhelm Gustloff by a Soviet Uboat, but have not been able. I am curious about the true events that provide the setting for this fictional work.
Definitely worth reading. The German Nationalist kid is an interesting character. The ending is very effective.
Definitely worth reading. The German Nationalist kid is an interesting character. The ending is very effective.
November 24, 2020
یک شاهکار تمام عیار.
باید 170 صفحه پیش رفت و حوصله کرد و واگویه های یک پدر خسته و رنجور را تحمل کرد تا دریافت :"او شیطان نیست؛ جهان شیطانی ست."
باید 170 صفحه پیش رفت و حوصله کرد و واگویه های یک پدر خسته و رنجور را تحمل کرد تا دریافت :"او شیطان نیست؛ جهان شیطانی ست."
August 2, 2022
"Crabwalk" by Gunter Grass is a fictional story of a man who is searching for information about the boat that sank the night he was born. Tulla Pokriefke, as a pregnant young woman, was one of the few survivors of the disaster; once an ardent Nazi, she became an equally ardent Stalinist; clearly, she has a great need to belong. Her son Paul was born on the rescue vessel; now a journalist, he has few strong feelings, although he doggedly pursues his research into the sinking. Paul's estranged teenage son Konrad turns out to run a website with neo-Nazi sympathies. His research opens his eyes to both truths about his family and the dangerous ways in which Nazi ideals live on in certain communities.
Gunter Grass is a skilled writer, that is beyond dispute. But whether everything he wrote has to be compared with his masterpiece 'Tin Drum" is open to question. I did not enjoy this one at all. I did not like the way the author jumped around and spent pages and pages describing insignificant details like when he described the sinking of the William Gustloff. The book is a little bit non-linear as events of the past are talked about alongside the main plot which takes place in the late 1990s. If you really want a non-fiction account, try the "Death in the Baltic: The World War II Sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff" by Cathryn J. Prince. She weaves personal narratives into a broader story, finally giving this WWII tragedy its rightful remembrance. Grass' short novel fails to convince me as fiction. His ideas were better than the plot of the story which seemed to jump over the details more important to the characters and the story that would have helped to make the book better.
Gunter Grass is a skilled writer, that is beyond dispute. But whether everything he wrote has to be compared with his masterpiece 'Tin Drum" is open to question. I did not enjoy this one at all. I did not like the way the author jumped around and spent pages and pages describing insignificant details like when he described the sinking of the William Gustloff. The book is a little bit non-linear as events of the past are talked about alongside the main plot which takes place in the late 1990s. If you really want a non-fiction account, try the "Death in the Baltic: The World War II Sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff" by Cathryn J. Prince. She weaves personal narratives into a broader story, finally giving this WWII tragedy its rightful remembrance. Grass' short novel fails to convince me as fiction. His ideas were better than the plot of the story which seemed to jump over the details more important to the characters and the story that would have helped to make the book better.
April 14, 2015
The events surrounding the biggest naval disaster in history and its tragic outcome are not an easy topic to bring to the attention of the reader of fifty-some years later. "Why only now?" is a good question and one that starts IM KREBSGANG. The Wilhelm Gustloff, a "Strength through Joy" cruise ship turned refugee carrier, sank after a Soviet submarine attack on January 30 1945 leading to the death of more than 9,000 people, half of them children and infants. Although the details of the sinking have been known since then, there has been reluctance to publicize them. Grass has found a way to break the silence. At least one aspect of his motivation for doing so revolves around the disaster's aftermath in today's society and emerges clearly towards the end of the book.
Tulla Pokriefke, one of the survivors of the tragedy, cannot find words to describe what she saw on the ship as the torpedoes hit: "There's no notes in the scale for it..." Nevertheless, for years she has been insisting that her son write it all down - the way she remembers it. Paul Pokriefke, a second-rate middle-aged journalist, born on one of the rescue ships at the time of the sinking, reluctantly takes on the "job". He's pressured into it by the major background player, Grass himself. Paul timidly argues with Him about the format, scope and depth of his book. He is in favour of a neutral documentary on the ship, its history and its namesake, a Nazi "martyr" and hero. His disinclination to take on this project at all speaks volumes about his generation's reluctance to relive and confront all aspects of the German past. Paul is typical in other ways too... But He nags and guides Paul through the details: take the central theme of the sinking of the ship and trace its history; bring out the lives of the people directly connected with it; don't forget Tulla, yourself and your son - make it personal. The outcome is a description of historical characters like Wilhelm Gustloff, the Nazi activist, David Frankfurter, the German Jew who killed him in 1936, and Alexandr Marinesko, the submarine captain who sank the vessel, interwoven with Paul's and his family's life, from then to now. Three generations of Pokriefkes, deeply influenced by the disaster, have to deal with it and the wider Nazi history in their individual way. None of them is comfortable with their present-day life.
