Language:
German
Year of publication:
1999
Titel der Quelle:
Peter Weiss Jahrbuch
Angaben zur Quelle:
8 (1999) 114-140
Keywords:
Walser, Martin,
;
Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) Influence
Abstract:
Traces the development behind Walser's notorious remark, in his speech accepting the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade in 1998, that it was time to stop asking Germans constantly to confront the Holocaust. Already in 1965, after attending several sessions of the Auschwitz trial, Walser rebelled against the sensational representation of the Holocaust as the work of inhuman brutes rather than the systematic national program it was. In his essay "Unser Auschwitz" he said that this left ordinary Germans like himself feeling uninvolved. Thereafter, he avoided the Holocaust in his literary work, although he returned to it in many essays, speeches, and interviews. In his eyes, the only "morally beautiful" representations of the Holocaust were accurate and critical accounts of personal experience, by both victims and perpetrators or bystanders. German national history includes all of the 20th century and all Germans, Jews and non-Jews, who in this wider context are victims too.
Note:
On an essay written in response to the Auschwitz trial in Frankfurt.
URL:
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