Read the video transcript here
Elke Heidenreich
“At this point I am always happy to introduce you to a new and an old book. Today there are two older ones and a new one, but all by the same author, namely by the jack-of-all-trades Florian Illies, born in 71, who became famous with his book about the "Generation Golf". And then he wrote a book "The Summer of the Century" about 1913. About ten years ago, it was a huge success. And then five years later he added it again: "What I really wanted to tell you". It's about the summer of 1913 again, two big books about a summer.
What was so famous that summer? It was the last before the outbreak of the First World War. It raged through the beds, through the love stories, through art. The modern age was just beginning. And then the First World War began, with its millions of dead. And everything that had arisen so far was destroyed again. Peoples who were actually connected to one another through art, through many personal friendships, hit one another. And he tells it well researched and with humor, but with the dark clouds that were already floating over this time. He practically, one could say, laid this year 1913 on the couch, as Sigmund Freud did with his patients at the time. He arranged it by months and it happens as easily as a review, but it still has depth.But of course we learn a lot of gossip stories. Gottfried Benn has an unfortunate affair with Else Lasker-Schüler. Kafka asked for Felice's hand and wrote in the same letter: “But it would be better if you didn't marry me. I'm not very suitable for marriage. ”Rilke has a cold, he likes to suffer. And Musil has burnout. But that doesn't prevent him from writing really big novels.
Always resonates, after all that comes the dead of the First World War. Is it one last breathless summer? On the one hand they were still dueling as in the 19th century, on the other hand Malevich had already painted his black square. Everything was on the move, and then the lights went out in Europe.
And now he's actually topped it up again, but with a decade: "Chronicle of a feeling", the decade from 1929 to 1939, also published by Fischer like the other two. And it is called "love in times of hate". In 1939 another war began. So we are in a decade when the trumpeting Nazis are knocking on the door. And now he tells us about love, what love is happening there. And that's a lot. You read breathlessly from passion to passion and from love to love. It rages through letters, conversations, beds, and one often has the feeling that it is more about desire than really about love. Marlene Dietrich has a wild affair with Erich Maria Remarque, and she already said in a play in 1924, but that also applies to this period: “Who would risk marrying a man out of love? Not me.«Cool. And there is also a cult around the cool at this time. The heart, it is always said, is just a muscle. Marriages are concluded very hectically and divorced quickly. Despite the marriage, one has affairs. It's like the thirties are now somehow paying the price of the twenties. There is already Mussolini in Italy, Franco in Spain, Hitler in Germany. The air is getting thinner, one emigrates, one is expatriated, one flees.one emigrates, one is expatriated, one flees.one emigrates, one is expatriated, one flees.
And in a modification of Remarque's novel "Nothing New in the West", Ilies writes "Nothing New in the Heart". The book is a single sheet of images about love, desire, confusion, hate and politics. We are often in Berlin in this book. Berlin is wild, loud, sexualized in this decade. The women all fall for Gottfried Benn, the doctor with the heavy eyes. Everyone is somehow dancing on the volcano. And then suddenly they are gone. In the south of France, in Spain, because in Germany this is heading towards war. But they are never really safe anywhere. The résumés are broken, and Florian Illies creates a wonderful picture gallery for all of this with this book.
And we sense that there is no time to lose. You have to live so fast. Some feel too much, others too little. And those who hate the wild and the unattached anyway and would like to have it gone. It's getting darker. It's like breathing in this decade and in this book. There is no time to breathe out and I think you will read it all breathlessly. It's like being at a party. One reviewer wrote: "The whole book is like a big review." We are currently living in somewhat hysterical and constantly agitated times. Maybe a little coolness and a little more passion would do us very well, against all being offended and feeling marginalized. Reading this book made me happy and enjoyable, and I hope you will too.And now we're looking at the Spiegel bestseller list. And maybe this book, even though it was only published at the book fair, is already on it. Who knows."
SPIEGEL bestseller
The eternal one July toe is slipping further down the bestseller list this week: The corona and village novel »About People« only makes it to 10th place.
Despite the advancing season, another two points in descending order: The Allgäu Christmas stories about Kluftinger in "Tomorrow, Klufti, there will be something" by the author duo Klüpfl and Kobr are now on the 9th.
New at 8: The Hollywood-rehearsed lawyer Bernhard Schlink, we remember "Readers", reports back with "The Granddaughter".
After bookseller Wettner finds his wife dead in the bathtub, he goes on a search for clues.
On 7: The actor Edgar Selge is a star on stage and in front of the camera.
In his autobiographical book "Did you finally find us" he tells of a childhood as the son of a prison director - and of severe strokes of fate.
The great American family chronicler Jonathan Franzen only managed to make it to 6 with his 832-page epic »Crossroads«. Two more volumes of the announced trilogy will follow.
Stable at number 5: The Swedish thriller »The fruits that you reap« by Michael Hjort and Hans Rosenfeldt about a supposed serial killer.
The case for the therapist Sebastian Bergmann is about coming to terms with the past.
The fantasy novel by Kerstin Gier loses a place, from 3 to 4: The prelude to a new fantasy trilogy "Forget-Me-Not - What You Can't See in Light" has a lot to do with young love.
The new eco-thriller by drugstore king Dirk Rossmann and his co-author Ralf Hoppe has to move from one to 3. In »The Wrath of the Octopus« we write the year 2029, mankind is in a climate of catastrophe - so far, so currently.
You can also find out in the book whether the world can be saved.
Next on the 2: the story of Adina, the young Czech woman who has to cope with a rape.
»The Blue Woman« by Antje Rávik Strubel, who deservedly won the German Book Prize.
And the big leap, a new entry straight to one: »Playlist« by crime writer Sebastian Fitzek.
Not only is the novel called that, it's also a playlist.
The book is both a music album and an online game - it couldn't be more cross-media.
