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Gunther Grass - Crabwalk

  • 12-07-2004 9:37am
    #1
    RE*AC*TOR
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,482 ✭✭✭


    Just finished this. Good book. Its like two books in fact, one book a historical retelling of the sinking of a German cruiseship during World-war 2. The second book is a story of 3 generations of a family affected by this disaster and the reappearance of naziism. In fact by the end - it started to remind me of One Hundred Years of Solitude (thematically - not on quality) - one of 100yrs major themes was the reecurrence of names and features of family memebers throughout the generations (among other things), Ursula was always convinced history was repeating itself. much the same here - we have two Konrad's seperated by a generation, a
    repeat of a politically motivated shooting - once by a jew lashing out at a nazi and nazism in the name of all jew's (the martyr giving his name to the ill-fated cruiseship) - and then by a german 60yrs later seeking revenge on a jew for the former act

    More importantly I got the impression Grass was trying to suggest that germans are in a kind of denial of political extremism - obviously due to the immense amount of history - he refers to censorship of discussions on Nazi history - whether it is pro or con - its like the elephant in the living room thing of Northern Ireland - everyone know its there - but no one discusses it.

    Anyway - good book - worth a read (and maybe a reread) - not too long - and quite accessible.


Comments

  • #2
    John
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,135 ✭✭✭✭John


    I bought "The Tin Drum" last week on recommendation from a friend. I haven't started it yet but if I like it I'll try "Crabwalk" after.


  • #3
    simu
    Closed Accounts Posts: 10,730 ✭✭✭✭simu


    Bump!

    I read this today and enjoyed it immensely. It reminded me a little of Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse 5, both in terms of content and style. It was a very interesting insight into German attitudes to the past and the complexities of dealing with past suffering and like the OP said, you could see some similarities with problems in NI. It was also very vivid and well-paced. I look forward to reading more of Grass. It's also the first non sci-fi book I've read where a relationship that develops over the internet is one of the central threads of the story.

    (Also - boards.ie people will find it funny that Stormfront gets a brief mention)!


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