Reviewed by: Hemingway und die Deutschen Lesley C. Pleasant Hemingway und die Deutschen. By Jobst C. Knigge. Hamburg, Germany: Kovac, 2009. 112 pages. Paperback 48 Euros. In Hemingway und die Deutschen (Hemingway and the Germans), Jobst C. Knigge, a journalist with a background in history, surveys Hemingwayâs personal and professional relationships and experiences with Germans, briefly cross-referencing these to German translations of Hemingwayâs texts and to quotations by Germans who met him. Admitting from the start that Hemingwayâs connection to Germans was not central to the authorâs work, Knigge nonetheless considers Hemingwayâs âspecialâ relationship with Germans to be a âred threadâ (7, 103) in his life. As a Germanist, I had hoped Knigge might prove this âred threadâ to be more significant. Although taking Hemingway to task for his political ambivalence, the 112-page study is primarily informational rather than analytical. Knigge announces on the first page that he will not discuss either Hemingwayâs influence on German writers and readers or the influence of German authors on Hemingwayâs style (which he considers virtually nonexistent). Except perhaps by his title, Knigge does not promise more than he delivers: Hemingway und die Deutschen is an interesting reference for those pursuing the âInternational Hemingwayâ (see for instance Ben Stoltzfusâs recent Hemingway and French Writers), and for critics studying Hemingwayâs relationship to Germans from a more analytical point of view. Citing the âlimits of Hemingwayâs imagination,â Knigge focuses on Hemingwayâs biography, claiming that the American author âusually could only write about that which he more or less experienced himself â (19, all translations from Knigge are mine). Written for a general German audience (all Hemingway quotations appear in German translation), the text is divided chronologically into seven main parts: âEarly Years in Europe,â âHemingway and Nazi Germany,â âGerman Friends in the Spanish Civil War,â âThe Second World War,â âWriting about the War,â âWives and Friendshipsâ and âBooks, Publishers, and Translators.â Knigge concedes that Hemingway did not really know, and had no interest in, Germans or their culture (7, 103). Yet, he also conveys disappointment that Hemingway did not âdo enoughâ with his World War Two experience. According to Knigge, Hemingwayâs first (and negative) encounters with Germans occurred after World War I when he served as a foreign correspondent for the Toronto Daily Star. While covering the economic conference in [End Page 136] Genoa, Hemingway mocked the appearance of German journalists. Reporting on the French occupation of the Ruhr, Hemingway described the situation as âabsurdâ (14) as the fierce propaganda war had turned Germans and French into caricatures of each other (see âHate in the Ruhr is Realâ and âFrench Speed with Movies on the Jobâ in DL 289â294). Negativity colors Hemingwayâs reactions to Germany and its people generally. Disturbed by the German tourist herds, he refused to hike through the Black Forest, which âwas no forest but just a lot of wooded hills and highly cultivated valleysâ (DL 198). Although the high inflation worked to his advantage, he felt unwelcome in Germany because of German unfriendliness toward foreigners. Returning that unfriendliness in print, Hemingway wrote of ugly, graceless people with âthe look of utter stupidity that belongs only to the bactrian and the South German peasant womanâ (DL 202, see âGerman Innkeepersâ article). The capital fared no better. Knigge asserts that Hemingway disliked Berlin even before his three visits, and that the âmachoâ writer âcouldnât standâ âthe homosexual milieu of the German metropolisâ (23). For Hemingway, âThere is nothing attractive nor gay about the nightlife of Berlin. It is altogether revolting... There is no nightclub in Berlin that is not disgusting, heavy, dull and hopelessâ (DL 407). Knigge criticizes Hemingwayâs description of his Black Forest fishing experience that appeared not only as a newspaper article (âFishing in Baden Perfectâ), but also as a âsimply recycledâ (22) description in âThe Snows of Kilimanjaro.â Questioning whether the experience really warranted a literary recurrence, the German wonders âwhat the reader should do with this realistic memoryâ (22). According to Knigge, Hemingwayâs descriptions are often langatmig as well as umstĂ€ndlich (both terms for âlongwindedâ) (18, 69) and âsomewhat clichĂ©d...