It takes a specially gifted writer and authoritative critic like Gunter Grass to make this tragedy public in a format that is meaningful today. Having referred to the sinking of the Gustloff in previous novels, "it seems that He knew Tulla when she was young", he had been reluctant to expand on it until he had identified the right fictional frame in which to embed the facts. He found it in the strong character of Tulla, 18 at the time of the disaster and turning completely white on that day, who epitomizes the successful survivor and practical realist of her generation. She remains in the East, seemingly switching allegiances without effort to the Stalinist regime, defending it long after the Wall has crumbled.
Gunter Grass' language and literary skills are undeniable; but his often difficult language (at least in German) and his complex imagery and use of metaphor have brought him admirers as well as critics. In this book, both the language and the imagery do not present any difficulty for the reader. In fact, the text flows relatively smoothly: it reads fast despite the subject matter. Walking sideways like a crab and "scuttling backwards" to move forward describes the flow of the story. Slowly the characters come into view and the different strands merge to form a comprehensive picture. Paul's more or less ongoing commentary about his writing efforts, his reactions to family and Him, his jumping back and forth in the story, results, at times, in a somewhat lighter, more conversational tone.
Grass deliberately uses the structure of a traditional 'novella' to convey the historical events and their impact on his group of Germans. An addition to being a `short novel', a novella is usually more tightly structured and focused on a single major event. It often comprises a didactic angle or moral message. All of these elements can be found in this novella. Grass' message in particular addresses the after-war generation(s). He integrates into the story the recurrent problem of young neo-nazis, skinheads and the danger of hate websites on the Internet characterized through Paul's son Konny. He reflects on the inability of the parent generation to come to terms with the children as well as their own reality. He criticizes the lukewarm attitudes towards politics and history by many Germans of Paul's generation. He is concerned with what the future holds. The German word `Krebs' also means cancer. Although not stated directly the reader of German cannot avoid reflecting on this connotation. Like cancers, totalitarian and fascist systems infect society, then go into remission, come and go. Can we be wholly cured of them? IM KREBSGANG is on many levels an important book, which leaves you with ample food for thought.
Tulla Pokriefke, one of the survivors of the tragedy, cannot find words to describe what she saw on the ship as the torpedoes hit: "There's no notes in the scale for it..." Nevertheless, for years she has been insisting that her son write it all down - the way she remembers it. Paul Pokriefke, a second-rate middle-aged journalist, born on one of the rescue ships at the time of the sinking, reluctantly takes on the "job". He's pressured into it by the major background player, Grass himself. Paul timidly argues with Him about the format, scope and depth of his book. He is in favour of a neutral documentary on the ship, its history and its namesake, a Nazi "martyr" and hero. His disinclination to take on this project at all speaks volumes about his generation's reluctance to relive and confront all aspects of the German past. Paul is typical in other ways too... But He nags and guides Paul through the details: take the central theme of the sinking of the ship and trace its history; bring out the lives of the people directly connected with it; don't forget Tulla, yourself and your son - make it personal. The outcome is a description of historical characters like Wilhelm Gustloff, the Nazi activist, David Frankfurter, the German Jew who killed him in 1936, and Alexandr Marinesko, the submarine captain who sank the vessel, interwoven with Paul's and his family's life, from then to now. Three generations of Pokriefkes, deeply influenced by the disaster, have to deal with it and the wider Nazi history in their individual way. None of them is comfortable with their present-day life.
It takes a specially gifted writer and authoritative critic like Gunter Grass to make this tragedy public in a format that is meaningful today. Having referred to the sinking of the Gustloff in previous novels, "it seems that He knew Tulla when she was young", he had been reluctant to expand on it until he had identified the right fictional frame in which to embed the facts. He found it in the strong character of Tulla, 18 at the time of the disaster and turning completely white on that day, who epitomizes the successful survivor and practical realist of her generation. She remains in the East, seemingly switching allegiances without effort to the Stalinist regime, defending it long after the Wall has crumbled.
