Status
Available
Call number
Genres
Collection
Publication
Penguin Classics (1994), Paperback, 224 pages
Description
A former Nazi general, now training Arab terrorists, attends a family reunion in Rome, his son being a priest. The novel chronicles his disgust with a degenerate city which he knew as a conqueror and his attempt to get even with the Jews by seducing a barmaid, an attempt that backfires when she turns out to be a Catholic. By the author of Pigeons on the Grass.
User reviews
LibraryThing member deebee1
It is 1950s Rome, a city which has ties with Germany going back centuries. Four members of a German family are reunited there by chance: Siegfried, a young composer; his father Friedrich, a former local official during the Nazi regime who has now resumed his public role as a democratically elected
The younger generation attempts a return to expressions of Germany's glorious past. Adolf, with his tortured soul, seeks redemption in the enduring rituals of the Church. For Siegfried, it was the grand tradition of the creation of music -- both acts of cleansing, a renewal, an upliftment of the soul. By these vocations, they might escape the evil shadow which they until very recently, simpy by virtue of who they were, helped cast. The older generation, complicit and guilty, deals with it in the here and now, brutish and extreme. Judejahn, now a renegade military adviser to an unnamed country in the north of Africa, is the central figure in this story, whose actions precipitate the disastrous events that take place within a few days of the crossing and crisscrossing of paths of the members of this family in the labyrinthian maze of the ancient streets and belowground -- a kind of macabre ballet where each meeting raises the temperature a notch higher, and the reader watches with an almost morbid fascination the tension that must soon give. Koeppen draws us into the workings of Judejahn's mind, crazed with hatred still, and obssessed with the fact that he was not able to exterminate them all, and deluded with the idea of his eventual return to Germany, through the graces of his brother-in-law, to resurrect the Reich believing that among his countrymen, many remain believers. Friedrich is the ultimate bureaucrat, loyal during the regime, accommodating, a broker of conveniences, useful to whomever is on top.
The novel is full of symbolisms, beginning with the major characters' names. The characters represent four areas of German achievement, or as Michael Hoffmann, the translator, describes it, the four quarters of the riven German soul: murder, bureaucracy, theology, and music. Koeppen's writing is powerful, compelling, and at a time when the 1950s Germany wanted disavowal, severance, Koeppen opts for confrontation. He was (and seems to be, until now) little forgiven for this.
In taut and searing prose and a plot that is both complex and elegant, Koeppen draws a portrait of the wrestling of immediate post-war Germany with its demons that many prefer to bury. Notes by Hoffmann explain that Koeppen's books, even in Germany, never had the acclaim they deserved, because they unsettled. His position never attained that of the returning exiles like Mann and Brecht. As the preferred form of literature was a clean slate -- an extension of collective amnesia, the nature of Koeppen's work exacerbated his position. He wrote of memory, of continuance, of criticism -- he was savaged for it by the press, which responded with "hostility, even revulsion and repugnance." The political content of his books embarrassed even those who praised them -- the conservatisim of the German public won out. Interestingly, though, he won the Buchner prize, Germany's most prestigious literary award, in 1962.
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burgomaster; Judejahn, Siegfried's uncle, an unrepentant former SS general; and Judejahn's son, Adolf, a Catholic seminarian. The younger generation attempts a return to expressions of Germany's glorious past. Adolf, with his tortured soul, seeks redemption in the enduring rituals of the Church. For Siegfried, it was the grand tradition of the creation of music -- both acts of cleansing, a renewal, an upliftment of the soul. By these vocations, they might escape the evil shadow which they until very recently, simpy by virtue of who they were, helped cast. The older generation, complicit and guilty, deals with it in the here and now, brutish and extreme. Judejahn, now a renegade military adviser to an unnamed country in the north of Africa, is the central figure in this story, whose actions precipitate the disastrous events that take place within a few days of the crossing and crisscrossing of paths of the members of this family in the labyrinthian maze of the ancient streets and belowground -- a kind of macabre ballet where each meeting raises the temperature a notch higher, and the reader watches with an almost morbid fascination the tension that must soon give. Koeppen draws us into the workings of Judejahn's mind, crazed with hatred still, and obssessed with the fact that he was not able to exterminate them all, and deluded with the idea of his eventual return to Germany, through the graces of his brother-in-law, to resurrect the Reich believing that among his countrymen, many remain believers. Friedrich is the ultimate bureaucrat, loyal during the regime, accommodating, a broker of conveniences, useful to whomever is on top.
The novel is full of symbolisms, beginning with the major characters' names. The characters represent four areas of German achievement, or as Michael Hoffmann, the translator, describes it, the four quarters of the riven German soul: murder, bureaucracy, theology, and music. Koeppen's writing is powerful, compelling, and at a time when the 1950s Germany wanted disavowal, severance, Koeppen opts for confrontation. He was (and seems to be, until now) little forgiven for this.
