A woman, an apartment, a novel

A woman, an apartment, a novel is a novel that the German writer Wilhelm Genazino published in 2003. From a first-person perspective, he tells the development of a young man from school failure to writer. The novel takes place around 1960 in an unnamed “southern German industrial city” and contains autobiographical elements. His title lists the three goals that the protagonist named Weigand sets for himself . Compared to other novels of Genazino, the young age of the main character and the confrontation with the tradition of the educational novel catch the eye.

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As a high school dropout, the 17-year-old Weigand initially showed no interest in his mother's efforts to find an apprenticeship for him. He refuses to communicate with potential employers during an interview. Instead, he begins to write articles for print media, sends articles to a wide variety of magazines from advertising leaflets to the daily press. In the end, the mother succeeds in finding an apprenticeship position for the son, who begins training in a freight forwarding company.

With his girlfriend Gudrun, a secretary in an engineering office, he is planning a conventional marriage with a joint savings account and premarital abstinence, although he cannot develop any real inner relationship with her. When they meet, he gives her lectures on literature and writers, partly out of enthusiasm, partly to avoid real closeness. When she tries to stage her first sexual intercourse when her mother is absent, he lets himself be distracted by a program about Heinrich Böll in the middle of the foreplay . Finally there is a cool breakup.

In the shipping company, the protagonist has his first sexual experiences with a married colleague, Mrs. Kiefer, who is around 30 years old. After a company outing, the two of them are intoxicated and have sexual intercourse in the bus, which brings the drunken company employees back. However, the encounter remains without consequences.

At the same time as his apprenticeship, Weigand's journalistic commitment increased, and more and more often he went to appointments for a local daily newspaper after work. When he was on vacation, he worked as an editor for the paper. Journalism opens up an alternative world for the first-person narrator to subordinate activities in the shipping company. However, the feeling becomes increasingly stale when he realizes that local journalism mainly satisfies the need for recognition of various busy people and basically looks haughty at the events and the little people it reports on.

Through his press work, Weigand met a colleague named Linda from another daily newspaper, with whom he quickly fell in love. Through Linda, who comes from northern Germany, he meets a number of strange would-be writers and thus people who share his passion for literature. Linda herself is said to be writing her first novel. She raves about Joseph Conrad and the sea and reports on her own boat trip to New York, on which she sexually harassed a sailor. The first-person narrator suspects that she is hiding a traumatic experience in this context.

Weigand gains respect in the shipping company when he courageously intervenes when a colleague has an epileptic fit. A chance meeting in the theater establishes contact with the company's authorized signatory, who promotes Weigand to the foreman. He now has to recruit day laborers every day to load and unload wagons, ragged figures who are ruthlessly handled. With the job, Weigand's salary increases, with the promotion, arrogance and separation from the lives of the common people grow.

The love for Linda ends in shock. The secretly loved colleague hangs herself in her parents' house in northern Germany. Weigand drives to the funeral in Linda's hometown in northern Germany and goes to her funeral without contacting the relatives.

At another local appointment, the first-person narrator reports on a tinkering pensioner who has recreated the Eiffel Tower to scale from matches. The 18-year-old helplessly observes his growing arrogance towards the small world of the retired couple, but only when the retiree, when asked whether he had seen the original in Paris, replies that even as a retiree, he wants to stay clean and therefore never goes to Paris , Weigand finally resigned himself to the lows of local journalism.

He declined an offer to work as an editor via a shortened traineeship on the grounds that he had to finish his studies first. The novel ends with the narrator's decision to give himself time to deal with his life as an observer. He says goodbye to his parents and rents his first apartment. The book ends with the “wiggle of the first word” of a novel of its own. (Chap. 8)

Themes and motifs

Local journalism and literature

A thematic core of Genazino's novel is the criticism of local journalism and the closely related staging of local events, which in 1960 were not yet called "events". In doing so, a profound knowledge of the world of provincial editorial offices and appointment journalism becomes clear. Genazino's work as a volunteer and editor at the Rhein-Neckar-Zeitung 1962–1965 as well as his later work as a freelance journalist and later as an editor for the Frankfurt satirical magazine Pardon 1969–1971 are the foundations of the knowledgeable milieu studies .

In the novel, Genazino's journalists, as a matter of course complicity with the organizers and local officials, write “kitsch puddles” (Chapter 2) on events that live from showing off the common people and their dreams. In doing so, Genazino succeeds in using local events to demonstrate mechanisms that also aptly characterize current media events. The Je-ka-mi evening (= everyone can take part), a local singing competition that lives mainly from the embarrassment of the participants, anticipates media presentations such as Deutschland sucht den Superstar .

In his local journalistic work, the first-person narrator experiences the “world of busy people and club mongers” (Chapter 1). Not only local greats, but also the little people up to the eccentric loner dream of being the subject of reporting. This fascination for the media and celebrities leads to a complicity that makes all criticism impossible. For the makers, this world can only be endured with cynicism and arrogance. The “share in the arrogance of writing and those who write” (Chapter 1) that the protagonist gains in this way initially gives him self-confidence and opens up paths to social advancement. At the same time, the job of a local reporter is fascinating due to the possibility of “a more careless lifestyle” (Chapter 1), especially in comparison to the hierarchical and bureaucratic structure of the shipping company. But the doubts grow after various local appointments and are primarily aimed at changing one's own personality.

"I immediately feared that the poverty of the hobbyist's life, by describing and concealing it at the same time, would become the poverty of my life." (Chapter 7)

The reports from the events of everyday culture for the local section of the local daily newspaper from the stupid film to Rex Gildo autograph lessons to the trashy amateur singing competition make the first-person narrator think of a "cartel of simplicity" (Chapter 4), a simulated simplicity that I want to profit from the “huge earnings of the simplicity of the people” (Chapter 4). The arrogance of the makers is not opposed by laughter: "Because only laughter and ridicule were possible at this cheap department store happiness." (Chapter 5)

When the first-person narrator is commissioned to write a short report on the Je-ka-mi singing competition, which lives from the embarrassment and embarrassment of the participants, the “infamy” (Chapter 5) of the local reports becomes clear to him, “twenty lines about a mass grave of feelings ”(ibid.). The insight "that stupidity was entertaining for stupid people" (Chapter 5) creates a feeling of melancholy in him.

The criticism of the world of local journalism gains its sharpness from the contrast to literary writing, which the novel repeatedly addresses and paradigmatically presents in some places.

The novel says about the Peter Alexander film Im Weisse Rößl :

“The film dragged on for over an hour, swaying back and forth between embarrassing and lying details. Its most important components (flat dramaturgy, stupid dialogues, silly plot, foreseeable plot) were of depressing simplicity. The numerous and unmotivated vocal interludes by Peter Alexander were particularly painful. "(Chapter 4)

From this impression, the first-person narrator generates the fragments of the newspaper report:

"Peter Alexander presents a bouquet of colorful melodies in his latest music film ... Over time, the shy housekeeper Elfie also succumbs to his magical charm ..." (Chapter 4)

Genazino lets his local journalists dream of an alternative existence as writers. As lyricists and novelists, they want to discover a different approach to the world and are guided by great role models. “Anyone who wants to can call himself or herself a writer.” But the first-person narrator's doubts grow: the only thing the alleged writers cultivate is the gesture of the writer, which everyone tries to embody in his own way , nobody really publishes anything. What is the difference between the first-person narrator and them? Perhaps the courage to quietly observe, the eye for amazing images in the middle of the flow of everyday life. At the end of the novel, Weigand found the opportunity to write.

“It is only in his very last line that the time has finally come when we see him waiting 'for the first word to wake up'. How great they sound, these last six words waiting for the first word. But in order for them to become a Genazino sentence, you have to read the preceding ones: 'I looked down at my breakfast and waited for ...' Again and again the great is placed next to the mean and inconspicuous, thereby depriving one of the aura, the other leaked. The everyday breakfast plate and lurking for the moment of inspiration are very dependent on each other. "

Women and love

Weigand's love life reflects the development of the hero. In the first chapters, the protagonist has to distance himself mainly from his mother, who wants to structure and organize his life. His first love for Gudrun represents a step forward in this regard, but remains a headbirth and a construct without sexual fulfillment. Weigand then finds his first sexual experience wrong, in the sexual encounter with his married and much older colleague, Mrs. Kiefer. The narrator's real great love is Linda, also a journalist and, like the protagonist, fascinated by literature.

Weigand's mother is primarily interested in the son's future career. Later, as Oedipus, the first-person narrator had advised her to get a divorce at the age of 14 (cf. Chapter 1), but the mother remained in the marriage, “she became dimmer and weaker from year to year” (ibid.). Like the participants in the singing competition observed by Weigand, the mother also dreams of a different life and chooses Liselotte Pulver, a media star, as a role model (Chapter 5). “She watched all of Liselotte Pulver's films, and sometimes she took me with her. In every film, Liselotte Pulver was funny, confident, quick-witted, daring, humorous and engaging. In all points, mother was the complete opposite. ”(Chapter 5) Disillusioned, the first-person narrator observes the repeated failure of his mother's attempts to escape the sadness of her life by following the example.