Gunter Grass' language and literary skills are undeniable; but his often difficult language (at least in German) and his complex imagery and use of metaphor have brought him admirers as well as critics. In this book, both the language and the imagery do not present any difficulty for the reader. In fact, the text flows relatively smoothly: it reads fast despite the subject matter. Walking sideways like a crab and "scuttling backwards" to move forward describes the flow of the story. Slowly the characters come into view and the different strands merge to form a comprehensive picture. Paul's more or less ongoing commentary about his writing efforts, his reactions to family and Him, his jumping back and forth in the story, results, at times, in a somewhat lighter, more conversational tone.
Grass deliberately uses the structure of a traditional 'novella' to convey the historical events and their impact on his group of Germans. An addition to being a `short novel', a novella is usually more tightly structured and focused on a single major event. It often comprises a didactic angle or moral message. All of these elements can be found in this novella. Grass' message in particular addresses the after-war generation(s). He integrates into the story the recurrent problem of young neo-nazis, skinheads and the danger of hate websites on the Internet characterized through Paul's son Konny. He reflects on the inability of the parent generation to come to terms with the children as well as their own reality. He criticizes the lukewarm attitudes towards politics and history by many Germans of Paul's generation. He is concerned with what the future holds. The German word `Krebs' also means cancer. Although not stated directly the reader of German cannot avoid reflecting on this connotation. Like cancers, totalitarian and fascist systems infect society, then go into remission, come and go. Can we be wholly cured of them? IM KREBSGANG is on many levels an important book, which leaves you with ample food for thought.
November 13, 2020
Well, if GoodReads won't give us half stars they certainly won't give us quarter stars. But a conflicted me wants to rate this 3.25? A novel that mostly struggled to capture my interest outright, but seemed to lull on easy enough ended with the type of book I would've hoped this to be! It only took 6 of the 9 chapters to get there! But reflecting on the book in its entirety I really enjoyed it. An unforeseen, modern sequel to the Danzig Trilogy, this book surprisingly brings back Tulla Pokreifke as a grandmother who has taken her anti-semitic grandson under her wing but told from the perspective of the father struggling to reckon with the infamous story of his birth. Günter Grass never disappoints when searching for a book that wrestles with the reality and affects of Germany's troubled past.
April 16, 2023
Mal etwas anderes, sehr interessante Geschichte. Konnte mich leider mit dem Ich-Erzähler und dem Schreibstil (viele Wechsel zwischen Gegenwart und Vergangenheit, für die buchstäblich der Titel "Im Krebsgang" steht) nicht anfreunden.
December 8, 2016
Gerçek bir olayı farklı bir yorumla ele alan G.Grass taraflar ve nedenler değil savaşın kendisi sorgulanmalı ve lanetlenmeli diyor.
November 25, 2019
یا این کتاب، کتاب من نبود!
یا این نویسنده، نویسنده من نیست!
یا این نویسنده، نویسنده من نیست!
April 25, 2015
This was the first work of Grass I've ever read. As I learned, his style in "Crabwalk" differs to his writing in the Danzig Trilogy although it deals with the same subject: The Second World War and the German responsible.
The book is told by Paul Pokriefke, son of Tulla Pokriefke (known from the Danzig Trilogy)who survived the sinking of the "Gustloff" on 30th January 1945, a ship, torpedoed by a Russian submarine. It was one of the most fatal sinking in history whose victims were mainly women and children, fleeing from the Red Army. Tulla is changed by this experience and keeps remembering the day over and over again. When Paul does not write about his fate, predestined by his birth on the sinking ship, Tulla projects all her hopes on her grandson Konrad whose parents are divorced. Influenced by his grandmother, he opens a website, remembering the sinking of the "Gustloff", even praising the Nazi system. His glorification of the Nazis culminates in a murder on Wolfgang Stremplin who impersonates himself as a jew, just like Frankfurter killed Wilhelm Gustloff, after whom the ship is named. The story is told in a crab walk way, telling non-fictional parts of german history in combination with the history of the Pokriefke family.
