Die groessere Hoffnung
book — Austria — 1948

7.5
Let`s be honest - you don`t know who I.Aichinger was and neither did I - until I read this book. Except for the fact that her book is a part of my German project and of my female-writers project as well. Ok, enough of that already, let`s focus on the story. There are 10 stories which make up this book, all of them are about a young half-jewish girl (at the age of 15 I guess) in the madness of WW2 somewhere at the cape of good hope, that`s the reason for the title - the bigger hope. But there`s not too much hope - since nazis rule the land. There are no facts, no figures, you can`t even tell how close of how far the end of the war was, if you`re not particulary well informed you don`t know what the situation there was like (and I`m not particulary well informed), but there`s one totally strange thing about this book I can`t find an explanation for - it`s easy to read. I must admit - the subject of the book is heavy, the description - unreal, something that you could even call cosmic, but it`s still easy to read. And it makes me wonder, how can a book of this content be easy to read, even if the main hero is killed by a hand granade at the end of the book.
2004-10-25
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