Physical Dramaturgy: Ein (neuer) Trend?

Dramaturgie im zeitgenössischen Tanz ist ? positiv gemeint ? ein heißes Eisen. Idealerweise sind Dramaturginnen und Dramaturgen während der Erarbeitung eines Stücks die besten Freunde der Choreografen. more more

GoetheInstitute

11/04/2006

Books this Season: Nonfiction

Spring 2006

The German newspapers have long and (for us) tedious names, so we use abbreviations. Here a key to them

Fiction / Nonfiction

Political books


You can say what you want about Necla Kelek, one thing remains true: her books are among the most talked about in the feuilletons. After "Die fremde Braut" (The foreign bride, more here), now she turns to discuss the other half of Turkish Muslim society: the patriarchal fathers who rule over family life, the sons whose mothers decide who they will marry, and the brothers who control, and even punish, their sisters. The FAZ calls "Die verlorenen Söhne" (The lost sons) long overdue, while Die Zeit is somewhat put off by the rapid succession of generalisations that Kelek drops like other people do cashier's receipts. The taz applauds Kelek for switching the focus of her "worst of Islam" from the daughters to the sons, while the FR would have liked her to feature not only Turkish-born, but also German-born young men.
See our feature "Happier without father," an interview with Necla Kelek.

Other books this season deal with the integration of migrants, primarily Turkish, in Germany. Also recommended are "Das Kreuz mit den Werten" (Crossed values) in which Dilek Zaptcioglu and Jürgen Gottschlich compare and contrast German and Turkish "defining cultures", as well as Hilal Sezgin's "Typisch Türkin?" (Typically Turkish?), with portraits of successful and self-confident Turkish-German women.

"Anyone wanting to improve their understanding of Iran should read this book", writes the taz about Christopher de Bellaigue's "In the Rose Garden of the Martyrs", and the other critics agree. The former Iran correspondent for The Economist writes about embittered intellectuals, cynical war profiteers, critical Ayatollahs, sobered revolutionaries and army regiments that broke out in tears at Khomeini's radio announcements. The taz credits Bellaigue with an immense knowledge of his domain. Die Zeit discovers a country whose embittered population is ever more harshly oppressed by a band of corrupt theocrats. And the FR is astonished at the country's high culture of ceremonial hypocrisy.

Another book that's kicked up a lot of dust this season is Frank Schirrmacher's "Minimum". In it the FAZ publisher warns how a childless society can bring about the loss of close social ties. Paul Berman's "Idealisten an der Macht" (Idealists in power) has also received much critical attention, albeit ambivalent. The book portrays the generation of European Leftist who set out in 1968 to teach the world about morals and human rights.


Biographies

Lars Brandt's very personal "Andenken" (Remembrance) of his father, former German chancellor Willy Brandt, has touched all critics. In it he tells of distinct moments, childhood memories of the Berlin governed by his father the mayor, fishing together, the atmosphere in the chancellor's villa in Bonn. The book is full of "good human feelings" and understanding for a complicated man, writes Gustav Seibt in the SZ. Martin Krumbholz is astonished in the NZZ how "cautiously, even indulgently" the author describes his father's aloofness. The FR believes it can detect a "deeply sorrowful core" to the book, while the FAZ is very impressed by the author's writing skills, stating that such a loving work ultimately says much for the person portrayed.

Die Zeit is shocked and fascinated by the career of Silvio Berlusconi, whose rise from construction speculator to media magnate and head of the Italian government is described by Alexander Stille in "Citizen Berlusconi". The paper is amazed at how little it knew about Berlusconi, particularly in relation to his Mafia contacts. The SZ and the taz also recommend Paul Ginsborg's pointed essay "Berlusconi". In it, the Florence-based historian warns against taking the politician too lightly. Because Berlusconi, Ginsborg writes, works unflinchingly on consolidating his personal power.

American founding father Benjamin Franklin was born 300 years ago. Two biographies have appeared simultaneously to mark the occasion, and both are well-received by the critics. The NZZ calls Jürgen Overhoff's "Benjamin Franklin" a successful, "spirited" biography which does much to bring this spearhead of freedom closer to German readers. Die Zeit finds the book gripping, welcoming it as a much needed antidote to all the books currently giving a distinctly negative image of the USA. Much praise also goes to "Benjamin Franklin" by Yale historian Edmund Morgan, who the paper calls a "highly gifted narrator", even if he puts Franklin in too rosy a light. The NZZ marvels at the elegance with which Morgan links the development of the American Revolution with Franklin's biography. The SZ, for its part, sees in Franklin the true American.