At the beginning of the novel, the narrator plans a future together with the secretary Gudrun. From buying furniture to having children, everything is thought through and a common savings account is set up. However, there are no real conversations between the two, Weigand instead gives her "major lectures" on literature. The sexual interest in the fiancé is also limited. “At the time, however, I was of the opinion that no one could be interested in another person for a lifetime anyway. Most of them, to whom Gudrun perhaps belonged, did not even find an initial interest. ”(Chapter 2) During a last day together in the outdoor pool, the two realized“ that they are not a couple after all ”(Chapter 4) Passbook and relationship dissolved.

Weigand had his first sexual experience, heavily drunk, with his older colleague, Mrs. Kiefer. Genazino stages the cohabitation as an absurd situation in the bus between the drunk colleagues. The two of them fall asleep again and again, but eventually sleep together. The encounter has no consequences. When Weigand meets Frau Kiefer with her husband and child in the department store snack bar, he knows that it will remain an episode. "Genazino is also a dreary master of helpless mating scenes."

Linda is Weigand's real love, she not only shares his journalistic activities with him, but also a fascination for literature. It gives Weigand access to a literary scene, which, however, quickly reveals itself to be hollow: the novel projects and lyrical ambitions turn out to be mere gestures to make themselves interesting or to escape the lowlands of provincial journalism. Nevertheless, Weigand's fascination for Linda remains, which he observes clairvoyantly. Reinhard Baumgart sees the central tension element in the novel in the character Linda.

“This Linda, repeatedly appearing and disappearing, puts something in Genazinos quietly driving prose in front of her that she and we readers do not expect at all: tension - the simple, anxious question of how things will go on with these two and their story . In order to only reveal so much, it doesn't go any further, it suddenly breaks off. Linda's disappearance tears a big, sore hole in the book and also in its protagonists. And again you are amazed at how calm and gentle they both know how to deal with grief: "The news slowed my thinking" - the loss is considered so almost in silence. "

Linda eventually hangs herself in her parents' house. Her suicide does not make the novel a tragedy, the first-person narrator continues his observations, even at Linda's funeral in a northern German town by the sea. The narrative remains sober and distant. Perhaps Linda's death becomes a starting point for a serious literary career, "in the end ... the old, questionable miracle, the transformation of pain and the sacrifice of girls into lamentation and literature".

“But Genazino not only skillfully unfolds the complex love story of two people in a few scenes, both of whom are trying to escape from the despised reality into art. Using Linda's fate, he also demonstrates how endangered are hopes that are placed in one's own artistic work and how catastrophically they can fail. "

Alienated everyday life in the Adenauer period

Konrad Adenauer , postage stamp from 1968

One of the themes of the novel is the alienated everyday life in the late post-war period : “People's faces were full of admitted horror.” (Chapter 5) In the midst of the German “economic miracle” , the traumatic impression of war and National Socialism remains. There is no real communication about it.

Genazino makes the presence of the gloomy war memories in the lives of the elderly clear, especially in Weigand's memory scraps of his own childhood, small aside notes and scattered episodes. First of all, the musty rooms of Café Hilde “with dark brown wallpaper” are reminiscent of the post-war period. "The Café Hilde (and a considerable number of its visitors) was left over from the post-war period." (1st chapter)

The people also suffer unspokenly from the consequences of the war. Gudrun's father died in the war, mother and daughter live in a poor basement apartment (Chapter 1). The IG Chemie speaker at the May rally, about which Weigand reports, "was a typical post-war face: gray, lonely, lean, wrinkled." (Chapter 2) According to the one-armed editor of the business department, many older men were damaged by the war (Chapter 4 ) or one of the neighbors in Weigand's childhood who finally committed suicide in desperation (chap. 6). Other men are mentally damaged, for example the strange visitor in the editorial office who wants a submission to be published to Adenauer, one of the “old, unkempt men who speak in a low voice” (Chapter 4) who connect with reality no longer create. At the end of the novel, the narrator recognizes the effect of the gloomy memories on his parents as well: “The war had made my parents rude, mute and tired.” (Chapter 8) Another reference to the historical situation are the authors of post-war literature who are regularly mentioned .

All in all, it's about the psychological development of the Federal Republic, about inner sensitivities and changes in everyday life, not about big politics. Genazino's novels are "right from the start on the trail of the unconscious that underlies this society". The “stuffy air of the post-war period” freedoms and constraints characterize Genazino through the everyday life of people in cafes and canteens, in everyday work as well as in leisure time and consumer behavior.

The mass culture around 1960 countered the horror of the suppressed war with a sweet caricature, dreams of becoming a star like Rex Gildo or Peter Alexander , which one emulated in embarrassing competitions, “Italian weeks” in the Hertie department store, dreams of fame like him a sick pensioner who has rebuilt the Eiffel Tower to scale from burned matches.

“With a light hand, Genazino embeds this story of a successful self-rescue and an unsuccessful love in a portrait of the late Adenauer era. Very few, but atmospheric details are enough for him to make tangible the decisive historical distance that separates us today from those years shortly before the beginning of the student movement. But unlike Wilhelm Genazino's sinister strollers, Weigand does not indulge in the suffering of his time demonstratively. Rather, he discovers them with a critical curiosity, but also an enthusiasm that fits perfectly with his youth. "

Genazino's novel characterizes the simplicity played in the media of the time as a profit-oriented fraud. From the fired editor who had deliberately placed hidden advertising in his articles to the Italian boom, the haughty makers are aiming for the money of the naive ordinary people.

“After the end of the Nazi terror, the Germans went into historical silence. Now they are allowed to discover that there are simple bliss (straw hats, sweets, beach shoes) that are completely sufficient for life. ”(Chapter 5)

Culture and consumption act as masks for the underlying trauma. Even as a small boy, the narrator feels “like a doll in disguise” (chapter 5), when the silent father dresses him up as a little “art Bavarian” (chapter 5) in a traditional jacket and lederhosen. Childhood appears to him as the "origin of all ridiculousness" (Chapter 5).

Despite the flourishing economy, which also opens up marginalized job opportunities, the ruthlessness in dealing with the socially disadvantaged continues unabated. The forwarding company recruits day laborers in the branch office of the employment office every day. The “stench” in the day laborer's hall, “half-ragged, cloudy-looking men” (Chapter 7) make the narrator think of Dostoyevsky's notes from a house of the dead . Like the lows of local journalism, my career in freight forwarding appears increasingly gloomy: “I was not forced to be a wretched worker who found even wretched workers to be useful or not useful. But neither did I want to dilute the Tagesanzeiger more and more and end up drowning in my own arrogance. ”(Chapter 7)

In search of an alternative, the protagonist designs himself as an observer who observes “things and events” (Chapter 7). He takes up the courage to "waste his time", to listen to himself and to things "in the passing of time" (ibid.).

"Weigand escapes the growing weariness of both activities only by turning to things in a new way:" It was as if I could watch my own gaze as it turned a mere collection of objects into a wonderful relationship of things ( ...). Nothing happened, I felt the excitement of a new life "(A woman, an apartment, a novel, p. 155 f.)" A woman, an apartment, a novel "is the first part of a life novel, the entire story to date Genazinos once again caught up or prepared. From this position reached here, future life gains an undoubted validity - as a novel: "I did not doubt that I was moving in an unwritten novel" (A woman, an apartment, a novel p. 160) "

Wilhelm Amann sees Genazino's location of the plot in the early 1960s as a renunciation of spectacular historical events and refers to Genazino's above-cited concept of “historical silence”. Weigand's efforts to create a literary counter-world therefore developed against a background of “continuing petty-bourgeois values”, as represented by Weigand's father, which drove Weigand's mother into resignation.

Workers and employees

Genazino's first literary success, the Abaffel trilogy, had dealt intensively with the lows of being an employee. Later, marginal strollers were at the center of his literary production. “A woman, an apartment, a novel” is now being told for the first time from the perspective of an aspiring writer; it is Genazino's first artist novel. Nevertheless, Genazino also deals with the everyday life of employees around 1960, which he contrasts with the lifestyle and appearance of the workers.

First of all, there only seems to be hierarchical encounters between the layers. On the company outing of the forwarding company, Weigand saw “workers and employees in one room” for the first time (Chapter 3). When Weigand looked for a place, he initially felt “more drawn to the workers” (ibid.), But then he was but repelled by their behavior, by the "images they produce" (Chapter 3). The novel initially describes the “incomprehensible life of the workers” negatively: “They did not seem to combat their dullness. It allowed them to get through life half dead. ”(Chapter 1) At the May demonstration, the workers seem like foreign bodies in public space. “They imitated a solemn wandering that failed because they only wandered around publicly once a year.” (Chapter 3) On the other hand, Weigand is certain that none of the forwarding workers would whistle to the boss about his press work on the Tagesanzeiger. He knows "that a worker does not open his mouth voluntarily, especially not to a high boss." (Chapter 3)

On the company outing, workers and employees sit separately, the workers drink from the bottle and display unsavory eating manners, “... when a worker drank, the bottle in his hand said: We both, you and I, are afraid of the labyrinths of refinement, we stick to the advantages of simplicity. ”(Chapter 3) The employees, on the other hand, order glasses and, in their dark suits, hold onto outer shapes.

