The Language of Silence: West German Literature and the Holocaust
Focusing on individual authors from Heinrich Boll to Gunther Grass, Hermann Lenz to Peter Schneider, The Language of Silence offers an analysis of West German literature as it tries to come to terms with the Holocaust and its impact on postwar West German society. Exploring postwar literature as the...
| Summary: | Focusing on individual authors from Heinrich Boll to Gunther Grass, Hermann Lenz to Peter Schneider, The Language of Silence offers an analysis of West German literature as it tries to come to terms with the Holocaust and its impact on postwar West German society. Exploring postwar literature as the barometer of Germany's unconsciously held values as well as of its professed conscience, Ernestine Schlant demonstrates that the confrontation with the Holocaust has shifted over the decades from repression, circumvention, and omission to an open acknowledgement of the crimes. Yet even today a 'language of silence' remains since the victims and their suffering are still overlooked and ignored. Learned and exacting, Schlant's study makes an important contribution to our understanding of postwar German culture. Book Cover -- Half-Title -- Title -- Copyright -- Dedication -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- The Different Kinds of Silence -- The Corruption of Language -- The Inability to Mourn -- The Break in Civilization -- A Word on Organization -- one The First Postwar Decade -- Heinrich Böll -- Wolfgang Koeppen -- two Documentary Literature -- Alexander Kluge -- Günter Grass -- three Autobiographical Novels -- four Autobiographical Novels -- five The War on the Eastern Front -- six Ruptures and Displacements -- seven Restitution of Personal Identity? -- Alfred Andersch -- Peter Härtling -- Gert Hofmann -- eight Speeches and Controversies -- Bitburg -- Literary Disputes -- The Historikerstreit -- The Jenninger Affair -- Unification -- Grass vs. Walser -- nine Post-Unification -- Bernhard Schlink -- Peter Schneider -- W.G.Sebald -- Conclusion -- The Jewish Presence in Contemporary Germany -- The Institutionalization of the Holocaust -- Notes -- Selected Bibliography -- Primary Literary Sources -- Secondary Sources -- Index. |
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| Item Description: | Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources |
| Physical Description: | 1 online resource (279 pages) |
| ISBN: | 978-0-203-01009-9 0-203-01009-4 0-415-92220-8 0-415-92219-4 |
