Der siebente Brunnen. Roman by Fred Wander, Ruth KlügerFred Wander. Leben und Werk by Walter Grünzweig, Ursula Seeber

Abstract

AUSTRIAN STUDIES, I4, 20 6 375 does not do justice to itscomplexity, and implies that there isone single, accepted way of reading 'DerMeridian', a possibility that isbelied by the ongoing critical debate on precisely this subject. A concluding chapter would have been useful in drawing together these insights into Celan 'spoetological statements, perhaps leading to the conception of a Celanian poetics of translation. Nevertheless, this is a thorough and enlightening study that lays firm foundations for a broader understanding of themetapoetic dimensions of Celan 's translations. University College London Charlotte Ryland Der siebenteBrunnen. Roman. By Fred Wander. Mit einem Nachwort von Ruth Kl?ger. G?ttingen: Wallstein. 2005. 168 pp. 19,00. isbn 3-89244-837-x. Fred Wander. Leben und Werk. Ed. byWalter Gr?nzweig and Ursula Seeber. Bonn: Weidle. 2005. 256 pp. 23,00. isbn 3-931135-88-8. In academic research into political, economic, social and cultural life in the German Democratic Republic, an aspect that continues even today to be largely neglected is the interaction between literature produced by authors living and working in the GDR and German-language literature produced in countries other thanWest Germany. Like Swiss and Austrian literature, the writing of the former GDR is viewed primarily in terms of its relationship to the Federal Republic. Although the study of literary relations between different areas of the periphery could open up completely new perspectives for the literary-historical representations of German-language literature as a whole, hardly any research has so far been done on, for example, the relations between GDR writers and their colleagues in Switzerland or on the reception of Austrian literature in the GDR. When the issue of literary transfer within the German-speaking world is thematized, this almost invariably takes place from the perspective of Berlin, which is treated as the undisputed hub of German-language literature. Investigations such as the study of the reception of Stefan Zweig in the GDR by Holger Naujoks (2002) are a rarity and tend to go largely unnoticed in overviews of literaryhistory. An interesting figure, whose life history could form the starting-point for a broader study of literary relations between theGDR and Austria, is theVienna born writer Fred Wander (b. 1917), whose novel Der siebente Brunnen ( 1971 )was reissued in 2005, coinciding with the publication of a collection of essays on his life and work, edited byWalter Gr?nzweig and Ursula Seeber. The collection of essays on Fred Wander. Leben und Werk is divided into two sections. Alongside seven scholarly analyses it also contains six so-called 'Ann?herungen', inwhich contemporaries tell of their encounters withWander and his work. Whilst Christa Wolf's contribution thematizes the difficulties of treating such traumatic experiences as life in a concentration camp in literary form,Wulf Kirsten and Wolfgang Trampe, both ofwhom are themselves writers and for a long while worked as editors for theAufbau Verlag, which published out of Berlin and Weimar, assert that 'FredWander liebt das Gespr?ch' (p. 38) and recount theirmany interesting conversations withWander about his literary activity. Particularly informative is the contribution of Eberhard G?rner on the 376 Reviews attempt in the 1980s tomake a film of Der siebenteBrunnen. That the plan was never realized isattributed byG?rner to the circumstance that the novel did not correspond with themode of Vergangenheitsbew?ltigungexpected in theGDR. In the view of the ruling SED, Wander had produced an impressive depiction of the fate of theJews under National Socialism but had paid insufficient attention to the role of the Communist resistance. Attempts to film the novel since 1989 have been equally unsuccessful. The last two 'Ann?herungen' are provided by Karl M?ller and by Sybille Klemm, whose academic field isEnglish literature. Alongside a few reflections on the role of literature as a form of escapism and a means of extending one's own horizons in less open societies such as theGDR and an account of a visit to Wander inVienna, where he has once again been living since 1984, Klemm's text also contains interesting insights intoWander's book Holland auf dem ersten Blick (1972), which exerted a significant influence on her image of theNetherlands. Karl M?ller, Professor ofModern German Literature at...