In the novel only the employees gain individual contours. The authorized representative of the shipping company only dances with the wives of the workers out of calculation. His tough attitude towards the workers is particularly evident in the episode of day wages. “Make sure you always have too few people, never too many. It must not happen that workers stand around idly, said the authorized officer. "(Chapter 7) When one of the already signed day laborers holds his signed agreement close in front of his eyes, the authorized officer takes it from his hand" and tore it up his bad eyes. "(Chapter 7)

Double life

“At seventeen I tumbled into a double life with no particular intention .” Even the first sentence of the novel shows the literary motif of the double life as a central theme of the novel. The first-person narrator Weigand moves between different poles. The first thing that is striking is the division into commercial apprenticeship and journalistic work. On a psychological level, however, one can also observe a split in the ego in Freud's sense : in many situations the narrator outwardly meets the demands of reality, adapts to the demands placed on him as a son, as an apprentice or as a reporter. In his mind, however, he imaginatively develops alternative worlds and language games that make the situation bearable for him.

If one compares Genazino's design of the subject of double life with other examples from literary history, the position of the author becomes clearer. Bertolt Brecht creates the motif of the double life in the good person of Sezuan in the double role Shui Ta / ShenTe. Desperate about the failure of morally good behavior in the face of the reality of capitalism , Shen Te invents and plays her cousin Shui Ta, who plays with all hands on the keyboard of ruthless economic life. Brecht's concept is clearly based on a Marxist social theory. Although Genazino also focuses on the problem of ruthless exploitation in the novel, for example using the example of day laborers, his criticism of society is fundamentally constructed differently. Weigand's moral conflicts do not revolve around the pole of morality / love versus profit / career, but rather around arrogance and modesty, adjustment and secret refusal. Weigand's path is the search for individual meaning in the context of social platitudes and dumbing down. Genazino does not suggest collective resistance, but rather the search for a satisfying niche existence:

“I think that the individual is indeed threatened by the advancing globalization and economization of the entire world. If you are not able to find a few subjective, personal life techniques that put an individual world at your side, so to speak, then I see black. "

Genazino considers the formulation of a “utopia for a whole society” to be an immeasurably overestimating self. Genazino's perspective is the “extreme of a private utopia”, a “liberation” is only possible “individually, selectively”. In the sense of Beckett's "refreshment of escapes" his writing describes "the negative to positive escapes".

Another point of comparison would be interpretations of the motif, such as those presented in The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde are addressed. In his novel, Robert Louis Stevenson created the contrast between adapted bourgeois life, as the scientist Dr. Jekyll embodies, and the double existence as a criminal (Mr. Hyde), in which Jekyll can live out his dark, instinctual side. While at Stevenson the double life had the function of opening up an area for the instincts that were suppressed in the Victorian age , at Genazino the relief through the double life worked fundamentally different. Weigand behaves appropriately, both as a journalist and as an apprentice. Just knowing about the alternative area of ​​life relieves the narrator when he comes under pressure. When the authorized officer in the shipping company harassed him for a while, he was comforted by the thought that he would write about him later. On the other hand, the income from the haulage company enables him to limit his adaptation to the “kitsch puddles” journalism and to decline the offered internship .

Another aspect of the double life is the targeted protection of literary writing through a job. While Genazino was writing the novel, he gave a lecture on literary unsuccessfulness at the autumn meeting of the German Academy for Language and Poetry in 2002 . In this speech he quotes William Faulkner with the recommendation to his fellow writers that they secure their lives with a second job. He contrasts this realistic view with the massive financial problems of great authors such as Robert Musil and Undine Gruenter , who, because of a “majestic” self-esteem, would have fundamentally refused any activity outside of writing.

“You don't even have to use Faulkner's idea. There were (are) models for a double life in German literature. I remember the older models Joseph von Eichendorff and ETA Hoffmann , who worked as lawyers during the day and emerged as active romantics in their free time; I remember Kafka , Döblin and Benn , who we can no longer imagine without their civil professions. "

He points out that Musil had studied mechanical engineering and could have worked as an engineer, so that his undeserved failure was the product of his "mockery of the world and his arrogance". Similarly, Italo Svevo sought his “salvation” exclusively in writing. "A more blatant overvalue of writing can hardly be imagined." With covert reference to his own novel project, Genazino explains how Svevo failed with his first novel "Una Vita", which describes the life of an employee who wants to become a writer. He concludes from this that there can be no claim to success in culture, not even the right to reception. In addition, the writer is dependent on the confirmation of others without being able to offer them recognition himself. “According to Hegel, such a one-sidedness is doomed to failure or unhappiness with oneself.” For many authors, the lack of recognition leads to a form of self-affirmation that can be described as crankiness. Wilhelm Genazino ends his reflections on literary failure with the defensive remark that he is "instructed that every writer is his own illusionist and that not even writers should give writers advice." The novel "A woman, an apartment, a novel" is also to read as a literary reflection to what extent a double life can be the basis for a successful life as a writer. In the novel, Genazino formulates a much clearer answer than in his speech. Precisely because of his conscious decision for a double life and against the arrogance of the writer, Weigand gains perspectives, both for himself as a person and as a literary observer.

Tilman Spreckelsen sees the balance between refusal, discomfort in the world of work, haphazard organization of the day and introspection on the one hand and "making a living that is recognized as necessary" a characteristic of many figures in genazino. Weigand, the hero of the novel, is also looking for exactly this compromise. The “distrust of rules and customs” often results in “obsessive observation of the environment and oneself, in a rapid change from alienation or the feeling of embarrassment and occasional euphoric moments that are often conjured up in variations.” This often leads to the dissolution of Links.

In the novel, Weigand repeatedly enters into ties in order to later purposefully relativize or dissolve them completely, for example the relationship with his girlfriend Gudrun or in the field of daily journalism. According to Spreckelsen, Weigand tries consistently to avoid any embarrassment that he encounters in its purest form at the singing competition. The naive attempt to emulate role models without "adequate self-observation" and without a sense of the effect on others is particularly embarrassing to Weigand.

Literary form

chronology

The material of the story is largely arranged chronologically with regular short flashbacks to the narrator's childhood. The time told begins around the turn of the year 1959/1960. Like the author Wilhelm Genazino (born January 22, 1943), the first-person narrator Weigand is 17 years old at this time. The mother finds the apprenticeship “in mid-February”, and the author starts his apprenticeship at the forwarding agency on April 1 (Chapter 1). On the last Sunday in May, Weigand receives the offer to work as a generalist (Chapter 2), 14 days later the company outing takes place. The narrator takes over the representation at the “Tagesanzeiger” on Monday, July 2nd for 3 weeks. At the end of the substitution, the narrator mentions that he is now 18 years old (Chapter 7). The visit to the theater, where he meets the general manager for the first time in private, takes place a weekend after the vacation replacement, on the following Monday Weigand is promoted to foreman. One week after starting work as a foreman, Weigand declines the traineeship (Chapter 8). Shortly afterwards he rents the apartment.

Leitmotifs

Franz Kafka 1906

In the course of the daily observations of the first-person narrator, certain themes and motifs emerge again and again as leitmotifs . Impressions of people's lives in the late post-war period, of the lifestyle of ordinary people and workers, of the behavior of children and their mothers are not systematically developed, but rather presented discreetly in marginal notes and small observations.

Some of the motifs run through several of Genazino's novels, such as references to Franz Kafka , which appear again and again in the “Abolition” trilogy and in the novel “The spot, the jacket, the room, the pain” from 1989 and since then.

On the one hand, the references to Kafka trigger reflections on literature, Kafka is “the key witness to the immeasurable but hopeless knowledge of literature”. On the other hand, Kafka stands for the "rift between yourself and the world", which, however, also has a comical side. In the novel, Weigand kisses Gudrun passionately after giving her a long lecture about Kafka. The two consider this to be a “sign” of their love, but the narrator suspects that he “kissed through Gudrun and thanked Kafka in the background because he made [him] so alive again.” (Chapter 1)

In another situation, Weigand gives his mother Kafka's letter to the father to read. In response to his mother's enthusiastic reaction, the narrator asks if she would invite Kafka to lunch one day. It remains to be seen whether the mother is only pretending to be involved in this “game”. (Chapter 1) Franz Kafka also becomes the connecting element between Linda and Weigand: He gets to know them when he compares one of the speakers with Kafka to himself at the press table at the May rally. In response to her competent answer, Weigand stated that “for the first time he had come across a person who was as strongly controlled by literature as I was.” (Chapter 2) “It is a tenderly implied love that already a fleeting stripe with the hip when getting up from the armchair creates great sensations. He can talk to Linda about Kafka, she counters with Joseph Conrad. "

Kafka also stands for the double life, for the juxtaposition of job and literature, the "tension between literature and life" that Weigand also experiences. Helmut Böttiger sees Kafka as one of Genazino's important literary role models. “Literature is also Wilhelm Genazino's sore point. … It was no coincidence that Kafka was employed by a workers' accident insurance company, which is why a considerable number of characters at Genazino have similar jobs. "

Weigand and Genazino's project is to transform the abysses of one's own life, everyday observations and hardships into texts and into literature. Kafka appears here as the great role model, perhaps because of the radicalism with which he dealt with the catastrophes of his life in literary terms with fine irony. “Kafka is a constant point of reference for Wilhelm Genazino - it serves as evidence for the strange and exciting connection between literature and life as well as a guarantee for his“ theory of secrecy ”. Kafka is always in the most vulnerable, most open, most intimate place. Genazino seems to be making fun of smuggling Kafka into every one of his books. "

Bildungsroman

The specialist literature first discusses the question of how Genazino's novel relates to the literary tradition of the educational novel , more precisely of the adolescent novel . Wilhelm Amman sees Genazino in the tradition of Wilhelm Meister , since Weigand, like Goethe's protagonist, tries to escape being an employee as an artist. Like Gottfried Keller's Grüner Heinrich , Genazinos Weigand has to deal with the defeat of a school expulsion and a damaged family life and is also a hard-working self-taught person . In contrast to the modern form of the educational novel, Weigand's development is not based on “disillusionment” and “radical extinction of the subject”. Gustav Seibt also sees Genazino's work as an unagitated variant of the genre, and speaks of an educational novel in the " bonsai format" due to its small size and the lack of education .

