The game of crying

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Gabriele Wohmann (1992)

The game »Crying« is a radio story by Gabriele Wohmann , which appeared in 1972 in the short story collection Counterattack at Luchterhand in Neuwied .

content

"Crying" is a card game that the first-person narrator Flora played with her sister during her lifetime. Flora laments the deaths of all her loved ones - as there are father, mother, sister Emmy and brother Artur; more precisely, Flora monologues to the dead Emmy. First, Flora speaks of "our fiancé Richard". Ours is to be understood as follows: Richard was with Emmy for a year and then with Flora for two years.

Flora, the more active, more life-affirming of the two sisters, had found Emmy a job in the cataloging cellar of the State Archives, but had stayed at home on Kreuzstrasse herself. Emmy had to give up the "dragging in the archive" for health reasons. In the monologue, Flora struggles with her remorse. It was she who brought Emmy into the institution when it was no longer possible . The institution is specified on the following pages of the small text: There, for example, Emmy von Flora is addressed as “my madman”, as “confused, little sister!”. And Flora means her dead sister when she speaks of "someone's madness ".

It's not just the sister who has relentlessly tackled Flora. She took her sick father for a simulator and suddenly he died. Flora herself, who - as I said - has a strong will to live, wants to go on living. She got the corner - left Kreuzstrasse.

Counterattack

Podak has reviewed the volume the story is from. The accuracy of Podak's statements requires admiration: "... the text at hand ... is boring." This " reasoning prose " can "only please Germanists." Why? Well - Podak gives four reasons: first, in the light of these texts, the term narrative itself appears questionable. Second, language is used to ponder language. Third, it's not about action at all, but more about syntax and structure . Fourthly, Gabriele Wohmann is interested in: How can existential issues be communicated socially?

As an exception within the difficult to understand bundle, Podak highlights the monologue of Flora to Emmy outlined above: The author draws a picture of the relationships between the members of the family in which Flora grew up with precise lines. Even more: "Torturing others as self-torture, addiction to justification, attachment to memories that can be conjured up by narrative ..." were on the agenda.

literature

First edition

Output used:
  • The game of "crying". Funkerzählung , pp. 89-103 in: Gabriele Wohmann: Counterattack. Prose. Editing: Klaus Ramm . 182 pages. Luchterhand, Neuwied 1972. (also contains: The boxing match. Nice poor and just creatures. Swell. A beautiful day. The flood. It is an urgent case. Robert. New Year's Eve. The First Golden Era. From good parents. Hugged overjoyed. Temporarily lifelong . Self-defense. Timetable. Message blackout )

Secondary literature

  • Klaus Podak : Voicebox fights. In: Gabriele Wohmann. Materials book. Introduction by Karl Krolow . Bibliography by Reiner Wohmann. Edited by Thomas Scheuffelen. Luchterhand, Darmstadt / Neuwied 1977, ISBN 3-472-61184-7 , pp. 79-83.
  • Günter Häntzschel, Jürgen Michael Benz, Rüdiger Bolz, Dagmar Ulbricht: Gabriele Wohmann . (= Author's books. Volume 30). Verlag CH Beck, Verlag edition text + kritik, Munich 1982, ISBN 3-406-08691-8 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Magirius, p. 4 and Häntzschel, p. 157, entry 11
  2. ↑ Podak, p. 82, 19. Zvo

Remarks

  1. ↑ Gabriele Wohmann frightens the reader with the incoherently thrown down "... Artur slain ..." (Edition used, p. 99, 2nd Zvu). The circumstances of death are ignored and cannot even be guessed.
  2. ↑ For example, Flora reproaches the dead: "... I thought it was a bit silly how you sometimes messed with Brother Artur ..." (Edition used, p. 92, 5th supplement).