Kruso

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The 2014 novel Kruso by Lutz Seiler is set on the island of Hiddensee in the milieu of seasonal workers and social dropouts at the time of the collapse of the GDR in 1989. It tells the story of the friendship between the German studies student Edgar Bendler and the kitchen worker Alexey Krusowitsch, known as Kruso, who is recognized as an authority in the community of seasonal workers. Both are traumatized by the loss of someone close to them. Kruso develops a utopia of freedom that Edgar is drawn into. Together they take care of the “shipwrecked” - all those who have closed with the state or have failed in various ways. A deep friendship grows between the two men, which almost makes them overlook the fact that the state is falling apart around them and more and more companions are leaving the country. Kruso gets sick about it; Ed does his job.

Seiler's novel is characterized by a high level of linguistic accuracy and combines historical concreteness with surreal features. In the year of publication, the novel received the Uwe Johnson Prize and the German Book Prize .

Historical background

Middle and highest part of the Dornbusch on Hiddensee : left the Dornbusch lighthouse , right in the forest the buildings of the restaurant Zum Klausner

The action takes place mainly on the Dornbusch , the northern part of the island of Hiddensee . In the GDR, this island was considered a niche for those who think differently and dropouts who often worked in hotels, restaurants or as lifeguards in the summer. They were easy to control on the small island, and despite some open Stasi observation, some incidents and meetings were accepted. There was an intellectual climate on Hiddensee, and artists, writers, actors, musicians and scientists retired here. Lutz Seiler reflects this location as the “place of longing for freedom” in 1989 exactly. In his novel, Hiddensee becomes an island “outside of time” and the restaurant Zum Klausner becomes the last bastion of an idealized freedom within socialism.

Real role models that served as inspiration for the characters in the novel are, for example, Aljoscha Rompe , the singer of the GDR punk band Feeling B , and his stepfather, the scientist Robert Rompe , but also the “original claus” Alexander Ettenburg . In one chapter, Seiler interweaves one of the real appearances that Rompe and his band had on the beach at Hiddensee with the fictional story, but without using the name Feeling B. In addition, Seiler allows numerous people who worked as seasonal workers on Hiddensee to flow into his story as fictional characters.

The author also worked as a washer in the "Klausner" in the summer of 1989.

action

After the disappearance of his cat, which was the last thing he had left of his unfortunate girlfriend, the 24-year-old German studies student Edgar left his place of study in Halle and went to Hiddensee to at least spend the summer there. In the excursion restaurant Zum Klausner (which actually still exists today) he gets a job as a washer and meets Alexey Krusowitsch.

Kruso, also known as Aljoscha or Losch, is the son of a Soviet general and a circus artist who died in an accident . Since his sister left him on the beach as a child and never returned (whether it was an accident or an attempt to escape , the book leaves open), Kruso has been traumatized . He tries to keep the "Esskaas" ("SKs", abbreviation for "seasonal workers") and "castaways" - the socially disappointed - from fleeing. Kruso offers them three days on the island as an alternative to escaping. With an initiation ritual that consists of (illegal) accommodation, the “holy soup” and an ablution, they are accepted into the community of the castaways. Kruso believes that through the ritual they can feel the root of their inner freedom and so can return to the mainland until one day “quantity turns into quality” and “the measure of freedom in the heart suddenly exceeds the lack of freedom of the circumstances”. The principles of his utopia are the acceptance of each individual as well as solidarity and community. It is a kind of primordial communism that he invokes in the midst of crumbling “real socialism” .

Ed is increasingly included by Kruso in the rituals, which, as an expression of a lifestyle, weld the crew of the hermit together in a special way. Ed experiences his sexual initiation, but realizes that this is by no means at the center of Kruso's idea. The shared love of literature - both write poetry - and the loss of a loved one make Ed and Kruso increasingly an inseparable community.

The events in the summer of 1989, when more and more people tried to get to the West via Hungary or the embassy building of the Federal Republic in Prague , were washed into the isolated world of the hermit by the radio viola , but initially hardly noticed by the hermits. With forbidden Western books, the recitation of poems by Georg Trakl and their own literary products, the protagonists experience the last days of the GDR “like in a feverish dream”. The anarchic freedom, however, ultimately turns out to be a “collective self-deception”: Border troops and state security control the island and also define the framework of the freedom utopia, of which at least Kruso is aware.