Tilman Spreckelsen also sees elements of “a classic initiation story” such as leaving the parental home, the first sexual experience, the first apartment of one's own. At the same time, however, Spreckelsen also sees signals running in the opposite direction: There is no community of adults into which Weigand wants to integrate, he asks himself “whether we are dealing here with an anti-initiation, with the cunning refusal of belonging that is discreetly - and all the more effectively - in the guise of willingness to integrate ”. Spreckelsen sees the specific strategy of Weigand and other protagonists of Genazino in the formation of compromises. Despite an inner distance to the world of work and the media and a targeted waste of time, they do not lose the feeling for successful life strategies.

Claudia Stockinger sees Weigand's role model in Franz Kafka and his double life as an author and employee and points out that the hero of Genazino's abolition trilogy saw himself in the light of the transformation as an animal that crawled around on the floor of a snack bar. In the abolishing novel as in “A Woman, an Apartment, a Novel”, the allusion to Kafka appears satirically distorted by the context: Weigand had given his mother Kafka's letter to his father to read and then asked her if he would like Mr. Kafka may bring one to dinner.

In his review of Die Zeit, Reinhard Baumgart emphasizes the special form that Genazino gives to the concept of Bildungsroman. The development concept is hidden behind a specific mixture of banality and moments of inspiration.

“Again and again, the great is placed next to the mean and inconspicuous, thereby depriving one of the aura and passing it on to the other. The everyday breakfast plate and waiting for the moment of inspiration are very dependent on each other. Every new attempt at emotional upswing is humbly grateful if it runs out of breath before the jump. So you only notice after a while that Genazino is actually telling his Stephen Daedalus , Tonio Kröger and Malte Laurids Brigge , the portrait of the poet as a young man and a puppy, the gradual creation of writing in life. And on top of that, saying goodbye to your parents by moving into your first own apartment.

Genazino made Weigand's move out of his parents' apartment outwardly undramatic, but still clearly shows the deep break between his protagonist and the previous generation. In view of the planned move-out, the father is particularly interested in the threat that his son will no longer make financial contributions to the family budget. Weigand answered his father's unspoken question about his financial situation with silence: "For the first time it was he who fell victim to a silence between us." (Chapter 8) In view of his departure, the first-person narrator reflects on his childish fear, like the mother being ground up by the father like a bar of soap until it is completely dissolved. He wonders whether the mother only became “a little coarse” (Chapter 8) through the husband, or whether she has always been “indelicate”. He sums up his excerpt in the inner monologue as a farewell to the “parents' junk”.

Narrator and author

Genazino's variant of the educational novel is developed from the perspective of an ironically distanced first-person narrator . The narrator mostly stays close to the inner experience of the 17-year-old Weigand, only in a few places this personal narrative attitude is broken and the time lag between the experiences and the writing is made clear. "At that time, I did not have the courage to call life incomprehensible," says about the fifth chapter. The clearest authorial remark can be found in the last chapter: “The war had made my parents rude, dumb and tired. It was only twenty years later that I was able to empathize with the rest of the war life. "

Excerpts from the protagonist's 17th and 18th year are told, supplemented by regular short flashbacks to childhood. The novel begins at a breaking point: failing at high school. Beyond establishing a professional existence, it is about gaining goals in life and a perspective as a writer.

"The reader accompanies this young, silent person, lost in reflections about himself and his environment, on his way from foreign to self-determination, past the stages that every adolescent has to go through: slow isolation from parents and their" Clutter "of incomplete divorce, mutual wear and tear and finally a flight into silence, first sexual experiences and desires with and without meaning, the gaining of the strength to be able to break away from a stagnant relationship and - most importantly - the slow realization of what you actually want to achieve in life. "

Some reviewers look for autobiographical traces of Wilhelm Genazino in the novel, see in the youthful hero of the novel a picture of the writer Wilhelm Genazino as a young man.

“The parallels to Genazino's biography seem obvious: the nameless city could very well be Mannheim and Genazino, who began to work as a freelancer for newspapers, published the novel“ Laslinstrasse ”in his early twenties, which portrays the dreams of a schoolboy towards the end of the Adenauer era portrays. But it does not matter whether Weigand, "awkward to the point of non-behavior," bears the traits of the young author. It is not that one admires Weigand, on the contrary. Because he only sees life as an alibi for writing, he sometimes even gets on your nerves - precisely because he hits the mark so often. "People needed a few deviations from time to time so that they could continue to live in their circumstances all the more unchallenged."

Wilhelm Amman also sees the complexity of the narrator's ego partly due to the fact that the "perspective of a remembering ego" suggests "closeness to the experiences of the empirical author". At the same time, in the late mention of the narrator's name in the second chapter, he sees tendencies towards a “fictionalization of the narrator's ego”, surprising for the reader. In this context, Amann speaks of the "construct of the" implicit author "". The play of identities between author and narrator continues in a surprising authorial remark that Amman quotes. Almost at the end of the novel it says:

“The war had made my parents rude, dumb and tired. It was only twenty years later that I was able to empathize with this remaining war life. "(Chapter 8)

The links between the novel and the biography of Genazino, the confusion between author and first-person narrator, are certainly also due to the topic of the future writer. Like Genazino, Weigand also seeks access to the existence of a writer through journalistic activities. Genazino himself has confirmed that the novel follows his vita in essential aspects:

“That is definitely written down in certain parts of my life, this slow distance from home and also from the world of school. But it has to be said that everything was already shaped by an early experience of writing. I started working for newspapers as a schoolboy; first of all for the local newspapers there. To my astonishment, I was quickly successful: It is of course a great experience when, as a 17-year-old, you are successful in what you want to do. And that actually dictated the career path. "

Like Weigand, Genazino was "a total school failure". Genazino states that he was thrown out of high school "because of dreams and incapacity" and too much interest in writing. At that time, instead of doing his homework, he “wrote for four local newspapers”.

The novel also leads a “double life” in terms of stylistic devices: Using the resources of the experienced author, Genazino characterizes the beginning of a literary career by ascribing these stylistic devices and thoughts to his youthful alter ego. In doing so, the novel develops a "ranking of author ideas - from reporter up to novelist". In keeping with this hierarchy, many journalists dream in vain of the “rise” from wage clerk to freelance writer in the novel.

The relationship between author and text is also thematized in the novel. Linda and Weigand discussed the relationship between text, life, author and reader while they were waiting for the speaker at a press conference held by the Italian Tourist Office. Since the reader knows that neither Weigand nor Linda have any real writing experience, there is a certain irony about the debate. In addition, from Weigand's relationship with Gudrun, it is clear that his comments on literature also have the function of wooing. Despite this ambiguity of the dialogue, the two basic questions of the letter cut.

"Writing is a movement that aims to familiarize us with pain," said Linda. Isn't it the other way around? I asked; Doesn't the one who writes transform the confusion of life, that is, his pain, into the clarity of a text? It's an illusion, said Linda. (...) The illusion of clarity comes about, said Linda, because the text is always clearer than the life of the person who wrote it. "

The naive yet brilliant statements of Lindas and Weigand formulate questions to the literature and witty remarks that go beyond their horizon and also seem absurd in view of the waiting situation. When writing, does the author think of the reader? Is the author ultimately the addressee who explains the pain that led to the creation of the text? How can “the most obscure living beings that exist at all bring about something as clear as text.” Is literary theory a compensation for the disappointment with literature? Is literature the expression of the "distance of the author from the world"? The conversation breaks off, the handsome Dr. Alessio enters, celebrated by the ladies present.

Linguistic opposite worlds

Distance through language games

More significant than external biographical parallels, however, is the portrayal of the writing and thinking processes of the future author. Like Genazino, Weigand is fascinated by words and word creations that sum up feelings, images and situations. The situation in the job interviews appears “half bitter” to the protagonist and real communication slips away from him because of the fascination for the term he discovers on an advertising poster (Chapter 1). Neologisms such as “historical silence” as a characteristic of the post-war period or the new verb “dilute” (Chapter 7) for the young journalist's changing self-image could be ascribed to genazino as well as to his protagonist. Reinhard Baumgard sees in Weigand another “collector of inconspicuousness”; like Genazino, he is a “specialist in epiphany ”. “From the simple perception that every guest who gets up in a café warps the tablecloth, which the waitress or kitchen helper then hurries to adjust again, he develops a brooding phenomenology and poetics of the INCONENTATIVE:“ Or did I only produce the inconsequential in my head or maybe only in my head my gaze? ""

The words become a counter-world to everyday life that is perceived as depressing, the reflection on language functions as an exit point from all entanglements, as an antidote to the world of "normality" and adaptation.

