'Stimme der Wahrheit': German-Language Broadcasting by the BBC by Charmian Brinson , Richard Dove (review)

Abstract

878 Reviews based on re-presenting the absent homeland. Bischoff's contribution is particularly impressive for its scholarly overview of the differentand competing discourses of current exile studies. She is keen to differentiate exile literature from the narrow definitions of German Exilforschung and also from the French postmodern paradigm of universal strangerhood. (Rather more esoteric contributions, such as Tobias on Celan and Schmidt on Baer, would have benefited from this kind of academic contextualization .) Hilfrich's article examines exile in Helene Cixous's writings, but does not stress adequately the Jewish particularity of this writer,remaining instead within the postmodern paradigm of ubiquitous homelessness. Nevertheless, her emphasis on the bodily dimension of exile writing is worthy of note and corresponds in many respects both to Philipp Theisohn's analysis of the relationship between writing and soil in Kafka, and to Schmidt's intriguing, if difficult,examination of conflated historiographical-theological modes in Baer's treatise on 'Galut'. The volume ends on a contrapuntal note with Frank Stern's critique of the com? monplace and often obscurantist German-Jewish exile narrative in scholarship con? cerned with the German-Jewish influence on Hollywood. Overall the volume is thematically coherent and of a solid scholarly standard. Some ofthe contributions, such as Schmidt's article on Baer, however, could have done with more direct editorial intervention, as the English-language register is not sufficiently idiomatic throughout. University of Edinburgh Mary Cosgrove 'Stimme der Wahrheit': German-Language Broadcasting by the BBC. Ed. by Charmian Brinson and Richard Dove. (The Yearbook of the Research Centre for German and Austrian Exile Studies, 5) Amsterdam and New York: Rodopi. 2003. xvi + 25opp. ?53; $66. ISBN 90-420-0978-0. The Yearbook of the Research Centre for German and Austrian Exile Studies has established itself as a must-read for anyone interested in the field of Exile Studies in Britain and internationally. This fifthvolume is no exception: its focus on the BBC, employer of numerous German-speaking refugees in the late 1930s and the 1940s, promises greatly to enhance our understanding of refugee activity in Britain. The firstsection, '"London Calling": Broadcasting to the Enemy', concentrates on the war years, with a chapter on the Austrian radio service and its editor Patrick Smith by Charmian Brinson and one on the Feature Programmes of the Austrian Service by Richard Dove. Both stress the factthat the Austrian Service was established almost as an afterthought to the better-known German Service and outline the increasing em? phasis placed on the independence of Austria from Germany. Although both Brinson and Dove provide a detailed overview of this particular service, it becomes evident that the overall picture of wartime German-language broadcasting in Britain will necessarily remain fragmented. The volume, based on the papers of a conference on the topic held at the Germanic Institute in 2002, might have benefited from further papers on the German Service to give a more comprehensive picture. Unfortunately, it is clear that further research will be hindered by the lack of material preserved in the BBC archives. However, in other areas the volume follows its predecessors by extending its focus beyond the well-known institutions and individuals in exile. Two chapters outline the difficulties of those who sought to contribute to the BBC pro? grammes as freelance writers: Deborah Vietor-Englander and JenniferTaylor focus on two women writers, Hermynia Zur Muhlen and Grete Fischer, who suffered the vagaries of the hand-to-mouth existence of the refugee intellectual. The second section moves chronologically forward and concentrates on post-war radio services, both in Britain and in East and West Germany. Stephen Lawrie shows MLR, 100.3, 2005 879 Erich Fried as a successful employee of the post-war BBC, who even had it written in his contract that he was allowed to write poetry during officehours. Lawrie credits the Corporation with giving Fried much-needed support during the early stages of his career. The subject of the BBC's post-war influence on the West German media is explored by Toby Thacker's research, showing how the wartime experience of using music for propaganda purposes influenced the practice of 'music control' in the British zone. Jens Briining's article...