Die Stadt hinter dem Strom

Die Stadt hinter dem Strom (The city beyond the river) is a German language existentialist novel by Hermann Kasack, published in 1947 in Berlin. It is considered one of the most important novels written in Germany after World War II, dealing with the horrors of Nazi Germany, along with works such as Thomas Mann's Doctor Faustus and Günter Grass' The Tin Drum.

History

Hermann Kasack described a "Schreckensvision" (horror vision) initiating the writing of the novel: "'Ich sah die Flächen einer gespenstischen Ruinenstadt, die sich ins Unendliche verlor und in der sich die Menschen wie Scharen von gefangenen Puppen bewegten." (I saw a vast ruined city, extending endlessly, in which people moved about like imprisoned puppets). Kasack wrote the novel in two periods, first during the war from 1942 to 1944, then after the war in 1946. Kasack had not left Nazi Germany, but remained in what was later described as "Innere Emigration" (inner emigration). He shows the individual, helpless in an incomprehensible society, questioning existence.

A shortened version of the novel was published in the Berlin newspaper Der Tagesspiegel already in 1946. The complete novel was published in 1947. The novel was well received and soon translated to several languages. The first translation to English by Peter De Mendelssohn was published in 1953 by Longman in London and New York.[1] A revised version of 1956 was published in 1960.

Kasack's fictional vision of a city shows similarities to Ernst Jünger's Heliopolis.

In 1949 Kasack was awarded the Fontane Prize of the city of Berlin for this work.[2] He was the first recipient of this prize. Kasack himself used the novel as the base for an opera libretto. The work Die Stadt hinter dem Strom, termed an "Oratorische Oper" (Oratorio Opera), by Hans Vogt was premiered at the Hessisches Staatstheater Wiesbaden in 1955.

Plot

The protagonist is the orientalist Dr. Robert Lindhoff, introduced to the reader just as Robert. He travels by railroad on a mission which is unclear to him to a foreign city, which appears as strange and incomprehensible. He meets people whom he believes to be dead, such as his father and his beloved Anna.

Robert receives the order from an invisible authority of the city to write a "Chronik" (chronicle) of the city. Robert is called the Chronicler, and he explores the city, partly on his own, partly guided. The city is a megalopolis under a cloudless sky, full of catacombs, without music. Its people appear more and more strange and incomprehensible to him. The people resemble shadows and perform senseless, repetitive and destructive tasks. Two factories employ many of them, one producing building blocks from dust, one destroying building blocks to dust. Robert feels unable to write the chronicle. The authority who ordered it thanks him anyway for his work full of insight.

Back in his home country, Robert travels restlessly, lecturing on the sense of life. In the end he travels to the city, as in the beginning.

Editions in German

Translations

Literature

References

  1. ↑ The city beyond the river openlibrary.org 10 December 2009
  2. ↑ John R. Frey: Hermann Kasack jstor.org 1957

External links