“The fact that his mood, like the whole of the novel, remains only half-bitter and not entirely bitter, is due to the words. The words help life when they appear as suddenly as the word "semi-bitter" out of nowhere, from the chocolate advertising, and sink into the hero's consciousness. He wants to deal with words. Reading and writing, nothing more. "

According to Claudia Stockinger, observation raised “to an artistic act” gives meaning to the disparate objects and events of everyday life. "Genazino's poetics of" meaningful seeing "" turns the shop window of a coal merchant into a work of art, in the romantic sense of the word Weigand turns to things poetically.

"It was as if I could watch my own gaze turn a mere collection of objects into a wonderful sibling of things: a mystery with myself in the middle." (Chap. 8)

Roman Bucheli also emphasizes in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung the protective function of the conceptual confrontation with reality. Weigand keeps the “hardship” at bay by staying out “with the means of language”. "He clings to individual words that come to him, and just by listing things he loses" the feeling of being at the mercy "."

Weigand conquered the distance through the distance of the literary observer, through mental sketches, word creations and reflections. The viewer approaches things very closely. “When I was upset as a child, I would go through the apartment and open all the drawers. I put my hand into the open drawers and rummaged through things at random. The despondency soon ended and the preoccupation with an object began. ”(Chapter 8) This patient interest in things is constitutive of Wilhelm Genazino's writing. In an interview with Jochen Kölsch, he presented his phenomenology of the stretched gaze using examples. The patient observation of sparrows, for example, who use a discarded music cassette to build a nest, is an example of patient observation of the world, be it people, natural processes or things. "I am writing today for the sake of the objects, so to speak, and in order to become aware of this disenchantment or enchantment - because they are very close together."

Things - according to Roman Bucheli in his essay "The Desire of Rescue" are "reassurance of existence" for Genazino's characters, who are threatened with disappearing. This concentration on things, clinging to inconspicuous objects beyond their practical value, is at the same time an expression of inwardness.

“So, from Genazino's books, an extremely discreet and curious subject looks at us, who reveals little about itself other than what is indirectly recognizable ... It is not what the observer sees that is the focus of interest, but rather the reaction of the observer himself and so the sensation which observation triggers in him. "

Marit Hofman sees in the self-observation of the observer a commitment by Genazino to constructivism in the sense of Niklas Luhmann's system theory . “An individual in the modern sense is someone who can observe his own observation.” At the end of the novel “A woman, an apartment, a novel”, this is implemented paradigmatically when Weigand seems to recognize himself as a fictional character and turns into a novelist, “ into the narrative subject “transform. Marit Hofman quotes Genazino's speech on the Bremen Literature Prize, in which the author identified reading and writing as forms of resistance against self-image imposed by institutions. Inner images, the conquest of language and deviation are ways to defend oneself against the "degradation to the object of investigation".

Genazino himself sees his "marginality" "in writing and in perception" as an effective protection, also against the public interest in his person. As a self-observing observer, he creates a relieving distance for himself.

The humorously chosen names of many of the characters in the novel are also an expression of an ironic distance from the post-war world. “The strangest thing about this lovely little novel is the names of its characters - there is Ms. Finkbeiner and Mr. Frühwirth, Ms. Siebenhaar, Mr. Wettengel and Albert Mußgnug. The "extremely irritable lyricist" is called Herr Schube and the pensioner Erich Wagenblaß, ... "The fact that the hero is called Weigand ," fighter "or" hero ", has at least an ironic connotation.

Resistant visual worlds

The search for meaningful images is still characteristic of Weigand and Genazino. The breastfeeding woman on a passing coal ship reminds Weigand of images of paradise from children's religious instruction, in which animals and people finally live together in harmony and peace: "The image of the white child's head and the white breast right next to a black pile of coal was to sink." 7)

Genazino contrasts images of harmony and eroticism with real cruelty, images of boys blowing frogs up to bursting, the day laborer's hall, the idea of ​​the hanged Linda, for the first-person narrator “the ordinary war” (Chapter 7). Bucheli quotes Genazino's view of the picture as a “refusal to tell”, and the picture also opens up scope for the “reader's novel”.

Genazino tried to define the phenomenon of the "stretched gaze" as "permanent perplexity of attention". "Perplex is a Latin word, it means: to be perplexed, taken by surprise, to be speechless." Against the emphasis on language as the only source of consciousness by modern philosophy, he claims that seeing has an independent meaning even for the toddler. The "gaze knowledge of the world" is a possibly underestimated source for the development of the ego. This perception through observation is fragmentary from the start, despite the initial hope for an "unproblematic connection with everything and everyone" through the eye. Genazino develops a perception strategy from this disillusionment:

“We now see affectively, that is, we ourselves go over to looking at the world with enigmatic glances. In other words, we give back to the outside world the riddles which we were not spared in perceiving it, at the level of exchanging glances. We have now learned an enigmatic look for ourselves, which mixes the aspects and details as it suits the needs of our inner life. "

According to Genazino, the lack of “phenomenal” memory becomes “unexpected, belated sovereignty”. The “grown-up seer” happily turns the “deficient child's view” into “the epiphany's theater of meaning”. As a further development of James Joyce's concept of the epiphany , Genazino developed the “conscious catch-up of the sense ... which provides us with new ideas. The stretched gaze carefully disassembles everything it sees and puts it back together again ... The ongoing dismantling and reassembly of the images is our technique for dealing with the problem that even the stretched gaze does not do everything at once and not everything at once can see. ”Genazino describes this technique as“ the refined perfecting of our child’s vision ”. The novel uses various examples to demonstrate the free handling and daring combinations of different visual worlds.

The end of the novel demonstrates Genazino's concept of perception using a small scene as an example. A child who carries a loaf home falls. It is observed by tourists and café guests. The child manages to hold onto the bread when it falls so that it remains undamaged.

“The child spotted his observers and looked at them in quick succession. First the two women, then me, then the Americans. In the chain of eyes, secret and public life gently collided. The child basked in the homage of his beholder and lifted the bread for a moment, then it disappeared. I had no doubt that I was moving in an unwritten novel. I looked down at my breakfast and waited for the first word to wake up. ”(End of the novel)

Gustav Seibt speaks of a “harmony of art and life that gives the genre its final twist.” Werner Jung relates Genazino's literary processing of this small scene to the phenomenology of perception in Maurice Merleau-Ponty . He quotes the sentence from Genazino's collection of aphorisms "From the shore": "Ideas arise through long looking."

"Whether through this long look, through intensive observation or through the more fleeting glance and a sudden attention - Genazino is always concerned with this core: the construction of the text from the perceiving gaze, its development possibilities and phenomenality of the writer in ever new constellations or . Simulations .. tested, that is, demonstrated in narratives. "

Anja Hirsch places Genazino's visual worlds in the context of “disappearing”. Your own disappearance is "existential fear as well as pleasure". The “I” find its identity through “looks…, never completely, always only as part of something, in the refraction of the other, people like things, but above all always in motion.” For Anja Hirsch, dealing with promised images is a central task for the readers of Genazinos.

“Reading Genazino - that means taking part in a basic movement that is inscribed in all of this author's texts: turning away from a previously gleaned image, the art of disappearing from the depicted scene in time, of interrupting the narrative, of allowing gaps in between reading and writing , in which the perceived image can charge itself and remains veiled, what should remain veiled. "

Frankfurt tram type H

Like other motifs in the novel, some of the images in the novel can be traced across Genazino's oeuvre. As early as 1993, Genazino had put together the illustrated book “Aus der Ferne”, which annotated old postcards and photographs with short texts. The cover picture is a view from a high window: in the snowstorm an old tram with a trailer drives through the picture, next to it a car from the pre-war period. This view from above of a passing tram is reflected and reinterpreted in the novel. In order to simulate a hash rush, Weigand, standing by the window, describes his “perceptions” and hallucinations about this picture to Linda's other party guests in the style of the “drug books” by Burroughs , Ginsberg and Kerouac :

“Far down on the street, a yellow-lit tram slowly drove past. As planned, she came to a stop at the bus stop. I began to portray the tram as a picture in a picture, as a tram that was going into and out of another tram. I had immediate success with the doubled tram. "(Chapter 3)

For Anja Hirsch, because of such further processing, “the illustrated books are to be understood as a preliminary stage to all other works.” The productive examination of a section of reality that has been immobilized by photography is also characteristic of Weigand's handling of visual impressions. A section is isolated and captured by means of the "stretched gaze". The combination of different details creates new combinations and meanings. When processing into text, literary models play an important role for the future author.

Reviews

The novel has long been on numerous recommendation and best lists and is also used as school reading. The novel received positive reviews across the board.

Reinhard Baumgart puts an emphasis in his review on Die Zeit on the aspect of double life. In addition to the break between the work as a journalist and the apprenticeship in freight forwarding, he also sees the duplication in the perception of the world:

“In any case, everything that is perceived leads a double life here, transforming 'incessantly' into the calm flow of narrative: a moment ago 'just there', it has now become the wording, text, literature. And in this score everything that the young observer sees together stands side by side as if on an equal footing, his day laborers in the warehouse of the shipping company and their hopelessly patient nature, breadcrumbs on a swimming pool ceiling or mother with child in the café. And again and again he trains look and language in writing exercises before our eyes and asks himself: Are his sentences' maybe just beautiful, but not sincere; or intelligent but sad; or maybe beautiful and sad, but unfortunately not true; or…'?"

