There have been many novels on Brexit (those by Jonathan Coe and Nick Hornby, in particular) but we were waiting for the novel of German reunification.
Günter Grass had tried with
From one Germany to another
in 1990 but without the temporal hindsight that we now have.
It is time that amplifies emotion.
The Germans were separated for four decades.
Since 1989, they had to pretend to belong to the same country.
Read alsoOur review of the Disunited Kingdom, by Jonathan Coe: “An English novel”
Finally, here is the novel capable of telling this crazy story: Bernhard Schlink's
Granddaughter
ideally balances sadness and tenderness.
The great German novelist takes up the plot of his greatest success:
The Reader
(1995).
We remember this love story between a teenager and a concentration camp guard.
Here, Kaspar, the grandfather, a very progressive bookseller, has a crush on his neo-Nazi granddaughter.
Dizzy
Schlink is the specialist in the clash of generations.
Germany, like France, is made up of individuals who do not understand each other...
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