The initial image of the hermit as a ship and a protective ark is increasingly becoming a metaphor for the “sinking ship” that is abandoned by the crew. When the western borders are open, only Ed and Kruso remain of the utopian community. Together they try to keep the ship on course.

Uncertainty, rumors and a loss of trust not only undermine the foundation of Kruso's idea of ​​freedom, but also the friendship between him and Ed. Kruso is deeply disturbed by the questioning of his utopia and the disintegration of the herman's community. Little by little he drifts into madness. When he physically attacks Ed because he feels he has betrayed him, he injures himself badly. Ed takes care of him. Since the island's doctor has fled to the west, a state security man informs Kruso's father, who immediately rushes to Hiddensee and has his son put on a Soviet armored cruiser. With a gun salute reminiscent of the armored cruiser Aurora and the beginning of the October Revolution , Kruso is "brought home". Edgar, now completely alone, takes over the Klausner and reconstructs the volume of poetry Krusos, which had been lost in the confusion of the last few weeks. On November 12th, he learned from the radio that the borders had been open for days.

In the epilogue, the character Ed tells of Lutz Seiler's research with Danish authorities for the 174 GDR refugees who had perished in the Baltic Sea since 1961. However, he cannot clarify the identity of the anonymous victims; only the fictional character “Speiche” is clearly identified.

Language and design

Lutz Seiler is currently considered one of the most important German-speaking poets. He also wrote essays and short stories. Kruso is Lutz Seiler's debut novel. The book prize jury judged: His “first novel impresses with its completely independent poetic language, its sensual intensity and cosmopolitanism”. “The scenes in the wash-up kitchen, when plates are pre-cleaned or drains clogged, are vivid to the point of disgust when reading. Everything in the novel is not only to be read, but to be heard, smelled, tasted. ”A“ lyrical, […] into magic playing language ”is also emphasized. The oscillation between an almost meticulously portrayed reality and surreal counter-worlds has traits of magical realism .

Roman Bucheli stated in his review in the NZZ : "With« Kruso », Lutz Seiler is writing a novel about the turning point of 1989, but manages the trick of telling a completely different story". The ties to the political frame of reference are vague and loose. "Only from this, however, does the poetic provocation arise: Because the novel - similar to the discrepancy between the omitted contemporary history and the narrated individual fates - draws its impetus from the refusal to make clear gestures."

For Christoph Schröder from the taz , the book is therefore an example of persistently different tendencies in German literature : If West German authors profess unrestrained realism, "East German writers basically lead the literary pretense, work undercover on reasonably safe terrain, to which the GDR forced them to continue to this day ”.

The novel contains numerous intertextual references and allusions. The friendship between Kruso and Ed is modeled on the relationship between Robinson Crusoe and his companion Friday from Daniel Defoe's novel Robinson Crusoe . Furthermore, Georg Trakl's poetry and his presumably incestuous relationship with his sister, Uwe Johnson's novel Mutmassungen über Jakob , Michail Bulgakow's Der Meister and Margarita , the self-discovery process of Edgar Wibeau from Ulrich Plenzdorf's Die neue Leiden des Junge W. , the poems by Rimbaud and numerous play other literary references matter.

expenditure

Theater adaptations

  • Kruso . Play by Dagmar Borrmann based on the novel by Lutz Seiler, world premiere on September 25, 2015 at Theater Magdeburg , directed by Cornelia Crombholz. Further production: Hans Otto Theater Potsdam, premiere: January 15, 2016, director: Elias Perrig .
  • Kruso . Based on the novel of the same name by Lutz Seiler, edited for the stage by Petra Paschinger and Caro Thum, premiere on November 6, 2015 at Theater & Philharmonie Thuringia , director: Caro Thum.
  • Kruso. Play based on the novel by Lutz Seiler, in the play version by Hannes Hametner and Sascha Löschner, premiere on September 30, 2016 at Theater Vorpommern , Greifswald, director: Hannes Hametner
  • Kruso based on the novel by Lutz Seiler, arranged for the stage by Armin Petras and Ludwig Haugk. Premiere on October 1, 2016 at the Schauspiel Leipzig , director: Armin Petras

radio play

  • Kruso . Based on the novel of the same name by Lutz Seiler. Processing: Ulrich Gerhardt. Director: Ulrich Gerhardt. Speaker: Jens Harzer . Composer: Daniel Dickmeis. Production: DKultur / MDR 2015. First broadcast on June 29, 2015

filming

The film rights for the material were given in 2015 to UFA FICTION (Managing Director: Nico Hofmann ), who already successfully filmed Uwe Tellkamp's novel The Tower . Here too, Thomas Kirchner wrote the script. Director was Thomas Stuber . In September and October 2017, the shooting took place in Lithuania in Klaipėda and on the Curonian Spit . The film Kruso with Albrecht Schuch in the role of Kruso and Jonathan Berlin as Ed was broadcast on the television station Das Erste on September 26, 2018 . It was seen by 3.27 million viewers, that is an 11.2 percent market share.

