I was somewhat disappointed by Karl Heinz Bohrer's much-praised memoir Granatsplitter. Bohrer is a highly-respected literary scholar and former editor of the intellectual review Merkur. Granatsplitter covers the years 1939 to 1953. Bohrer was just seven years-old when war broke out, and the first half of the book is a highly engaging description of wartime Cologne through the eyes of a young boy. Bohrer uses the third person "er" or "der Junge" in referring to himself throughout, providing some measure of objectivity or distance. During the firebombing of Cologne, young Bohrer and his playmates would gather fragments from flak (Granatsplitter) found on the street. The boys cherished these fragments ("Die Granatsplitter waren das Schönste, was man sich ausdenken konnte") and Bohrer kept them as a kind of talisman until young adulthood. What's interesting is that even Bohrer's young classmates had an inkling of the atrocities committed by the Nazis:
"Ein Klassenkamarad hat ihn {Bohrer} gefragt, ob er wisse, was ein 'KZ' sei. Er hatte das Wort noch nie gehört. (...) er erfuhr, dass ein KZ ein Lager sei, in dem Menschen, die als Gegner der Regierung erkannt wurden, zu Tode gequält wurden. (...) Es seien hauptsächlich "Juden", die getötet wurden, und diejenigen, die töteten, nenne man "SS".
The boy asked his parents if this was true, and they confirmed that is was. That even ten-year-olds knew something about the Holocaust makes the postwar denial of so many - Davon haben wir nichts gewusst! - all the more incredible.
And then, shortly after the war ended, the boy encounters a poster put up by the British occupying forces:
"Es war die Fotografie von nackten Körpern, auf die Knochen abgemagert, mit geschorenen Köpfen. Sie ware offenbar alle tot und bildeten ein einziges Über- und Nebeneinander, ein Haufen toter Männer und Frauen, deren Geschlechtsteile offen dalagen wie schmutzige Lumpen. Darunter sand in groβen Buchstaben, um was es sich handelte: Es seien die toten Gefangenen des Konzentrationslagers Bergen-Belsen, wie sie die englischen Truppen gefunden hatten. DIe ehemalige deutsche Regierung sei dafür verantwortlich, und man werde diejenigen, die diese Befehle ausgeführt hatten, finden und bestrafen."
Once again the boy is shocked and disappointed by the denial of so many adults, even when confronted with photographic evidence of the crimes:
"Eine Frau schrie dann doch im Geschäft, das sei eine Lüge der Engländer. Was die da anklebten, seien Fälschungen. Das seien zum Teil Leichen von Deutschen Zivilisten, dim im Bombenangriff umgekommen seien."
Unfortunately, for me at least, the second half of Granatsplitter is not nearly as interesting. The boy is sent to an elite boarding school in the Black Forest where he studies Greek and Latin, and begins acting in class plays. The long descriptions of the plays and his fellow acting students become a bit tiresome. But the boy remains troubled by what he knows of the war crimes and that many of those who were complicit simply are allowed to continue on with their careers. Two of his Latin teachers were committed Nazis, while another was the widow of one of the July 20 conspirators who was executed. He asks her how she can stand to be around the former Nazis:
"Es lieβ ihn nicht in Ruhe (...) Wie konnte sie es mit den beiden Lateinlehrern aushalten? Sie fragte zurück, ob das eine Kritik sei. Er antwortete, er wundere sich nur. Das Leben müsse weitergehen, meinte sie."
Later, as a young man, Bohrer would matriculate at the University of Göttingen and study Germanistik under the guidance of Wolfgang Kayser, the great literary historian who was an early follower of the Nazis - and a member of the Nazi Party.
Das Leben muss weitergehen - life must go on.
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