Frankfurter Rundschau 10.10.2009

Bernhard Bartsch introduces Beijing's next generation of writers, who meet in private book shops and are now keeping blogs. Han Han, a star among literary bloggers, explains in an interview: "I always try to go to the limits and push them out a little further every time (...) In my opinion, the most critical issue in China today is freedom of the press, because I believe in the power of information. A lot of people in China are proud that things are so much better there here than in North Korea, but if it weren't for North Korea, we'd look pretty goddam old."


Die Welt 10.10.2009

Uta Baier was at the opening of the Ai Weiwei exhibition in Munich's Haus der Kunst: "Everything that made him famous is here on show, and most of it has been discussed and written about extensively. But all these words cannot explain Ai's work. The vast hall in the Haus der Kunst are only just big enough to house the hundreds of tree stumps, the temple columns and the multitude of photos that Ai has taken of himself and his people. Here is a man baring his soul, here is a man mourning for the destruction of his own culture."


Die Tageszeitung 10.10.2009

Kirsten Küppers and Dirk Knipphals tell the story of how Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass" was translated into German. The two paid a visit to both the translator, Jürgen Brocan, and the editor and publisher, Michael Krüger: "By the time Brocan sent the last version to Munich, it was already April, four months later than planned. But the job was done. He says: 'I was absolutely exhausted, completely destroyed. A mental and physical wreck.' And Michael Krüger: "'When the book arrived I was beaming with joy, at being able to see this day!' He had been wondering how much his work would stand the test of time. This translation would certainly outlive him. The publisher lights a cigarette, stands up and sits down again. Then he says: 'The pride I felt about the book was greater than the pain I felt about the money we lost making it."


From the blogs 13.10.2009

Herta Müller's ex-husband, Richard Wagner, vents his spleen about an op-Ed piece in the Polish newspaper Rzeczpospolita, which opined that the Nobel prize for Herta Müller was another brushstroke in the portrayal of history that featured the Germans as WWII victims. "It is just plain cynical to suggest that Herta Müller is a revanchist. There is probably no other German writer of her generation who has done more to work through the Nazi past, that of the Banat-Swabians and of her own father as well. And with such relentlessness that her own people have accused her of 'fouling the nest' or of being a 'communist agent'. This information, by the way, is all available in her books. Seven of Herta Müller's works have been translated into Polish, but the Rzeczpospolita commentator has evidently read none of them."


Berliner Zeitung 13.10.2009

"This is the most outrageous, beautiful and fantastic film to have come out of German-language cinema in a long time," writes Anke Westphal about Michael Haneke's "The White Ribbon" (trailer). It recounts a series of strange and terrible occurrences which take place just before the outbreak of WWI in a Northern German village. The spectacular photography reminds the critic of August Sander, and it depicts the brutality typical of the day in matters of child raising. "Punishment, here, is regarded as the basis for respect and 'cleansing through chastisement" is the order of the day. This is all executed as if it were the most rational thing in the world, and it is impossible to resist – it is a closed system of repression, which believes itself to be the best system. And what gets under your skin most is the systematic production of internal distress, which finds expression in maliciousness, envy and apathy. Everything is overlaid with taboo, and even the smallest things are met with heavy punishment."


Perlentaucher 14.10.2009

Ekkehard Knörer, by contrast, couldn't stand the film. "As a director, Haneke is incredibly authoritarian. That and the fact that he wants complete control over every last detail of his stories and images so that nothing is left open. So when, at the beginning of a Haneke film, there is a voice-over, it has only one function: it is the needle and thread which stitches the film so tightly together that nothing can fall out, so that anything that might possibly contradict the entirely unequivocal morality of its auteur, is forced to the margins."


Süddeutsche Zeitung 13.10.2009

This year's German Book Prize was won by Katrin Schmidt for her novel "You're Not Going to Die", about a woman who survives a stroke and has to relearn everything from scratch (excerpt). Thomas Steinfeld celebrates the book's language, "which is what makes the book so good. With never a hint of pathos, or the least flirtation with dismay and pity, the events are presented in a spartan language that so befits the recovery of speech."


Die Tageszeitung 15.10.2009

Beijing author Wang Xiaoshan had obviously been hoping for rather more dialogue at the Frankfurt Book Fair: "The Germans are probably not entirely aware of the extent of the tragedy that the Chinese are saddled with. Germany made its mistakes with the First and Second World War. But China has been making the wrong decisions on almost every key issue for the last 150 years. The Chinese need neither sympathy nor empathy, what they really need is to be helped to reflect on why this happened and why they have always got it wrong."


From the blogs 15.10.2009

In her blog, the writer Jagoda Marinic comments on the ignorant reaction of the New York Times to Herta Müller's Nobel award ("Herta WHO?"): "Ok, so Germany plays no major role on the US book market, we've known that for ages. But Romania? How is it possible that Herta Müller has received zero attention until now, despite her being a Nobel candidate? After all, her publishers (Hanser Verlag) have good contacts in the US, and they publish Nobel candidates from the US, bringing them fame, honour and a huge readership. Even the least well-read bookseller in Germany has heard of the mountains of Philip Roth books."


Die Welt 16.10.2009

The Tibetan blogger Tsering Woeser (more here) explains in an interview, why she is unable to fly to Frankfurt to introduce her new book. "I can't get a passport. That was the case when I was editor of the Tibetan Literature magazine in Lhasa. Despite being a member of the writers' association, the authorities ignored my application. It's not that simple for Tibetans to get passports. In 2003, I lost my job because of a number of critical essays published in the magazine. I moved to Beijing with my husband Wang Lixiong. Since then I have been trying to get a passport. I had to travel to Changchun in North-East China, which is where my husband was originally registered to live. I have put in a application three times now. But I haven't managed to get a passport, or even an answer as to why."