Erik Tawaststjerna's major biography of the Finnish composer Jean Sibelius is finally available in German, writes the FAZ. Sibelius, one of the most important Scandinavian composers, was born in 1865, and is famed above all for his national epic Kalewala and his violin concerto and seven symphonies that derive from it. Tawaststjerna, who died in 1993, is referred to reverentially by the FAZ as "Mr. Sibelius". The book is the result of his decades of research into Sibelius' life and work.


History

Edgar Wolfrum has written "Geglückte Demokratie" (Fortunate democracy), a modern history of the Federal Republic of Germany. The FR is only a little put off with Wolfrum's unconcealed identification with the Federal Republic, because his portrayal of history is just too good. Die Zeit finds the division into three major phases of stabilisation, pluralisation and internationalisation entirely plausible. Both the narrative and the theoretical passages are agreeably challenging, and the discussion of social questions stimulating, the paper writes.


Cultural history

Peter von Matt has critics raving with his book "Die Intrige" (The intrigue), dedicated to the major schemers of literary history from the Biblical rogues and scoundrels through Homer, Dante and Shakespeare right up to Thomas Mann and Patricia Highsmith. Roman Bucheli writes in the NZZ that the book is nothing less than a "key event in the history of civilisation." It tells how the "schemers" mark reason's appearance in literature, when the understanding began to flout blind fate. In Die Zeit, Fritz J. Raddatz cheers at this "roller-coaster of intellectual pleasure." In the FAZ, Alexander Honold rejoices at a "first-class piece of work", while in the SZ, Jens Bisky tells how disappointed he was when he got to the end.

A history of psychoanalysis has appeared on Sigmund Freud's one hundred fiftieth birthday, the likes of which Die Zeit had previously only dared to dream. Eli Zaretsky's "Freuds Jahrhundert" (Freud's century) is rich in material and portrays in a wonderfully readable way the ins and outs of psychoanalysis. And at the same time Zaretsky manages to keep a distance to his subject, whose basic problems are also given a tongue-in-cheek analysis. Die Zeit is entirely satisfied with the work, and hopes Zaretsky will continue his performance with a book on how psychoanalysis was received worldwide.


Art

Art restorer Antonio Forcellino treats "Michelangelo" as delicately as the artworks he rejuvenates. "It has been a long time since someone gave such a good explanation for what comprises genius", writes Die Zeit, particularly happy that Michelangelo's artworks, and not his purported homosexuality, are the focus of attention. Forcellino presents each work over several pages, outlining Michelangelo's pioneering methods, ethereal glazing techniques and unique ability to turn the flaccid human body into "ciphers of pain, love, and willpower."

Two other large glossy works dedicated to Renaissance and Baroque giants have critics breathing hard. The FAZ is happy that Frank Zöllner's monumental monograph "Botticelli" steers clear of intellectual acrobatics. Die Zeit agrees, though it would have preferred a somewhat less pompous presentation. The FAZ is also very taken by Arne Karsten's "Bernini", especially by how well the author situates the architect and sculptor in the social and political turbulence of his time.

Fiction / Nonfiction

Get the signandsight newsletter for regular updates on feature articles.
signandsight.com - let's talk european.

 
More articles

No one is indestructible

Tuesday, February 28, 2012

TeaserPicA precision engineer of the emotions, Peter Nadas traces the European upheavals of the past century in his colossal and epic novel "Parallel Stories", which was published in English in December. The core and epicentre of the novel is the body, which bears the marks of history and trauma. In his seemingly chaotic intertwining of lives and stories, Nadas penetrates the depths of the human animal with unique insight. A review by Joachim Sartorius
read more

Road tripping across the ideological divide

Wednesday 1 February, 2012

TeaserPicThe USA and the USSR should not simply be thought of as arch enemies of the Cold War. Beyond ideology, the two nations were deeply interested in one another. Ilya Ilf and Yevgeny Petrov were thrilled by the American Way of Life in 1935/6, John Steinbeck and Robert Capa praised the sheer vitality of the Russian people in 1947. Historian Karl Schlögel reviews a perfect pair of travel journals. Photo by Ilf and Petrov.
read more

Language without a childhood

Monday 23 January 2012

TeaserPicTurkish-born author, actor and director Emine Sevgi Özdamar was recently awarded the Alice Salomon Prize for Poetics. Coming to West Berlin in 1965, Özdamar first learned German at the age of 19. After stage school she went on to become the directorial assistant to Benno Besson and Matthias Langhoff at the Volksbühne in East Berlin while still living in West Berlin. Harald Jähner warmly lauds the author's uniquely visual sense of her acquired language and her ability to overcome the seemingly insurmountable dividing line through the city.
read more