- Reinhard Baumgart : Orpheus in Ludwigshafen, Wilhelm Genazino provides a few hours of brittle delight, Die Zeit , 13/2003

In merkur-online, Simone Dattenberger puts the genesis of the writer at the center of her review. At that moment, the experienced young press writer becomes a man of letters by reflecting on his arrogance as a writer.

“The young poet, from whose perspective everything is perceived, also controls himself, his gaze and his evaluation of everything. 'I sat there and couldn't get rid of the idea of ​​my pride. Possibly I was just a little city monkey who wanted to act out his resentments unobtrusively. ' Only after this level of consciousness has been reached - and this is where Genazino's loving wisdom lies - does the writer's birth begin. "

- Simone Dattenberger : Böll or Busen, Genazinos new novel, Merkur-Online from March 14, 2003

Uwe Wittstock praises in the world Genazino adolescence novel as outstanding literary achievement:

“Nevertheless, Wilhelm Genazino's 'A woman, an apartment, a novel' is a real jewel, and probably the best that Genazino has ever written: A successful mixture of an ironically sparkling artist's novel, a tender, doomed love story and a suggestive visualization of the early one sixties. "

- Uwe Wittstock : Let's flee into art, Wilhelm Genazino's new novel is a real gem, Welt Online from March 5, 2003

He sees the novel as a positive departure from the all too negative heroes of earlier works. For Weigand, literature becomes a way of conquering the neurosis developed from a gloomy childhood. Genazino developed this “psychic self-rescue” of the hero from a “completely casual, plausible constellation”. As a freelance journalist, Weigand found a way to break away from the oppressive everyday life from the distance of the writer. In the same sense, Anne Kraume also sees Weigand in the TAZ as a special case among the heroes of the novel Genazinos:

“Weigand is alone and doesn't really mind being one. Shortly before saying goodbye to his girlfriend, he notices that for him literature also has the function of being a 'separating lever' between him who reads and those who don't. The danger here, and he is also aware of this, is the arrogance into which he threatens to lapse with his sense of the nuances, the words and the embarrassment of other people. If, at the end of the novel, he therefore decides against a career as an editor and in favor of the sovereign waste of time, it is also because he can avoid the impending arrogance. And this is where the hero of this novel differs from those of the earlier ones: He is young and still has a lot of time that he can waste listening to things. "

- Anne Kraume : Listening to things, a life made of words: Wilhelm Genazino goes back to the Adenauer time for his new novel “A woman, an apartment, a novel”, TAZ from April 1, 2003

Gustav Seibt also rated the novel in the Süddeutsche Zeitung positively with reference to the genre of the educational novel :

“How does the soul fight between the forwarding company and the local newspaper end? Against the expectation. The young man of letters turns down an offer for a permanent position at the newspaper. The compulsion to gloss over lies in journalistic writing bothers him, the arrogance that is not hidden behind it. The book exposes this decision as one for real life and real art at the same time. The young man discovers more and more beauty when he observes purposefully; and he has enough Kafka in him to appreciate the camouflage existence as an employee. He wants to 'behave as a listener' towards his life. He is delighted when a worker utters the word 'feeling' like 'rotten' - someone who is gifted with such joy need not take up the profession of literary man, and he will never want to step into kitsch puddles. Genazino's quiet Bildungsroman ends with a harmony of art and life that gives the genre its final twist. "

- Gustav Seibt : The half-bitter lessons of life, "A woman, an apartment, a novel": Wilhelm Genazino's educational novel in bonsai format, in: Süddeutsche Zeitung of April 9, 2003

Roman Bucheli relates the topic of double life in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung to Gottfried Benn's double existence as a writer and doctor. Unlike Benn's pathetic junction "Dionysus - including varicose veins!" the first-person narrator Weigand is more likely to suffer from the split, but at the same time wants to maintain the tense double existence, for example by renouncing the traineeship.

“In this light book, Wilhelm Genazino not only describes the young man's awakening to literature, he also inscribed the story, which is colored by a mild melancholy, a reflection on the deeply humane narrative, and in the end, he has a wonderful one Self-portrait created: Wilhelm Genazino tells us how someone learned to listen and look into reality, and he tells us like someone who has never done anything else, who is constantly listening to and questioning the phenomena of life and all with affection that never grows cold transformed into art. "

- Roman Bucheli : Listening into reality, "A woman, an apartment, a novel" by Wilhelm Genazino, in: Neue Zürcher Zeitung of March 29, 2003

Secondary literature and reviews

• Text + criticism . Journal for Literature, Ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold. Volume 162. IV / 04, Wilhelm Genazino, ISSN  0040-5329 , ISBN 3-88377-755-2 .
• Wilhelm Amman: Authorship in Genazinos “A woman, an apartment, a novel” . In: Text + Criticism . 162 IV / 04, pp. 87-97.
• Reinhard Baumgart: Orpheus in Ludwigshafen, Wilhelm Genazino ensures a few hours of brittle delight . DIE ZEIT 13/2003 [1] .
• Anne K. Betz: Everyday frustration and petty bourgeoisie, Wilhelm Genazino's development novel “A woman, an apartment, a novel” . literaturkritik.de No. 4, April 2003 [2] .
• Helmut Böttiger: Kafkas Lachen, laudation for Wilhelm Genazino on the occasion of the award of the Büchner Prize in 2004 . quoted from: deutscheakademie.de .
• Helmut Böttiger: Advocate of the smallest things, a laudation for the narrator Wilhelm Genazino, who was awarded the 2003 Fontane Prize in Berlin . Welt Online April 26, 2003 [3] .
• Roman Bucheli : Listening to reality. "A woman, an apartment, a novel" by Wilhelm Genazino . In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung of March 29, 2003 [4] .
• Roman Bucheli : The desire to save, Wilhelm Genazino's poetics of a close look . In: Text + Criticism . 162, pp. 46-54.
• Simone Dattenberger: Böll or Busen, Genazino's new novel . Merkur-Online March 14, 2003.
• Katharina Deschka-Hoeck; Enjoyment of failure, Genazino in the literary house . FAZ of March 13, 2003.
• Albertine Devilder: ‹Je-ka-mi› news . Bochum working group for social constructivism and reality check, June 22, 2004 [5] .
• Natascha Freundel: The Pathology of Prosperity . In: Berliner Zeitung, March 18, 2003.
• Wilhelm Genazino: The stretched look, lecture at the Hessian Literature Office in Frankfurt am Main on February 2, 1999 . In: The literary messenger . No. 54, Frankfurt am Main 1999, quoted from: Wilhelm Genazino: The stretched look . dtv, Munich 2007, pp. 39–61.
• Wilhelm Genazino: Small Romantic Theory . Neue Zürcher Zeitung of March 15, 1991, quoted from Wilhelm Genazino: The stretched look . Munich 2007.
• Wilhelm Genazino: The consolation and the inconsolability of literature . Acceptance speech for the 2004 Büchner Prize [6] .
• Wilhelm Genazino: A gift that goes wrong. About literary failure . Lecture at the autumn conference of the German Academy for Language and Poetry on October 25, 2002, published in: Wilhelm Genazino: The stretched look . Munich 2007, p. 64 ff.
• Volker Hage: With Gudrun on the couch . In: Der Spiegel from May 12, 2003.
• Elke Heidenreich: Review of the novel for WDR 2 book tip in “Between Rhine and Weser”. quoted from: the WDR 2 website .
• Katrin Hillgruber: People hate complicated things. The writer Wilhelm Genazino on humor, the Büchner Prize and the end of prosperity . April 22, 2004, tagesspiegel.de .
• Anja Hirsch: Hovering luck of literature. The narrator Wilhelm Genazino . Dissertation Bielefeld University 2005, Heidelberg 2006, ISBN 3-935025-88-2 .
• Anja Hirsch: Between lust and fear. Storytelling in the age of disappearing . In: Text + Criticism . 162, pp. 70-78.
• Marit Hofmann: As if I could watch my own gaze. Observed observer in Genazino's novels . In: Text + Criticism . 162, pp. 55-64.
• Jochen Hörisch: Kiss through Gudrun . In: Literatures . 4. 2003, issue 7/8, pp. 99-100.
• Werner Jung: Sketch for a literary phenomenology of perception . In: Text + Criticism . 162, pp. 65-69.
• Julia Kospach: double life. A development novel by Wilhelm Genazino . In: Profile . No. 13 of March 24, 2003.
• Claudia Kramatschek: Usually a double life. Discrete accuracy in Wilhelm Genazino's new novel . In: New German Literature . 51, 2003, H. 549, pp. 177-179.
• Anne Kraume: Listen to things. A life of words: Wilhelm Genazino goes back to the Adenauer era for his new novel “A woman, an apartment, a novel” . TAZ of April 1, 2003, [7] .
• Felicitas von Lovenburg: double life, half bitter. Wilhelm Genazino and the sweet scent of futility . In: FAZ of April 5, 2003 [8] .
• Martin Lüdke: Mysterious agreement with the embarrassment. In his new novel, Wilhelm Genazino draws the wonderful portrait of an artist as an apprentice to life . In: Frankfurter Rundschau of March 22, 2003.
• Nils Minkmar: cakes, tortures. "A woman, an apartment, a novel": Wilhelm Genazino conjures up the old Federal Republic . FAZ of March 23, 2003.
• Samuel Moser: Isola Insula. Aspects of individuation with Wilhelm Genazino . In: Text + Criticism . 162, pp. 36-45.
• Heinz F. Schafroth : double life or young Weigand's apprenticeship and wandering years . In: Basler Zeitung of May 2, 2003.
• Gustav Seibt: The half-bitter lessons of life. “A woman, an apartment, a novel”: Wilhelm Genazino's educational novel in bonsai format . In: Süddeutsche Zeitung of April 9, 2003. [9] .
• Tilman Spreckelsen: Social participation in the novels Genazinos . In: Text + Criticism . 162 IV / 04, pp. 79-86.
• Claudia Stockinger: Genazinos Aesthetics of Repetition . In: Text + Critique 162, pp. 20–21.
• Jürgen Verdofsky: The long road to your own novel . In: Tages-Anzeiger Zurich , April 23, 2003.
• Benedikt Viertelhaus: Praised from oblivion, the Büchner Prize winner Wilhelm Genazino . Kritische-ausgabe.de (PDF; 276 kB).
• Uwe Wittstock: Let's flee into art. Wilhelm Genazino's new novel is a real gem . Welt Online from March 5, 2003 [10] .
• Gerhard Zeillinger: Rex Gildo or: From the happiness of the little citizens . In: The press. Vienna, April 26, 2003.