literature

  • Christiane Baumann: "Hidden" or robinsonades of thinking. An approximation of Lutz Seiler's novel Kruso, who won the 2014 German Book Prize . In: Studia Niemcoznawcze - Studies in German Studies. Czasopismo naukowe Zakładu Komparatystyki Kulturowej i Literackiej Instytutu Germanistyki Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego / Scientific journal of the department for cultural and literary comparative studies of the German Institute of the University of Warsaw. Tom LV, Warsaw 2014
  • Christiane Baumann: Transformation Processes I: Lutz Seiler's novel Kruso on stage . and Transformation Processes II: The author Lutz Seiler in conversation about the adaptations to his novel Kruso . In: Studia Niemcoznawcze - Studies in German Studies. Czasopismo naukowe Zakładu Komparatystyki Kulturowej i Literackiej Instytutu Germanistyki Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego / Scientific journal of the department for cultural and literary comparative studies of the German Institute of the University of Warsaw. Tom LVII, Warsaw 2016. pp. 305-325.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Marion Magas: Hiddensee - Hidden Island in the Lost Land. GDR contemporary testimonies from island friends and bon vivants . 2nd Edition. Berlin 2010, ISBN 3-00-018132-6 , pp. 31–40, 57–59, 171–174.
  2. ↑ Interview with Hiddensee contemporary witness Torsten Schlüter | FilmWednesday on the First. September 5, 2018, accessed on September 26, 2018 (German).
  3. ^ Lutz Seiler: Kruso. Berlin 2014, ISBN 978-3-518-42447-6 , pp. 47, 86.
  4. ^ Lutz Seiler: Kruso. Suhrkamp Verlag, Berlin 2014, eISBN 978-3-518-73936-5, chapter Das Konzert , from p. 218
  5. ↑ a b Gerrit Bartels: Hiddensee was a kind of afterlife experience: an interview with Lutz Seiler. Der Tagesspiegel, October 6, 2014, accessed on December 4, 2016 .
  6. ^ Lutz Seiler: Kruso. Novel. Suhrkamp Verlag, Berlin 2014, p. 175
  7. ^ A b Thomas Andre: Book price favorite Lutz Seiler: Die Schiffbrüchigen des Sozialismus. Spiegel Online, September 10, 2014, accessed November 9, 2014 .
  8. ^ Lutz Seiler: Kruso. 9 audio CDs. Abridged reading by Franz Dinda. Audiobook Hamburg 2014, accompanying text.
  9. ↑ He describes the island commander as "guardian of our fate, if you will. But even if we don't want to. ”Audiobook CD 3, No. 9
  10. ↑ a b Lutz Seiler: "Kruso". MDR Figaro, September 9, 2014, archived from the original on September 15, 2014 ; Retrieved November 8, 2014 .
  11. ↑ litrix.de
  12. ^ German Book Prize 2014. Kruso. Explanation of the jury. Retrieved November 14, 2014 .
  13. ↑ a b Roman Bucheli: The ghost ship on the steep coast. NZZ , October 3, 2014, accessed December 4, 2016 .
  14. ↑ Christoph Schröder: Utopia in the shape of a seahorse. In: taz . September 16, 2014, accessed December 4, 2016 .
  15. ↑ phinau.de
  16. ↑ volksstimme.de accessed on September 28, 2015
  17. ↑ schattenblick.de
  18. ↑ maz-online.de accessed on January 19, 2016
  19. ↑ focus.de
  20. ↑ tpthueringen.de
  21. ↑ The island of funny border violators. October 1, 2015, accessed December 4, 2016 .
  22. ↑ The successful novel "Kruso" as a radio play on MDR FIGARO. (No longer available online.) June 25, 2015, archived from the original on December 5, 2016 ; Retrieved December 4, 2016 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.mdr.de
  23. ^ Lutz Seiler's novel Kruso is made into a film. March 10, 2015, accessed December 4, 2016 .