In taut and searing prose and a plot that is both complex and elegant, Koeppen draws a portrait of the wrestling of immediate post-war Germany with its demons that many prefer to bury. Notes by Hoffmann explain that Koeppen's books, even in Germany, never had the acclaim they deserved, because they unsettled. His position never attained that of the returning exiles like Mann and Brecht. As the preferred form of literature was a clean slate -- an extension of collective amnesia, the nature of Koeppen's work exacerbated his position. He wrote of memory, of continuance, of criticism -- he was savaged for it by the press, which responded with "hostility, even revulsion and repugnance." The political content of his books embarrassed even those who praised them -- the conservatisim of the German public won out. Interestingly, though, he won the Buchner prize, Germany's most prestigious literary award, in 1962.
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LibraryThing member jwhenderson
Wolfgang Koeppen is one of the least well known literary giants of the twentieth century. While his output consists of only five novels they all are at least minor masterpieces and his final novel, Death in Rome, ranks as a major one. In this spare novel Koeppen creates a vision of the German
Overall the effect is impressive with the result being a novel that challenges the reader with its taut presence. I found the challenge invigorating and it encouraged further meditation on the ideas raised by the author.
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postwar experience that is at once bleak and devastating. The four main characters of the novel meet in Rome and in small pieces of their thoughts and lives the anxiety and sordidness of their lives is laid bare for the reader. The death motif is perhaps the strongest from title through to the end of the book, but Koeppen also uses symbolism and unique metaphors, particularly animals and insects, to heighten the impact of his story. None of the characters are likable, but like a Kafka novel I found myself fascinated with them and the world inside their heads. Of particular interest to me was the use of music and the representation of the composer, Siegfried Pfaffrath, as a modern serial composer in the mold of Schoenberg. His music is described as like the "degenerate art" that the Nazis rejected while in its modernism it is not approved by the Catholic Church either. Some readers have made the comparison of the structure of the novel itself with a twelve tone musical composition. Perhaps, but whether the comparison is apt the novel certainly seems surrealistic, especially in the use of time in the movement and activities of the characters.Overall the effect is impressive with the result being a novel that challenges the reader with its taut presence. I found the challenge invigorating and it encouraged further meditation on the ideas raised by the author.
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LibraryThing member stillatim
You won't enjoy this if you're looking for 'three dimensional characters,' and you won't enjoy it if you're looking for anything about Rome: someone is dying in Rome because it's like dying in Venice, except it's the seat of empire. If you're willing to tread the line between actual human beings
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and symbols of German history, on the other hand, this is a very moving novel, very well translated and rather insightful. The ex (sic)-Nazi Judejahn is too bad to be true, but, on the other hand, Nazism was too bad to be true; his family includes a priest (desperately trying to purify himself for his youth in Hitler's school); a composer (trying to flee his youth...); a politician (trying to cover up his Nazi past, but not too much, because really, they were mostly right...); a conformist (who wants Germany to be great and misses the old greatness but, on the other hand, really would like a well-paying job); and Judejahn's wife, surely one of the most appalling characters in all of modern fiction--more Nazi than Himmler, if you like. These character-symbols wander around Rome and struggle with their historical situation in various ways. There are a few pointless formal tricks (paragraphs that don't end in a full stop!!! WOW!!!!), but this is a serious, well-formed, discomforting book. Show Less
LibraryThing member jonfaith
As a rule I attempt to distance my reviews from the personal. Certainly anecdotes thrive in this context. It is the more central experiences and principles which I make every effort to keep to myself. I'm afraid i can't do such this time. My friend J who I have worked with for 20 years died this
Death in Rome is exactly that. Koeppen penned a vast German family postwar dynamic and then enkindled such in 200 dense pages of shifting points of view and acerbic images. The fact that such unfolds in the Eternal City affords it relief, a perspective, a historical resonance. The family broods and rebels on issues of guilt and accomplishment: culture and the Camps. The novel succeeds with its focus on hotels, the concert hall and a smoky gay bar. Hopefully more will witness this remarkable novel, an unblinking snapshot of the odd time in (West?) Germany between 1945 and the Fassbinder expressionism of the late 60s and early 70s.
There are aspects here which anticipate Boll's masterful Billards at Half-Past Nine.
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past week. This has been one of the worst times of my adult life. I once went on a trip with J to Rome. It was around this time that I acquired this novel. For the life of me, I can't remember if it was before or after. My friend battled cancer twice in the last 20 years, this second time it was for keeps. This burning loss plagued my reading, tearing the book from hands after every ten or so pages. My wife has been wonderful throughout.Death in Rome is exactly that. Koeppen penned a vast German family postwar dynamic and then enkindled such in 200 dense pages of shifting points of view and acerbic images. The fact that such unfolds in the Eternal City affords it relief, a perspective, a historical resonance. The family broods and rebels on issues of guilt and accomplishment: culture and the Camps. The novel succeeds with its focus on hotels, the concert hall and a smoky gay bar. Hopefully more will witness this remarkable novel, an unblinking snapshot of the odd time in (West?) Germany between 1945 and the Fassbinder expressionism of the late 60s and early 70s.
There are aspects here which anticipate Boll's masterful Billards at Half-Past Nine.
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Awards
Schlegel-Tieck Prize (Winner — 1993)
Language
Original publication date
1954 (original German)
1992 (English translation)
Physical description
224 p.; 7.6 inches
ISBN
0140187901 / 9780140187908