We had to read this book in school and mainly, we were taught that it deals with the difficulties of the distinction between victim and perpetrator. It is hard to distinguish between "Good" and "Bad" when many people suffered under the circumstances of this World War, even the "Bad Ones", the Germans. The focus of the story is the sinking of a ship, a german ship which was by law warship so its torpedoing was allowed though the victims were women and children, not guilty of any crimes, maybe only guilty of accepting the Nazi government without acting against it. It is hard to distinguish here between "good" and "bad" because how can a child who never harmed anyone be guilty of a crime just because it fled from the Russian soldiers?
But for me the most impressive thing about "Crab Walk" is how it also functions as a reminder not to repeat history and also as a reminder to stop right wing radicalism. Tulla slowly indoctrinates her grandson with all her stories about the sinking which at first seem harmless but later end in a murder. For me, the main message of the book was to talk more open about the history so that we can prevent crimes motivated by right wing radicalism.
The book had a great influence on me because I realized that this part of German history is more difficult and complex than I thought the years before. I started thinking about crimes cause by racism and hate and I began thinking that never ever a war like this should happen again. And I felt like it is the task of my generation to prevent this from happening and to always act tolerant and not swallow everything parents or other authorities tell us (like Tulla did with Konrad).
The writing style was rather different than what is said to be "typical" for Grass. After that I read a few pages of "The Tin Drum" and even poetry and came to the conclusion that style-wise this work of "Grass" is weaker than others. But even in "Crab Walk" were some sentences which made my heart beat faster and which reflected his exalted style of writing.
For me, this book is way more than a story about a sinking ship, it is a story about the rehabilitation of the Second World War (with the both sides: Paul who never talks and Tulla who talks too much)and me and all of my classmates, as I can speak for them, thought differently about it after reading.
The book is told by Paul Pokriefke, son of Tulla Pokriefke (known from the Danzig Trilogy)who survived the sinking of the "Gustloff" on 30th January 1945, a ship, torpedoed by a Russian submarine. It was one of the most fatal sinking in history whose victims were mainly women and children, fleeing from the Red Army. Tulla is changed by this experience and keeps remembering the day over and over again. When Paul does not write about his fate, predestined by his birth on the sinking ship, Tulla projects all her hopes on her grandson Konrad whose parents are divorced. Influenced by his grandmother, he opens a website, remembering the sinking of the "Gustloff", even praising the Nazi system. His glorification of the Nazis culminates in a murder on Wolfgang Stremplin who impersonates himself as a jew, just like Frankfurter killed Wilhelm Gustloff, after whom the ship is named. The story is told in a crab walk way, telling non-fictional parts of german history in combination with the history of the Pokriefke family.
We had to read this book in school and mainly, we were taught that it deals with the difficulties of the distinction between victim and perpetrator. It is hard to distinguish between "Good" and "Bad" when many people suffered under the circumstances of this World War, even the "Bad Ones", the Germans. The focus of the story is the sinking of a ship, a german ship which was by law warship so its torpedoing was allowed though the victims were women and children, not guilty of any crimes, maybe only guilty of accepting the Nazi government without acting against it. It is hard to distinguish here between "good" and "bad" because how can a child who never harmed anyone be guilty of a crime just because it fled from the Russian soldiers?
But for me the most impressive thing about "Crab Walk" is how it also functions as a reminder not to repeat history and also as a reminder to stop right wing radicalism. Tulla slowly indoctrinates her grandson with all her stories about the sinking which at first seem harmless but later end in a murder. For me, the main message of the book was to talk more open about the history so that we can prevent crimes motivated by right wing radicalism.
The book had a great influence on me because I realized that this part of German history is more difficult and complex than I thought the years before. I started thinking about crimes cause by racism and hate and I began thinking that never ever a war like this should happen again. And I felt like it is the task of my generation to prevent this from happening and to always act tolerant and not swallow everything parents or other authorities tell us (like Tulla did with Konrad).
The writing style was rather different than what is said to be "typical" for Grass. After that I read a few pages of "The Tin Drum" and even poetry and came to the conclusion that style-wise this work of "Grass" is weaker than others. But even in "Crab Walk" were some sentences which made my heart beat faster and which reflected his exalted style of writing.