Friendship in the time of terror

Monday 9 January 2012

Nadezhda Mandelstam's personal memories of the Russian poet Anna Akhmatova, her intimate friend, offer a unique and moving testimony to friendship and resistance over decades of persecution. Published only after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989, the text is still unavailable in English but has recently been translated into German. A unique historical document, celebrating an intellectual icon in an age of horror. Portrait of Akhmatova by Kuzma Petrov-Vodkin.
read more

Just one drop of forgetfulness

Thursday 8 December, 2011

TeaserPicThis year is the 200th anniversary of the death of German writer Heinrich von Kleist. The author Gertrud Leutenegger has a very Kleistian afternoon on Elba, when she encounters the Marquise von O in the waiting room of a very strange eye doctor.
read more

German Book Prize 2011 - the short list

Tuesday 4 October, 2011

TeaserPicEugen Ruge has won the German Book Prize with his novel "In Zeiten des abnehmenden Lichts" (In times of fading light), an autobiographical story of an East German family. The award is presented to the best German-language novel just before the start of the Frankfurt Book Fair. Here we present this year's six shortlisted authors and exclusive English translations of excerpts from their novels.

read more

Torment and blessing

Wednesday 28 September, 2011

Chinese dissident Liao Yiwu escaped into exile in Germany in July this year. His new book about his life in Chongqing prison has just been published in German as "Für Ein Lied und Hundert Lieder". Both book and author have a life-threatening odyssey behind them. I am overjoyed that Liao Yiwu is here with us and not at home in prison. By Herta Müller
read more

In the vortex of congealed time

Monday 12 September, 2011

No other European city suffered more in World War II than Leningrad under siege, when over a million people lost their lives. Russian literature delivers a rich testimony of the events which have been all but forgotten by the West. Only a few works, though, also do the disaster aesthetic justice. By Oleg Yuriev
read more

My unrelenting vice

Tuesday 6 September 2011

In this apology for the vice of reading, Bora Cosic describes the magnificent and fantastic discoveries of one of its practitioners – revealing how texts contain what we bring to them, how we sometimes read without reading and how books are not only found in books but many other places. 
read more

Potential market, no buyers

Monday 4 July, 2011

The most successful Croatian book of 2008 sold exactly 1,904 copies. Not what one could really call a market, although together the successor republics represent a single language community. A look at the situation of publishers and authors in the former Yugoslavia. By Norbert Mappes-Niediek.
read more

Head versus hand

Monday 27 June, 2011

TeaserPicThis year's German International Literature Award goes to "Venushaar", a Russian novel that starts out as a dialogue between an asylum seeker and an immigration officer, and opens into a vast choir of voices. A conversation with its author Mikhail Shishkin, a literary giant in his own country, and his German translator Andreas Tretner. By Ekkehard Knörer. (Image: Mikhail Shishkin © Yvonne Böhler)
read more

Cry for life

Monday 20 May, 2011

Algeria's youth: Frustrated, isolated and in the stranglehold of clandestine political structures. Young Algerians are rebelling against being locked in traditional political and social structures, but have no chance of a national uprising like that in Tunisia, says Algerian author Boualem Sansal. An interview with Reiner Wandler.
read more

Witness to intellectual suicide

Tuesday 3 May, 2011

TeaserPicOn what would have been Romanian philosopher E.M. Cioran's 100th birthday, Suhrkamp has published a volume of his essays from the 1930s, "Über Deutschland". Effervescing with enthusiasm for Hitler and fascist ideas, they cast a dark shadow over his later writing. Fritz Raddatz wishes he'd never had to read such abominations and bids a former companion a bitter farewell. Photo: E.M. Cioran © Surhrkamp Verlag
read more

RIP Andre Müller

Wednesday 13 April, 2011

TeaserPicAndre Müller Germany's most insightful and most feared interviewer is dead. Elfriede Jelinek said of him in her obituary: "Andre Müller goes all the way into people and then he makes them into language, and only then do they become themselves." Read his interviews with Ingmar Bergman and Hitler's sculptor Arno Breker in English. Photo courtesy Bibliothek der Provinz
read more

A country on the edge of time

Monday 4 April, 2011

TeaserPicSerbia was the country in focus at this year's Leipzig Book Fair – its extensive literature seems to be bound up in the straitjacket of politics. Serbia is having a hard time with Europe, and Europe is having a hard time with Serbia. Although there are signs of a softening stance, the country is still locked up in the self-imposed nationalist isolation into which it manoeuvred itself as the aggressor in the Yugoslavian war of secession. A visit there inspires mixed feelings. By Jörg Plath
Photo: Sreten Ugricic
read more