‘Der Freie Leser’: Reading and Freedom in The Works of Alfred Andersch

Abstract

THERE can be few writers in modern German literature as passionately devoted to the ideal of freedom as Alfred Andersch, and even fewer who have associated freedom as closely with the act of reading. Andersch himself read widely in European literature~ as is evident from his essays and literary references in his fiction, yet in his lifetime he also experienced the worst excesses of censorship during the Nazi period. In the years of his journalistic activity shortly after the Second World War he defended the German press vigorously against the controls of the occupying Allied forces. Despite his artistic interest in radio and cinema, Andersch was essentially a nlan of the printed word. and throughout his life he linked the concept of freedom prinlarily with the opportunity to write and the freedom to read. In Andersch's works, the freedom to read often takes on a further dimension, as a liberating force in itself. While the general theme of freedoln in the works of Andersch has received considerable attention, 1 the part which reading plays in this freedom has been neglected by Andersch scholars. The role of reading assumes particular importance in his first novel Sansibar oder der letzte Grund (1957) and in his last story Der Vater eines Morders (1980), but is significant also in his other novels and stories. The theme of freedom and reading may be characterised by Gregor's term 'der freie Leser' from Sansibar oder der letzte Grund. Gregor uses the term to describe the 'Iesender KlosterschUler' sculpture;2 appropriately, the passage from the novel in which Gregor first sees this figure appears also 'statt eines Vorworts' in Das Alfred Andersch Lesebuch (1979).3 Admittedly, the concept of freedom, as is obvious from Andersch's works, varies from person to person, and is thus difficult to define and categorise; yet it is possible to identify three basic meanings behind the term 'def freie Leser', each associated with a different character in Sansibar, yet which can be applied to other works also: first, the reader who is free to criticise what he is reading (Gregor); sec-