For me, this book is way more than a story about a sinking ship, it is a story about the rehabilitation of the Second World War (with the both sides: Paul who never talks and Tulla who talks too much)and me and all of my classmates, as I can speak for them, thought differently about it after reading.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 29, 2015
Crabwalk is clearly not one of the better efforts by Gunter Grass whose Tin Drum is one of the great classics of 20th Century literature. This novel tells the story of the impact of the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff (a boat carrying 5000 to 9000 refugees from East Prussia to Germany in January 1945) on three generations of a single family. One major character is a the narrator's mother who is on the Willhelm Gustloff when it is hit by three torpedos from a Russian submarine. The narrator who is born in the lifeboat is the second major character and his son who will dedicate his life to seeking revenge for the incident is the third major character.
As I have family, in Gdansk where the ill-fated ship departed from, I had heard many stories of the incident and was interested in getting more details on the legendary disaster. To this extent reading the book was a success. The problem is that I am totally unconvinced by everything Grass had to say about contemporary German in Crabwalk which is a morose and dim-witted fable.
I think that we can all acknowledge that many Germans died because of Hitler's insane actions. We probably can also agree that some of the Germans who died during WWII can be considered innocent victims. Most of those who perished on the Wilhelm Gustloff were women and children and thus seem to be belong in this category.
The question is what to make of it all. The real number of deaths be it 5000 or 9000 is certainly large by most measures. It seems absurd to classify their deaths as being mere collateral damage. The mother considers the incident to have been a great moral outrage demanding retribution. The son is ambivalent while the grandson who agrees with the grandmother kills a person that he believes to be a Jew as an act or revenge.
The narrator concludes that his mother was wrong to have incited her grandson in the manner that she did and that the son was simply perpetuating a cycle of violence with no end. My problem is that I am not very convinced. I have the feeling that most Germans accept the fact that they lost the war and that they have to endorse the winners version of what happened; that is to say that they must periodically beat themselves on the breast for their sins and not trouble others with stories about how they suffered too.
As I have family, in Gdansk where the ill-fated ship departed from, I had heard many stories of the incident and was interested in getting more details on the legendary disaster. To this extent reading the book was a success. The problem is that I am totally unconvinced by everything Grass had to say about contemporary German in Crabwalk which is a morose and dim-witted fable.
I think that we can all acknowledge that many Germans died because of Hitler's insane actions. We probably can also agree that some of the Germans who died during WWII can be considered innocent victims. Most of those who perished on the Wilhelm Gustloff were women and children and thus seem to be belong in this category.
The question is what to make of it all. The real number of deaths be it 5000 or 9000 is certainly large by most measures. It seems absurd to classify their deaths as being mere collateral damage. The mother considers the incident to have been a great moral outrage demanding retribution. The son is ambivalent while the grandson who agrees with the grandmother kills a person that he believes to be a Jew as an act or revenge.
The narrator concludes that his mother was wrong to have incited her grandson in the manner that she did and that the son was simply perpetuating a cycle of violence with no end. My problem is that I am not very convinced. I have the feeling that most Germans accept the fact that they lost the war and that they have to endorse the winners version of what happened; that is to say that they must periodically beat themselves on the breast for their sins and not trouble others with stories about how they suffered too.
April 6, 2016
*2,5 / 2,75 STERNE*
Was soll ich groß sagen? Ich musste das Buch für die Schule lesen und mir gefallen Schulbücher eher selten.
Ich fand die ersten 30 Seiten am schlimmsten, obwohl ich die ja schon einmal im Sommer gelesen habe und jetzt aber erneut von vorne beginnen musste, da ich damals abgebrochen habe. Beim zweiten Lesen der ersten 30 Seiten ging es allerdings deutlich schneller und leichter.
Auch wenn ich nur ziemlich langsam durch dieses Buch durchkam und die Sprache sehr gewöhnungsbedürftig ist, hat mir das Thema sehr gut gefallen - Ich mag Geschichte und finde vorallem diese Zeit (Nazi-Deutschland) sehr interessant!
Es war nicht das schlimmste Buch was ich je gelesen habe, aber ich würde es freiwillig nicht nochmal lesen.
UPDATE: 06.04.2016
Nachdem wir das Buch in der Schule besprochen haben, nachdem ich meine Probe Abi Klausur darüber geschrieben habe und nachdem ich das Buch zum zweiten mal gelesen habe, muss ich sagen, dass ich finde, dies ist ein Buch was jeder mal lesen sollte. Klar, am Anfang versteht man so ungefähr nichts, die Sprache ist etwas anstrengend, es springt zwischen Zeiten/Geschichten/Gegenwarten usw. aber zum Ende hin wird es echt gut. Es ist einfach ein Buch, was meiner Meinung nach auch gerade zur Zeit sehr wichtig ist.
