The bread

The bread is a short story by the German writer Wolfgang Borchert . It was created in 1946 and was first published on November 13, 1946 in the Hamburg Free Press .

The short story is a typical example of rubble literature and takes up contemporary motifs from the immediate post-war period . Against the background of the prevailing food shortage, the secret consumption of a slice of bread disguised by a lie calls into question the mutual trust of a couple. Bread is one of the best-known short stories by Wolfgang Borchert, has been filmed several times and often dealt with in school lessons.

content

A woman wakes up at night to a noise in the kitchen and realizes that her husband is not lying in bed next to her. She finds him in the kitchen, where crumbs on the table reveal that he has cut off a piece of bread. However, the man does not admit this, but claims that he wanted to see that something was wrong because of a noise. Because she does not want to shame him, the woman tries to hide that she sees through his lie. An embarrassed conversation ensues between the two, which ends with the statement that the gutter must have caused the noise. Then they go back to bed. When he falls asleep, she secretly hears him chewing. The next evening, out of pity and under the pretext that she could not stand the bread, the woman placed a slice of bread that she was entitled to on her husband's plate. Both initially avoid eye contact, but after a while the woman sits down with her husband at the table.

Origin and classification in the overall work

After his return from the Second World War and several imprisonments for so-called “ defensive strength degradation ”, Borchert suffered from liver disease, which worsened in the post-war period due to the lack of food and medical care. Borchert was already bedridden at the end of 1945, and at the beginning of 1946, who had previously wanted to become an actor and wrote poetry, discovered the short story as a means of artistic expression. In the following two years until his death on November 20, 1947 at the age of 26, he wrote over 50 short prose texts and the drama Outside the Door from his sick bed .

The bread was created in 1946 and was first published on November 13, 1946 in the Hamburg Free Press . He did not include the story in the two prose collections, Die Hundeblume and On This Tuesday , which Borchert put together while he was still alive . Bernhard Meyer-Marwitz classified them in the 1949 section of Nachged Erzählungen when he published the Borchert Complete Edition by Rowohlt Verlag .

interpretation

The short story describes an everyday situation in the immediate post-war period. The meticulous representation of what happened is in the tradition of naturalism . The fact that the two protagonists are not introduced by name and the location of the action is not mentioned, however, suggests that the author is interested in a general statement that can also be transferred to other times and places. Heinrich Böll , who called Das Brot “a masterful story, cool and concise, not a word too little, not a word too much”, saw in it “all of the misery and greatness of mankind”.

style

In the short story, Borchert uses the paratactic style that is characteristic of him , which was also known as the staccato style . The monosyllabic or two-syllable words at the beginning, in conjunction with the numerous pauses created by punctuation marks and asyndeses , give the story a hard rhythm. The stylistic device serves to build up tension in the actually everyday starting situation. Key terms such as “kitchen” and “bread” (or compounds such as “bread plate” and “bread crumbs”) are repeated several times. The following dialogue between the two is also characterized by repetitions. These primarily characterize the man’s distraction tactics, but at the same time allow the reader to clearly see the tense situation.

The vocabulary used is very simple, the language laconic . No foreign words are used, and terms typical of the time such as “ food menu ” are avoided. Adjectives are used sparingly (“dark”, “cold”, “naked”) and serve to emphasize the milieu and the barreness of the scenery. On the one hand, this stylistic device makes the situation and the people involved appear authentic, on the other hand, it also indicates a possibility of interpreting the text: Simple people in particular have the ability to love selflessly, and after a catastrophe, mutual understanding is required for a new beginning.

The focus of the story is on the actions of women: "She" is mentioned 35 times as a subject , 14 times anaphorically , "He" 23 times. The woman as the embodiment of love who, through willingness to make sacrifices, shows a way to overcome a difficult situation, is a frequent motif in Borchert's work.

Another stylistic device used by the author is irony . He does not use them to expose people, but to generate understanding. This is particularly evident in the scene when the woman finally falls asleep from the man's monotonous chewing.

Motifs

The story is based on several motifs. The terms “kitchen”, “plate” and “bread” are closely related. The kitchen stands for a common living space and the associated security, as does the plate. “Eating from a plate” is a common metaphor for living together. This is figuratively threatened by the knife that the man uses to illegally cut off a piece of bread, thereby endangering the bond with his partner. The bread, which can be seen as a symbol of the instinct for self-preservation , triggers the conflict.

