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From Germany to Germany: Diary 1990 Hardcover – November 13, 2012

by Günter Grass (Author), Steidl Verlag (Author), Krishna Winston (Translator)

18 customer reviews

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“Very much the work of a writer conscious of his role as a political man of letters.”—Kirkus Reviews

In January 1990, just months after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Günter Grass made two New Year’s resolutions: the first was to travel extensively in the newly united Germany and the second was to keep a diary, to record his impressions of a historic time.

Grass takes part in public debates, writes for newspapers, makes speeches, and meets emerging politicians. He talks to German citizens on both sides, listening to their bewilderment and their hopes for the future. Ideas for stories take root—his novels The Call of the Toad and Too Far Afield.

From Germany to Germany is also a personal record. Grass reflects on his family, remembers his boyhood, and comments on the books he is reading, the drawings he is making, and the sumptuous meals he cooks for family and friends.

The picture that emerges—not only of the two Germanys struggling for a single identity but of a changed world after the end of the Cold War—is engrossing, passionate, and essential for anyone who wants to understand Europe’s new leading nation.

From Germany to Germany: Diary 1990

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Product Details

Hardcover: 272 pages
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt; 1 edition (November 13, 2012)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0547364601
ISBN-13: 978-0547364605
Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.6 x 1.2 inches
Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,527,983 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #851 in Books > Literature & Fiction > World Literature > European > German
- #1142 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > Historical > Europe > Germany
- #8999 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > Arts & Literature > Authors

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3.2 out of 5 stars

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Gunter Grass and the German Revolution of 1990-1991

By Paul R. Waibel VINE VOICE on November 29, 2012

Format: Hardcover Vine Customer Review of Free Product ( What's this? )

As a student at the University of Bonn, in what was then West Germany, I became somewhat familiar with the two outstanding German literary figures, Günter Grass and Heinrich Böll. Both provide a certain insight into the world that was West Germany before reunification in 1989-1990. Both won the Nobel Prize for Literature, Böll in 1972 and Grass in 1999.

Gunter Grass is best known for The Tin Drum (1959), the first volume of his Danzig Trilogy. The Tin Drum was made into a successful motion picture in 1979. While spending the summer of 1980 in Berkeley, I took advantage of the opportunity to see the film in a local theater. "You really must see it," was the advice I was given repeatedly. So I did.

A short while into the film, there was a scene where some people were at a beach. They pulled a horse's severed head tied to a rope from the water and began to shake it. Eels began to fall from the neck. The camera kept going back and forth between the eels falling from the horse's head and the same people at a dinner table eating plats filled with eels as if they were eating spaghetti. It was too much for me. I got up from my seat and walked out. As far as I can recall, that was the only movie I ever walked out of.

Obviously it was not Grass the novelist that drew me to From Germany to Germany: Journal of the Year 1990. Rather it was my interest in Günter Grass as a political activist, supporter of the Social Democratic Party, and friend of Willy Brandt. Grass has been a witness to much of what is positive in the history of postwar Germany. He is one of the German authors who have tried to come to grips with Germany's past and how it continues to haunt the present.Read more ›

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It's a German Thing

By Randy Keehn VINE VOICE on December 16, 2012

Format: Hardcover Vine Customer Review of Free Product ( What's this? )

I've had my ups and downs with Gunther Grass over the years. I was greatly impressed with "My Century", I was thoroughly confused with "The Rat", I was disappointed with "The Box" and I was impressed with "The Tin Drum". I have taken a casual approach to "Too Far Afield" and have read a bit over two thirds of it. I sense in "Too Far Afield" a similar uncertainty as I have found in "From Germany to Germany". The problem for me is that I don't really comprehend the depth of the issues involved in the reunification of East and West Germany. In what I have read in "Too Far Afield" I believe that I'm getting a sense of the issues of a reunification of a people who were divided into two opposite economic systems. In addition there is the openness of one society and the repressiveness of the other. I understand that I am at a loss with comprehending both books by not being German.