3 STERNE!!
Was soll ich groß sagen? Ich musste das Buch für die Schule lesen und mir gefallen Schulbücher eher selten.
Ich fand die ersten 30 Seiten am schlimmsten, obwohl ich die ja schon einmal im Sommer gelesen habe und jetzt aber erneut von vorne beginnen musste, da ich damals abgebrochen habe. Beim zweiten Lesen der ersten 30 Seiten ging es allerdings deutlich schneller und leichter.
Auch wenn ich nur ziemlich langsam durch dieses Buch durchkam und die Sprache sehr gewöhnungsbedürftig ist, hat mir das Thema sehr gut gefallen - Ich mag Geschichte und finde vorallem diese Zeit (Nazi-Deutschland) sehr interessant!
Es war nicht das schlimmste Buch was ich je gelesen habe, aber ich würde es freiwillig nicht nochmal lesen.
UPDATE: 06.04.2016
Nachdem wir das Buch in der Schule besprochen haben, nachdem ich meine Probe Abi Klausur darüber geschrieben habe und nachdem ich das Buch zum zweiten mal gelesen habe, muss ich sagen, dass ich finde, dies ist ein Buch was jeder mal lesen sollte. Klar, am Anfang versteht man so ungefähr nichts, die Sprache ist etwas anstrengend, es springt zwischen Zeiten/Geschichten/Gegenwarten usw. aber zum Ende hin wird es echt gut. Es ist einfach ein Buch, was meiner Meinung nach auch gerade zur Zeit sehr wichtig ist.
3 STERNE!!
October 24, 2023
I always look forward to a Gunter book, though in his now later years he's taken full advantage of his wealth, fame, and age to blabber on at times with whatever decadent West vs East agendas he has in the background.
In Crabwalk Grass examines how the Germans dealt, or not, with their grief over the war. Grass incorporates flashbacks and the internet and even inserts himself into the tale.
I find his 'interneting' a little self-conscious, trying. too hard to be contemporary, -see I'm still a hip dude!
It is a touching saga of all those names, those lists of names on casualty sheets, in papers, group photographs looking back at you, of people lost long ago, in a time no one can believe existed.
In Crabwalk Grass examines how the Germans dealt, or not, with their grief over the war. Grass incorporates flashbacks and the internet and even inserts himself into the tale.
I find his 'interneting' a little self-conscious, trying. too hard to be contemporary, -see I'm still a hip dude!
It is a touching saga of all those names, those lists of names on casualty sheets, in papers, group photographs looking back at you, of people lost long ago, in a time no one can believe existed.
November 23, 2012
What happened to Tulla from Langfuhr, her baby and her grandson, before, during and after the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff which sailed from Gotenhafen (Gdynia) in 1945. This is naturally very Günter: crabwalks at every turn, circular, sideways, diversions and detours, with such a light and devastating touch ('a small eternity later...'). Some find him impossible to read but for me his work is genius, the mature and serious way to do history and its current impact in fiction, ie not alternating slices of past and present, but a deep, complicated mat of now-and-then, truth-and-myth, them-and-us.
August 17, 2018
Sprachlich habe ich es genossen. Ich muss mehr von Grass lesen (dies war nach "Katz und Maus" mein zweites Buch von ihm).
Am Inhalt kann man sich reiben, man muss nicht mit allem einverstanden sein, mich lässt es nachdenklich zurück. Ein großartiges Buch, auch und vor allem, nachdem ich erst vor kurzem "Heimatmuseum" von Siegfried Lenz gelesen habe. Beide leider aktuell und zeitlos. Und dazu in so schöner Sprache verfasst.
Am Inhalt kann man sich reiben, man muss nicht mit allem einverstanden sein, mich lässt es nachdenklich zurück. Ein großartiges Buch, auch und vor allem, nachdem ich erst vor kurzem "Heimatmuseum" von Siegfried Lenz gelesen habe. Beide leider aktuell und zeitlos. Und dazu in so schöner Sprache verfasst.
November 22, 2007
Germans were victims too--a different perspective. You learn about the biggest maritime disaster, which is the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff. In this book, the main characters which span three generations are directly/indirectly affected by this disaster.
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