Another leitmotif is the contrast between light and dark. Its function is to connect the foreground and background of the plot. The woman wakes up in the dark and realizes that she is alone. The specified time ("half past two"), which stands for the blackest hour of the night, is also mentioned in another story by Borchert ( The Kitchen Clock ). Associated with the darkness is the cold and the “outside”, the potentially hostile environment. In the story this is symbolized by the wind, which at the same time serves the man as an excuse for his behavior. The cold is mentioned several times, it is a symbol of fear and mistrust. The window through which the man looks to hide his insecurity is the link between the outside and the inside. This moment can be understood as a turning point in history. Then they share the bed again, a place of togetherness and security, even if the incident must first be “covered”. The light, a common metaphor for the truth, is unbearable for the two people, especially in the kitchen scene, as it allows the man's lie to come to light. In the final sentence, however, when the woman sits down under the lamp again, it makes clear the resolution of the situation for the better.

Use in school lessons

The short story found its way into the German school curricula as early as the 1950s, because on the one hand it portrays the social reality of the immediate post-war period very realistically and on the other hand it symbolizes timeless values.

In German class today, the story is read in lower secondary level . The thoughts and feelings of the two people are worked out. It is also suitable to be portrayed as a role play .

It is also dealt with in religious instruction. The symbolic meaning of bread and the Christian principle "Giving is more blessed than receiving" ( Acts 20.35  EU ) are made clear.

filming

The fabric was 1997 adaptation as a 15-minute black and white short film on 16 mm format and as a VHS video cassette. The script and direction are from Wolfgang Küper, using Wolfgang Borchert's story as a template. Achim Grubel and Adriana Altaras can be seen as actors .

The film Not from Bread Alone by Andreas Kurz and Robert Breber dares to reinterpret Borchert's motif .

In 2008 the short story was rematched under the title The Bread by Yasin Demirel and shown at the Palm Springs Film Festival in 2009. The film is based on the original, but only English is spoken. The two main roles are played by Margarita Broich and Michael Sideris .

Ahmet Taş filmed Wolfgang Borchert's short story with Bruno Ganz and Angela Winkler in the leading roles. The short film Bread premiered on August 10, 2011 at the Rhode Island International Film Festival.

literature

• Horst Brustmeier: The breakthrough of the short story in Germany . Dissertation, Marburg 1966. pp. 158-163.
• Hans-Udo Dück in: Interpretations of Wolfgang Borchert . 9th edition. Oldenbourg, Munich 1976. ISBN 3-486-01909-0 . Pp. 88-97.
• Hans-Gerd Winter in: Werner Bellmann (Hrsg.): Classic German short stories. Interpretations . Reclam, Stuttgart 2004. pp. 23-27.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Peter Rühmkorf : Wolfgang Borchert in personal testimonies and photo documents . Rowohlt, Reinbek 1961, pp. 132-133.
2. ↑ Wolfgang Borchert: The Complete Works . Rowohlt, Reinbek 2007, ISBN 978-3-498-00652-5 , p. 538.
3. ^ Heinrich Böll : The voice of Wolfgang Borchert . In: Burgess (Ed.): Wolfgang Borchert, pp. 18-19.
4. ^ Alfred Schmidt: Wolfgang Borchert, Speech formation in his work . Bouvier, Bonn 1975, p. 109.
5. ↑ Kurt Bräutigam: External and internal reality in Borchert's short story "Das Brot" . In: The Pedagogical Province 13.1959,7 / 8, p. 393f.
6. ↑ Uta Geier and Anne Aichinger: Wolfgang Borchert: "Das Brot" . In: Schulmagazin 5 bis 10 1996,5, pp. 17-20.
7. ↑ Horst Stephan: Bread as a symbol . In: Schulmagazin 5 to 10 1995,4, pp. 19-22.
8. ↑ Screenplay of the short film Das Brot
9. ^ Homepage of the film Not from bread alone
10. ↑ The Palm Springs International Film Society's page on The Bread ( Memento of the original from July 21, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
11. ↑ Trailer of The Bread
12. ↑ The Bread in the Internet Movie Database (English)
13. ^ Sophia Savage: Rhode Island International Film Festival 2011 Includes Terry Gilliam, Colin Firth, Anna Paquin. In: indieWire. August 4, 2011, accessed August 10, 2011 .