Tags: Books
Date: 27 November 2008 01:56:51
I've just finished an assignment - it is well past the witching hour - but I had problems with the wretched software which meant that I had to print off my original translation and then type it out again. Grrrrr.
So as I am now wide awake, I will catch up on some of the posts I would have made earlier in the month had the site not been undergoing its transformation.
Stones from the river is written by Ursula Hegi, a German American. Considering that she grew up and lived in Germany until she was 18, her command of the English language is amazing.
The novel starts straight after the Great War and centres on the life of Trudi who was born shortly before the War ended. She was born with growth deficiency disorder (she calls herself a dwarf - or Zwerg - throughout the novel) and suffers greatly from being "different".
Trudi's mother is unable to support her in the way she needs but she forms a close and loving relationship with her father who is a librarian. Trudi helps him in the library and develops into being the town gossip as she sits on the counter listening to all the news the customers tell her sympathetic father. Because of Trudi's physical disability, the customers seem to think that she is mentally disabled as well and talk about things which they would not otherwise tell a child. Despite her spreading rumours around the town, Trudi comes over as being a very likeable character.
By the time she reaches her late teens, Germany is on the brink of war again and the hardships of the town's inhabitants are related. Trudi knows that although she is not Jewish she is in a weak position for surviving as the Nazis consider anyone with disabilities to be fair game for medical experimentation.
I won't tell you any more of the plot but this novel depicts small town life in all its detail - with births, deaths and marriages, the noble and upstanding members of society who risk their lives to save their neighbours to the despicable characters who change their political allegiance to save their own skin (and then deny they ever believed in their original cause). It covers childhood and adulthood, disability, love affairs, and deportation, the bombing of Dresden by the Allies, incest and swimming in the river and a moment of solidarity found at the circus.
It is beautifully written tapestry of very real people living in a period of extraordinary upheaval - and many of them manage to maintain their beliefs and morals when there it seems there is no honour in doing so.