Far from the Rosinkawiese

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Far from the Rosinkawiese. The story of an escape is an autobiographical novel by Gudrun Pausewang from 1989.

Pausewang describes her escape experiences with her mother and four younger siblings from the Rosinkawiese in the Eagle Mountains to Winsen (Luhe) in Lower Saxony from the perspective of the seventeen year old .

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In an introduction, Pausewang describes the situation and the simple yet idyllic life of her family on the “Rosinkawiese” not far from Wichstadtl in the Eagle Mountains. Pausewang uses “Rosinkawiese” to refer to the house and property on which her parents tried to live an alternative life in the 1920s.

The "Rosinkawiese" was made by hand by her parents from a swampy meadow and is located near Wichstadtl in Bohemia near the Polish, formerly the German border. At the end of the war, the father, although spared most of the time as an agriculture teacher from military service, fell and a mother and her six children began to flee dramatically: seventeen-year-old Gudrun, twelve-year-old Freya, eleven-year-old Sieglinde, eight-year-old Siegfried, six-year-old Gothild and the four year old Volker. Pausewang describes how the situation continues to worsen along the way and how the family wins a fight for bare survival against all the adversities of the general immediate post-war chaos. Her mother creates the basis for the success of this escape with strong nerves and her practical and well-organized manner. In the summer of 1945, the seven of them covered the distance to Lübz on foot with a handcart . From there it takes a few months' delay to continue by train west to an aunt in Winsen , where they arrive on November 10, 1945.

Gudrun Pausewang vividly describes the hardship and suffering the end of the war and the flight from their homeland meant for many people, mostly women and children, but also prisoners of war, forced laborers, bombed out and deserters from eastern Germany .

She also reflects on her ideological thoughts as a seventeen year old who felt betrayed. The three publications "Rosinkawiese - alternative life in the twenties" , "Far from the Rosinkawiese" and "Beloved Rosinkawiese" appear in one volume "Rosinkawiese - then and now" .

Book editions

  • Gudrun Pausewang: Rosinkawiese: alternative life 50 years ago . With Elfriede Pausewang, Maier, Ravensburg 1980, ISBN 3-473-35055-9 .
  • Gudrun Pausewang: Far from the Rosinkawiese: the story of an escape . Maier, Ravensburg 1989, ISBN 3-473-35099-0 .
  • Gudrun Pausewang: Beloved Rosinkawiese: the story of a friendship across borders . Maier, Ravensburg 1990, ISBN 3-473-35113-X .
  • Gudrun Pausewang: Rosinkawiese - then and now . Memories of East Bohemia: a book of reconciliation (The Rosinkawiesen trilogy in one volume) dtv, Munich 2004, ISBN 3-423-13203-5 .
  • Gudrun Pausewang: How the people from Rosinkawiese fared after the war . Eichborn, Frankfurt am Main 1996, ISBN 3-8218-0382-7 .