In "From Germany to Germany" I didn't connect with the subtle issues that I somewhat gatherred in "Too Far Afield". That's because Grass has his own opinions and seems to assume that everyone knows what they are. Yes, I picked up the economic issues as being the major focus of his disagreement with the unification proposals. However, other than a loss a currency value from the East and a gain in the West, I wasn't getting much specificity. He referred to several public speeches on the subject and I believe that his 30-some pages of "Notes" could have added the text of those speeches. I'm really not sure what his other issues were and I'm also wondering if, after 18 or so years later, he might have changed his opinions in light of the rebirth that some of us Westerners saw in the reunification of Germany. That could have found room in his notes as well.Read more ›

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Especially for admirers and fans

By Thomas F. Dillingham VINE VOICE on November 15, 2012

Format: Hardcover Vine Customer Review of Free Product ( What's this? )

Since the publication of The Tin Drum in English translation, which I read promptly when it became available, I have been an avid and faithful reader of Gunter Grass's works, even including the somewhat tiresome Flounder and the relentless Rat. Tin Drum, Dog Years, Cat and Mouse, Meeting at Telgte, and Crabwalk are among my favorite novels of the 20th century, and I would not ever say that I wasted time reading his other works. Even The Box, which I found amusing but (at best) slight, was worth my time and worthy of recommendation. The same is true of From Germany to Germany, even though it is the kind of book that probably would never have been published were it not by a writer of Grass's importance and stature.

From Germany to Germany is a diary of Grass's travels in that country (formerly divided but finally reunited) in 1990, recording his observations of the state of the German polity and culture. Of course, he is Grass, and his observations are sharp, not at all indulgent (either of the country or of himself), and resonant (for any reader of his other works) of the recurring themes and concerns he has pursued during his long career. The book also includes his drawings, which may surprise those who do not know he is also a visual artist, and shows us the genesis of one of his quirkier books, The Call of the Toad. There are probably better books for readers who want to know the results--politically, socially, economically--of German reunification. This is certainly far too personal and self-reflective a book to be a source of "objective" information about those questions; nonetheless, Grass gives his readers images and responses that can be added to the historical or analytical information to provide a deeper and more human (and humane) perspective.Read more ›

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

Gunter Hasn't Changed...

I picked up this one to see how Gunter Grass has developed since I last read his work. Gunter has not changed in a generation+ of time. Read more

Published on April 7, 2013 by Amazon Customer

Disheveled and rambling

Guenter Grass' "From Germany to Germany," his alleged diary entrees from 1990 to February 1991, reads like the mind of a rambling genius. Read more

Published on January 28, 2013 by Connie

Thumbs down

I bought this book hoping to get new insights into a very important historical period. Instead, Grass delivers a shallow, self-centered set of opinions and rememberances. Read more

Published on December 16, 2012 by Thomas

Tedious? Yes: Tedious

I really looked forward to this book. The collapse of Communism fascinates me, as I watched the cascade of successful revolutions of 1989 ripple outwards, starting in Poland and... Read more

Published on November 29, 2012 by Stephen Foster

Not the First Work to Read by Grass, But a Good Insight

"From Germany to Germany" covers the period of January 1990 through late February 1991, from shortly after the Berlin Wall opened to several months after East and West Germany... Read more

Published on November 17, 2012 by Mike Cunha

The personal views of Gunter Grass anno 1990

Shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall in November, 1989. Gunter Grass, the famed German author and card-carrying member of the SPD (then-West Germany's Social-Democratic... Read more

Published on November 14, 2012 by Paul Allaer

Ultimately unatisfying; only for well-informed 'insiders'

If you're knowledgeable about German politics from, say, 1960 through to 1992, and if you're familiar with Gunther Grass's oeuvre (and not just his iconic work, The Tin Drum), you... Read more

Published on November 7, 2012 by S. McGee

Something lost in the translation?

Gunter Grass, author of "From Germany to Germany," is a widely published and distinguished German author who was the recipient in 1999 of the Nobel Prize for Literature. Read more

Published on October 31, 2012 by KmVictorian

A Well-Written Testament to A Certain Fleeting Moment in European...

I lived in Europe for 25 years, spoke the various Western-European languages, and participated in the lifestyle of the "natives". Read more

Published on October 24, 2012 by hasselaar

Another insider literary memoir

I am a Deutschophile and a somewhat literary person, and thought this memoir of the time of reunification of Germany by Guenter Grass would be interesting. Read more

Published on October 22, 2012 by K. B. Fenner

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