A book full of memories of his father from Weßling

Anton G. Leitner dedicates a book to his late father, Anton Josef Leitner. © Maren Martell

Weßling – The popular former headmaster and founder of the Carl-Spitzweg-Gymnasium Anton Josef Leitner was 82 years old. It's been two years since he said goodbye to life – and for two years his son Anton G. Leitner (61) held memories of his father. This resulted in the book "Father, our lake is waiting for you: memorabilia and recalled verses", which has been on sale since the beginning of May.

Everyone copes with grief in their own way. Anton G. Leitner chose the literary form to deal with the life and death of his father. In the foreword, the literary scholar Ulrich Johannes Beil attests to the deceased's "Colombo-like quirkiness" – and the poet, publisher and editor Anton G. Leitner has processed this endearing quirkiness in minimalist poems and lyrical prose. The 61-year-old poetically reflects on individual stages of his father's life and, after his father's death, begins his own era for over a year: the first text about him was written on day one. "The chronological arrangement of the texts according to the date of their creation makes it clear how my grief over the loss of my father has changed over the course of a year of mourning," muses the Munich tower writer. For example, on day five in the very reduced poem "So still", when the son uses the deceased's chair in his study for the first time. "So silent // The house / Without you / My father // Your bathroom / Radio is on strike / The battery // Empty. But / What are already / news? No more / Worth a lot / For me."

Episodes to smile in the book "Father, our lake is waiting for you: memorabilia and recalled verses"

And there were plenty of episodes to smile about in the nature of the born Weßlinger. Among them is the anecdote from the hospital, where the son is recovering from a double-sided pulmonary embolism and the two are making themselves comfortable on a couch in the corridor. Opposite them, a lady settles down, "late Hildegard Knef, fading in the advanced stage", whereupon the father feels compelled to wish the "gracious lady" a "mild diagnosis" comfortingly. Ignoring the sign "Plastic-aesthetic and reconstructive surgery", he decides to pray for her out of compassion. "She looked so bad, hopefully she can still be helped!". A verse from day 54 gave the book its title and humanizes the Weßlinger See, which Leitner Senior loved so much: "Father, our // lake is waiting / For you / Daily // Scratched / He wants to be / From you // So gladly, he / Even rolls around / Already restless / In his / gravel bed".

Honest approach to Anton G. Leitner's father

It was important to Anton G. Leitner to have an open and honest approach to his father, "funny, humorous, but also evil", in High German and Bavarian and illustrated with almost 20 historical photographs from the family archive. "The book also says a lot about the village of Weßling as it once was," says Leitner. On day 173, for example, he recalls how his father "became the patron saint of the Italian guest workers in the village, who helped make Germany's economic miracle possible with their hands in the 1970s," he says. At that time, Leitner Sr. stood protectively in front of them after anonymous complaints "with accusations completely made out of thin air" had fluttered into their shack quarters on the outskirts of the village. "And with him, the polyglot Professor Bavarese at their side, they emerged victorious from the paperwork in the end."

Anton G. Leitner will read from his new work on May 22 in Weßling

On the 397th day after the death of his father, the reflections laid out by the artist couple Carola Vogt and Peter Boerboom come to an end. Next week, he will go on a tour of Germany, with stops in Berlin and Schleswig - and after his return on Monday, May 22, 2023 at 19:30 p.m., he will celebrate the Bavarian premiere of the tape, at the Seehaus Raabe, as part of a public event of the Rotary Club Wörthsee. "Father, our lake is waiting for you. Memorabilia and recalled verses" has been published in Anton G. Leitner's "edition Das Gedicht" and costs 20 euros. For more information, see www.aglv.com.