Book edition

• Wilhelm Genazino: A woman, an apartment, a novel . Hanser, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-446-20269-2 .

Translations

• Wilhelm Genazino: Una mujer, una casa, una novela . Galaxia Gutenberg, 2004, ISBN 84-8109-477-3 . (Spanish).
• Wilhelm Genazino: Un appartement, une femme, un roman . Translated into French by Anne Weber . Christian Bourgois editor, 2004.
• Wilhelm Genazino: Kobieta, mieszkanie, powieść . Wrocław 2006, ISBN 83-7432-130-X . (Polish).

Web links

• Reviews at Perlentaucher
• Review overview for single generation

References and comments

1. ↑ The novel mentions a journalistic report by the protagonist about the film Im Weisse Rößl with Peter Alexander , which premiered on December 21, 1960 in Munich in the Mathäser, which makes an approximate timing possible
2. ↑ The text mentions a tram ride to Griesheim (Chapter 7), this could refer to Darmstadt or Frankfurt am Main ; the line number of the tram and the mention of the "Osthafen" indicate Frankfurt as the likely place of the event; Time critic Reinhard Baumgart, however, moves the plot to Ludwigshafen am Rhein ; see. Reinhard Baumgart, Orpheus in Ludwigshafen, DIE ZEIT 13/2003; Nils Minkmar (cakes, tortures. "A woman, an apartment, a novel": Wilhelm Genazino conjures up the old Federal Republic, FAZ of March 23, 2003) considers a location in Mannheim , Genazino's hometown, to be possible, which is supported by Genazino himself sees his youth in Mannheim reflected in the story (cf. the interview with Wilhelm Genazino on BR-Alpha in conversation with Jochen Kölsch , broadcast on October 22, 2007)
3. ↑ Anja Hirsch, »Schwebeglück der Literatur«, Der Narrator Wilhelm Genazino, Diss. Bielefeld University 2005, Heidelberg 2006, p. 301.
4. ↑ on the dissemination of comparable concepts in the media see: Albertine Devilder, ‹Je-ka-mi› -Nachrichten, Bochum Working Group for Social Constructivism and Reality Checking, June 22, 2004: “It seems yesterday and today to induce lay people to do something they cannot do to be a primal source of joy for common sense. But that is not what this tiny tract is about for me. What I want to say is: This ‹Je-ka-mi› format is spreading, it diffuses into other formats, for example in ‹News›. ”(This means, for example, spontaneous surveys of passers-by on news topics)
5. ^ Wilhelm Genazino, Small Romantic Theory, Neue Zürcher Zeitung of March 15, 1991.
6. ↑ Reinhard Baumgard, Orpheus in Ludwigshafen, Wilhelm Genazino ensures a few hours of brittle delight, DIE ZEIT 13/2003.
7. ↑ Separations in the swimming pool are part of Genazino's standard repertoire: “A scene in the swimming pool seems to be a decisive role in this ideal literary youth. Genazino's books in the nineties are all very different, but this swimming pool almost always appears somewhere. It's summer and the main male character is 17 years old and is lying on a blanket with a female of about the same age. In the “Fleck” book she is called Jutta. In "An Umbrella For This Day" Dagmar. In the new book "A woman, an apartment, a novel" Gudrun. They are all characterized by the fact that the 17-year-old hero reads them from books, and then they always leave him. ”(Helmut Böttiger, attorney for the smallest things, a laudation for the narrator Wilhelm Genazino, who won the Fontane Prize in Berlin 2003 was awarded, Welt Online April 26, 2003)
8. ↑ ^{a b c d e f} Reinhard Baumgart, Orpheus in Ludwigshafen, DIE ZEIT 13/2003.
9. ↑ Anja Hirsch (Between Lust and Fear, Telling in the Age of Disappearance, in: Text + Critique 162, pp. 75 and 78) has pointed out that for Genazino the sea is always linked to death in terms of the history of the work.
10. ↑ ^{a b} Uwe Wittstock, Let's flee into art, Wilhelm Genazino's new novel is a real gem, Welt Online from March 5, 2003.
11. ↑ ^{a b} Helmut Böttiger, Kafkas Lachen, laudation to Wilhelm Genazino on the occasion of the award of the Büchner Prize in 2004.
12. ↑ Claudia Stockinger, Genazinos Aesthetics of Repetition, in: Text + Critique 162, p. 26.
13. ^ Wilhelm Amman, authorship in Genazino's "A woman, a flat, a novel", in: Text + Criticism, Zeitschrift für Literatur, ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold, Vol. 162 IV / 04, Wilhelm Genazino, p. 90.
14. ↑ cf. for example Helmut Böttiger, Kafkas Lachen, laudation on Wilhelm Genazino on the occasion of the awarding of the Büchner Prize in 2004: “But under the hand Wilhelm Genazino has gone from an author of time-moving employee novels to an author of artist novels. In "A Woman, an Apartment, a Novel" he did it for the first time without further ado. "
15. ↑ ^{a b} Wilhelm Genazino on BR-Alpha in conversation with Jochen Kölsch, broadcast on October 22, 2007.
16. ↑ Interview with Anja Hirsch on February 9, 1998; quoted from: Anja Hirsch, "Schwebeglück der Literatur", Der Narrator Wilhelm Genazino, Diss. Bielefeld University 2005, Heidelberg 2006, p. 280.
17. ↑ ^{a b} Interview with Anja Hirsch from February 9, 1998,; quoted from: Anja Hirsch, "Schwebeglück der Literatur", Der Narrator Wilhelm Genazino, Diss. Bielefeld University 2005, Heidelberg 2006.
18. ↑ Wilhelm Genazino, A gift that goes wrong, On literary unsuccessfulness, lecture at the autumn conference of the German Academy for Language and Poetry on October 25, 2002, published in: ders., Der gedehnte Blick, Munich 2007, p. 64ff.
19. ↑ Wilhelm Genazino, A gift that goes wrong, About literary unsuccessfulness, lecture at the autumn conference of the German Academy for Language and Poetry on October 25, 2002, published in: ders., Der gedehnte Blick, Munich 2007, p. 66.
20. ↑ ^{a b} Wilhelm Genazino, A gift that goes wrong, On literary unsuccessfulness, lecture at the autumn conference of the German Academy for Language and Poetry on October 25, 2002, published in: ders., Der gedehnte Blick, Munich 2007, p. 67.
21. ↑ Wilhelm Genazino, A gift that goes wrong, On literary unsuccessfulness, lecture at the autumn conference of the German Academy for Language and Poetry on October 25, 2002, published in: ders., Der gedehnte Blick, Munich 2007, p. 69.
22. ^ Wilhelm Genazino, A gift that goes wrong, On literary unsuccessfulness, lecture at the autumn conference of the German Academy for Language and Poetry on October 25, 2002, published in: ders., Der gedehnte Blick, Munich 2007, p. 75.
23. ^ Tilman Spreckelsen, Gesellschaftliche Teilhabe in den Romane Genazino, in: Text + Criticism, Zeitschrift für Literatur, Ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold, Vol. 162 IV / 04, Wilhelm Genazino, pp. 81f.
24. ^ ^{A b} Tilman Spreckelsen: Social participation in the novels Genazinos . In: Text + Criticism . 162 IV / 04, p. 85.
25. ^ Tilman Spreckelsen, Gesellschaftliche Teilhabe in den Romane Genazino, in: Text + Criticism, Zeitschrift für Literatur, Ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold, Vol. 162 IV / 04, Wilhelm Genazino, p. 86.
26. ↑ ^{a b c d e} cf. Helmut Böttiger, Kafkas Lachen, laudation for Wilhelm Genazino on the occasion of the awarding of the Büchner Prize in 2004.
27. ↑ ^{a b} Helmut Böttiger, attorney for the smallest things, A laudation for the narrator Wilhelm Genazino, who was awarded the Fontane Prize in Berlin in 2003, Welt Online April 26, 2003.
