Read Germany Day

READ GERMANY DAY

READING EUROPE FROM UK INDEPENDENT PUBLISHERS

                                                 

There are 24 countries in the EU in addition to the 4 countries in the British Isles and Commonwealth. Before the EU Referendum let us take the opportunity to find out something more about fellow members and neighbours. The recommended titles have been selected to let the reader know the literature, history and culture of each country better.

On 3 May to the 6 May we celebrate the literature of Germany.

                              RECOMMENDED TITLES FOR GERMANY

All the Lights by Clemens Meyer, translated by Katy Derbyshire (And Other Stories)        ISBN 978 1 908276 01 8, 256 pages, £10.

Clemens Meyer was born in Leipzig in East Germany. As a teenager he saw the Berlin Wall fall and massive unemployment hit Germany's eastern region. These stories tell of the people on the margins, particularly in Leipzig and Berlin, who try to get by, legally or illegally, in difficult times.

Simplicissimus by Johann Grimmelshausen, translated by Mike Mitchell (Dedalus)           ISBN 978 1 903517 42 0, 434 pages, £13.99

Described as a Catholic Pilgrim's Progress it captures the chaotic futility of war as Simplicissimus goes from a boy to a man during the Thirty Years War (1618-1648). It is a story of the most basic kind of grandeur - gaudy, wild, raw, amusing, rollicking and ragged, boiling with life, on intimate terms with death and evil - but in the end, contrite and fully tired of a world wasting itself in blood, pillage and lust, but immortal in the miserable splendour of its sins.

FURTHER READING ABOUT GERMANY FROM DEDALUS PUBLISHERS

Contemporary Fiction

Letters Back to Ancient China by Herbert Rosendorfer, translated by Mike Mitchell

ISBN 978 1 903517 39 0, 274 pages, £6.99

'A 10th-century Chinese mandarin travels forward in time, and writes letters home reporting on the strange land of 'Zha-ma-ni' in which he is surrounded by giants with big noses, and frightened by the iron carriages called 'mo-tao-ka'. We gradually realise that he is in present-day Munich, and the hapless voyager's encounters with modern life and love, make delightful reading.'    Scotland on Sunday

The Architect of Ruins by Herbert Rosendorfer, translated by Mike Mitchell

ISBN 978 1 903517 79 6, 368 pages, £9.99

'The novel concerns itself less with the fear of the bomb than with getting lost in a maze of storytelling. The narrative, nested like a set of Russian dolls, offers a surfeit of plot, as the steamship's passengers swap increasingly outlandish tales. Before Weckenbarth can explain his construction to the narrator, he gets sidetracked by an anecdote about a Milanese paediatrician who establishes an apocalyptic cult that is in thrall to psychic communications from his deceased sister. Digressions follow digressions...But it's certainly good, morbid fun.

Anthony Cummins in The Literary Review

The Staff Room by Markus Orths, translated by Mike Mitchell                                             ISBN 978 1 903517 36 9, 112  pages, £7.99                                                                                                                               'Dedalus love writers who deal in what they call distorted reality - the unusual, bizarre and surreal -such as this wonderful satire, which is as funny as it is savage.' David Sinclair in Tribune

'Orths' darkly humorous satire about a teacher trying to stop a nightmarish totalitarian regime damaging the school system is a hit in the author's homeland. This Mike Mitchell translation retains Orths' absurdity and penchant for the ridiculous.' Alex Donohue in The Big Issue

Classics                                                                                                                                            Life of Courage by Johann Grimmelshausen, translated by Mike Mitchell                         ISBN 978 1 910213 24 7, 168 pages, £8.99                                                                        'This is one of the jauntiest literary romps ever written; admirers of Fielding will love it. Be warned, she is a likeable, amoral and versatile rogue – predating Daniel Defoe’s Moll Flanders (1722) by 52 years. Her voice is candid, convincing, outrageously funny and more consistently sustained than Moll’s. Courage is no victim of circumstances, she never courts sympathy. Regardless of what she does, the reader cheers her on.'                             Eileen Battersby in The Irish Times

Tearaway by Johann Grimmelshausen, translated by Mike Mitchell                                   ISBN 978 1 903517 18 5, 168 pages, £6.99                                                                'Tearaway first published in 1670, is the third Johann Grimmelshausen novel to feature Simplicius and tells of the further encounters and exploits of this rather brazen traveller, with the horrors of the Thirty Years War looming in the background. Written in a direct narrative, the prose is just as engaging 333 years on.' Ian Maxen in What's on in London

The German Refugees by Wolfgang von Goethe, translated by Mike Mitchell               

 ISBN 978 1 903517 44 4, 176 pages, £7.99                                                                         'The young Goethe's collection of stories is loosely set on an aristocratic family fleeing the French Revolution. With the family quarrelling over the rights and wrongs of political action, the matriarchal Baroness pushes them to tell different ghost stories and romantic tales to distract them. The book is topped off with the separate Fairy Tale, a rich allegorical tale that more clearly shows the future of the man's work.' Buzz Magazine