The war has no female face (book)

The war has no female face ( Russian У войны не женское лицо , Transkr .: U wojny ne schenskoje lizo ) is a Russian documentary novel by the Belarusian author Swetlana Alexijewitsch , which was first published in 1985 in Minsk and in 1987 in German translation in the GDR . The book is about the fate and experiences of Soviet women who died during the Second World War , in the Soviet Union as the Great Patriotic Wardesignated, served at the front. The author spoke to soldiers, paramedics and civilian helpers, such as nurses. With this "novel of voices", a narrative genre designed by her, she provides harrowing insights into the lives of women involved in the war and illuminates both the great enthusiasm for the struggle for the fatherland as well as everyday life and the horrors of war female point of view.

content

The actual content of the book is preceded by a brief conversation with a historian about the history of women in the army. Thus among the Athenians, the Spartans, and the Slavs women fought side by side with men. Later, women also served at the front, but mostly did their job in hospitals , auxiliary corps or as mechanics, not as soldiers. During the Second World War, the number of women in the armies rose sharply; in the Soviet Army alone, over a million women served in all professions and branches of service. Following this introduction, Alexievich reports on the genesis of the book as well as the parts that were deleted by herself or the censorship.

The main part of the book, the stories of the women, begins with the telling words of the sniper Maria Ivanova Morozova: "This will be a simple report ... The report of a simple Russian girl ..." This simplicity and authenticity of the reports remains the following pages of the book. Because the interviewed women also talk about acts of war, injuries and casualties, but they often talk about less heroic things: the clothes they will wear when they get home, the food, what they want to eat, the love they have want to find. The special treatment of women in the army is also addressed: from discrimination and the accusation that they are weak or unsuitable, to scenes in which male soldiers threw themselves in front of them and thus saved their lives.

The women also talk about very personal things: that they signed up for the military committees when they were half children and became women during the war, that they missed periods or about the shame they felt because of their period for lack of hygiene products.

It also addresses how women were treated after the war: while men received fame and rewards, women were forgotten; and while men were worshiped as heroes, women were met with suspicion.

literature

Editions in German

• The war has no female face. Henschel, Berlin 1987, ISBN 978-3-362-00159-5 .
  • Extended and updated new edition; translated by Ganna-Maria Braungardt. Hanser Berlin, Munich 2013, ISBN 978-3-446-24525-9 .
  • The war has no female face. suhrkamp pocket book, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-518-46605-6 .

Web links

• Horror of the battles - A review of the book on Deutschlandfunk (by Karla Hielscher)
• The woman who is afraid of her books - article in the FAZ about Swetlana Alexijewitsch and the background to her books (by Kerstin Holm)

See also

• The Russian is talking (Records of conversations between Russian soldiers in World War I )
• The war has no female face (film) , a documentary based on the scenes in the book
• Beanpole , book-inspired feature film

Individual evidence