28. ↑ ^{a b} Wilhelm Amman, authorship in Genazinos "A woman, a flat, a novel", in: Text + Criticism, Zeitschrift für Literatur, ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold, Vol. 162 IV / 04, p. 88.
29. ↑ Gustav Seibt, Die Halbbitteren Lehren des Lebens, "A woman, an apartment, a novel": Wilhelm Genazino's educational novel in bonsai format, in: Süddeutsche Zeitung of April 9, 2003.
30. ^ Tilman Spreckelsen, Gesellschaftliche Teilhabe in den Romane Genazino, in: Text + Criticism, Zeitschrift für Literatur, Ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold, Vol. 162 IV / 04, Wilhelm Genazino, p. 80.
31. ^ Tilman Spreckelsen, Gesellschaftliche Teilhabe in den Romane Genazino, in: Text + Criticism, Zeitschrift für Literatur, Ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold, Vol. 162 IV / 04, Wilhelm Genazino, p. 81.
32. ↑ cf. Claudia Stockinger, Genazinos Aesthetics of Repetition, in: Text + Criticism 162, p. 25.
33. ↑ Reinhard Baumgart, Orpheus in Ludwigshafen, DIE ZEIT 13/2003 "
34. ↑ according to an authorial comment in the last chapter from a distance of at least 20 years, see u.
35. ^ Anne K. Betz, Everyday Frustration and Petty Bourgeoisie, Wilhelm Genazino's development novel “A woman, an apartment, a novel”, literaturkritik.de No. 4, April 2003.
36. ↑ Felicitas von Lovenburg, double life, half bitter, Wilhelm Genazino and the sweet scent of futility, in: FAZ from April 5, 2003.
37. ^ Wilhelm Amman, authorship in Genazino's "A Woman, a Apartment, a Novel", in: Text + Criticism, Zeitschrift für Literatur, Ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold, Vol. 162 IV / 04, Wilhelm Genazino, p. 89.
38. ↑ ibid .; Amann is referring to Fotis Jannidi's essay "Between Author and Narrator", in: Heinrich Deterding (Ed.): Authorship. Positions and revisions, Stuttgart, Weimar 2002, p. 548.
39. ↑ Interview with Wilhelm Genazino on BR-Alpha in conversation with Jochen Kölsch , broadcast on October 22, 2007.
40. ↑ Interview with Wilhelm Genazino on BR-Alpha in conversation with Jochen Kölsch , broadcast on October 22, 2007.
41. ↑ Interview with Wilhelm Genazino on BR-Alpha in conversation with Jochen Kölsch , broadcast on October 22, 2007.
42. ^ Wilhelm Amman, authorship in Genazinos "A woman, a flat, a novel", in: Text + Criticism, Zeitschrift für Literatur, ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold, vol. 162 IV / 04, p. 92.
43. ↑ Wilhelm Genazino, A Woman, an Apartment, a Novel (Chapter 2)
44. ↑ Wilhelm Genazino, A Woman, an Apartment, a Novel, Chapter 2
45. ↑ ibid.
46. ↑ Anne Kraume, Listening to things, A life from words: Wilhelm Genazino goes back to the Adenauer time for his new novel “A woman, an apartment, a novel”, TAZ from April 1, 2003.
47. ↑ ^{a b} cf. Claudia Stockinger, Genazinos Aesthetics of Repetition, in: Text + Critique 162, p. 26.
48. ↑ Roman Bucheli, Into listening to reality, "A woman, an apartment, a novel" Wilhelm Genazino, in: Neue Zürcher Zeitung of 29 March of 2003.
49. ↑ Roman Bucheli, Die Begierde des Rettens, Wilhelm Genazino's Poetics of Exact Look, in: Text + Critique 162, pp. 46–54.
50. ↑ loc. cit., p. 47; similarly also Anja Hirsch in her essay: Between Lust and Fear, Telling in the Age of Disappearance, in: Text + Criticism 162, p. 72: "Bringing your" visual experiences "to speech (and there are always looks, that open the narrative space) not only transforms the outside world into the interior of the characters, but also has protective power for them: ... "
51. ↑ Roman Bucheli, Die Begierde des Rettens, Wilhelm Genazinos Poetics of a precise look, in: Text + Critique 162, p. 50.
52. ↑ Marit Hofmann, "As if I could watch my own gaze", Observed observers in Genazino's novels, in: Text + Critique 162, p. 58.
53. ↑ Marit Hofmann, "As if I could watch my own gaze", Observed observers in Genazino's novels, in: Text + Critique 162, p. 63.
54. ↑ Marit Hofmann, "As if I could watch my own gaze", Observed observers in Genazino's novels, in: Text + Critique 162, p. 60.
55. ↑ Interview with Wilhelm Genazino on BR-Alpha in conversation with Jochen Kölsch , broadcast on October 22, 2007.
56. ^ Elke Heidenreich, review of the novel for the WDR 2 book tip in "Between Rhine and Weser", quoted from: the WDR 2 website
57. ↑ cf. Cape. 7th
58. ↑ Roman Bucheli, Die Begierde des Rettens, Wilhelm Genazinos Poetics of a precise look, in: Text + Critique 162, p. 50.
59. ↑ ibid.
60. ↑ ^{a b} Wilhelm Genazino, Der gedehnte Blick, lecture in the Hessisches Literaturbüro Frankfurt am Main on February 2, 1999, published in: Der Literaturbote No. 54, Frankfurt am Main 1999, quoted from: Wilhelm Genazino, Der gedehnte Blick, Munich (dtv ) 2007, p. 51.
61. ^ Wilhelm Genazino, Der gedehnte Blick, lecture at the Hessisches Literaturbüro Frankfurt am Main on February 2, 1999, published in: Der Literaturbote No. 54, Frankfurt am Main 1999, quoted from: Wilhelm Genazino, Der gedehnte Blick, Munich (dtv) 2007 , P. 49.
62. ^ Wilhelm Genazino, Der gedehnte Blick, lecture at the Hessisches Literaturbüro Frankfurt am Main on February 2, 1999, published in: Der Literaturbote No. 54, Frankfurt am Main 1999, quoted from: Wilhelm Genazino, Der gedehnte Blick, Munich (dtv) 2007 , P. 51.
63. ↑ ^{a b} Wilhelm Genazino, Der gedehnte Blick, lecture in the Hessisches Literaturbüro Frankfurt am Main on February 2, 1999, published in: Der Literaturbote No. 54, Frankfurt am Main 1999, quoted from: Wilhelm Genazino, Der gedehnte Blick, Munich (dtv ) 2007, p. 52.
64. ↑ ^{a b} Wilhelm Genazino, Der gedehnte Blick, lecture in the Hessisches Literaturbüro Frankfurt am Main on February 2, 1999, published in: Der Literaturbote No. 54, Frankfurt am Main 1999, quoted from: Wilhelm Genazino, Der gedehnte Blick, Munich (dtv ) 2007, p. 55.
65. ↑ Gustav Seibt, Die Halbbitteren Lehren des Lebens, “A woman, an apartment, a novel”: Wilhelm Genazino's educational novel in bonsai format, in: Süddeutsche Zeitung of April 9, 2003.
66. ↑ Werner Jung, sketch for a literary phenomenology of perception, in: Text + Critique 162, p. 68.
67. ↑ Anja Hirsch, Between Lust and Fear, Telling in the Age of Disappearance, in: Text + Critique 162, pp. 70–78.
68. ↑ Anja Hirsch, Between Lust and Fear, Telling in the Age of Disappearance, in: Text + Critique 162, p. 76.
69. ↑ ibid.
70. ↑ Anja Hirsch, Between Lust and Fear, Telling in the Age of Disappearance, in: Text + Critique 162, p. 70.
71. ↑ Anja Hirsch: Schwebeglück der literature. The narrator Wilhelm Genazino . Diss. Bielefeld University 2005, Heidelberg 2006, ISBN 3-935025-88-2 , p. 165.
72. ↑ cf. Anja Hirsch: Hovering luck of literature. The narrator Wilhelm Genazino . Dissertation Bielefeld University 2005, Heidelberg 2006, ISBN 3-935025-88-2 , p. 167ff.
73. ↑ cf. For example, the requirement for the Central German Abitur at vocational colleges in NRW here  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. or the reading recommendations of the 2004 Baden-Württemberg education plan ( PDF )  
74. ↑ Reinhard Baumgart, Orpheus in Ludwigshafen, Wilhelm Genazino ensures a few hours of brittle delight, Die Zeit , 13/2003.
75. ↑ Böll or Busen , Genazinos new novel, Merkur-Online from March 14, 2003.
76. ↑ Let's flee into art, Wilhelm Genazino's new novel is a real gem, Welt Online from March 5, 2003.
77. ↑ cf. Roman Bucheli, listening into reality, “A woman, an apartment, a novel” by Wilhelm Genazino, in: Neue Zürcher Zeitung of March 29, 2003.