The Lost Honour of Katharina BlumEssay title: The Lost Honour of Katharina BlumThe Lost Honour of Katharina BlumKnowing about the writer of a literary text can shape significantly the way that it is read. Consider the effect of the writer’s context on your understanding of The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum.
“As a writer of fiction Bцll was interpreting history, creating patterns of meaning, ordering his material to enable his reader to make sense of it.” The experiences of Bцll and his values that arose from these events have been influential on the content and themes of Bцll’s novel, The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum. Bцll experienced both the first and second world wars and the effects that these wars had on German society. Events such as the economic collapse in Germany post WWII, the construction of the Berlin Wall, the rise of student based urban terrorism in West Germany in the 1970’s and the increasing state controls to contain such alleged threats can be seen to influence the issues explored in The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum. The novel is a comment on the press and the law, the labyrinth of social truth, the collision of fact and fiction and the power of language. Bцll himself experienced the press first hand and this along with the experiences of Professor Bruckner, form the basis of his criticism directed at the powerful and hegemonic structures in society, in particular in relation to the police and the press and their corrupt relationship in the novella. Many of Heinrich Bцll s views and attitudes, resulting form his context, are clearly visible in the novella through the portrayal of certain characters in positive or negative lights. The historical, social, economic and political context of Bцll and West Germany at this time (1900’s) had a considerable effect on the issues Bцll delves into in The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum and greatly affected my understanding of the novel.
Germany has a deeply rooted history with fascism in the form of Nazism in WWII (1939-1945). Bцll was a teenager at the time of Hitler’s rise to power and he despised Hitler and everything that he stood for. “I hate the war and all those who love it”. Bцll actively refused to join Hitler’s Youth as a boy, yet as a young man he was forced to join Hitler’s army. After the war, until the German Republic was formed, Bцll lived under the Allied Occupation. These events led Bцll to view politics with doubt and skepticism and he became vehement about creating an informed public who were capable of involvement in the political life of their nation. In Bцll’s eyes,
“After the experience of the trade crisis, of being at the mercy of economic forces, now came the experience of being at the mercy of political forces, which was almost worse, since you could get used to the former and somehow do something for yourself, but there was nothing you could do about the other.”
Bцll found it especially distressing that the people who could have best afforded to resist the rise of fascism, for example the university professors, did so little. In The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum, Bцll s attitude of contempt for the Nazi’s can be viewed in the lack of interrogation of Konrad Beiters, “Konrad Beiters voluntarily admitted to having once been a Nazi and that alone explained why so far no one had paid any attention to him”. Konrad is the only character close to Katharina who is not questioned by the police and this shows the right winged political stance that West Germany still had in 1974 and the misuse of authority by powerful people in social institutions such as the media and the police, especially men.
The Left-wing reaction to the rise of Nazism during the past 12 years has been remarkable. Despite the attacks on the military, which, on the whole, has been highly successful, has done nothing to quell the tide of the civil war and was far more able to suppress dissent than the Nazi party. Even from a conservative perspective, the media’s efforts to suppress dissent have always been far worse than that of the party, who have tried to suppress dissent from the left by presenting itself to citizens as the alternative. It is also fair to say that such attempts at suppressing any dissenting view from the ruling party, is a big step removed from doing so. It would be absurd in our government to try and maintain that the Left has given up the fight with a democratic right and it would be absurd to try to explain to ordinary people these kinds of attempts to suppress, or at least conceal, the actions which have already happened.
Katharina Blum writes, “The Left’s attack on Konrad, as it was carried out in January 1969, was a complete hoax. It was part of an overt campaign to provoke German youth to revolt against the Left, to get rid of the ruling class, and to spread racism within the German state. The Left deliberately misrepresented the facts in order to show its own weakness.”
It’s also clear that the Left tried to “inspire people” to take political action against the Right-wing party and the Left failed to do so.
Jasin Hjögens at the end of his political career.
On the other hand, it is clear that the Left’s aggressive approach to resisting Hitler that led to the fall of the Berlin Wall did not change until after the fall of the Berlin Wall:
Even before the start of the Holocaust a small number of anti-fascist groups had sprung up in the capital. This consisted of large numbers of individuals who had recently taken up arms to protest against the Nazis and others such as Rosa Luxembourg, who was not a revolutionary but a German who had given up her own life to escape the Nazis, who had not shown any sense of being anti-national.
In short, the Left turned up and began to fight fascists. In August 1944, as the country lay on the verge of fall, the Left launched an attack. It is obvious from the fact that in order to get support, people wanted to attack the fascists. The Left’s methods of fighting fascists, as determined by its own tactic, are simply not adapted to their needs. It was evident from the fact that the Right’s tactics of fighting fascists, as determined by its own tactics and policies, are adapted
In 1949, Germany was divided into the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) and the German Democratic Republic (East Germany). Bцll was living in West Germany at the time and this is where The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum is set. West Germany was allegedly the democratic, capitalist sector whereas East Germany was governed with communist ideologies. Great paranoia was present in West Germany about East Germany because communism, with its focus on the redistribution of wealth was always a possible threat to capitalism. This fear of communism is very apparent in The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum and is portrayed through characters such as the pastor and the doctor. “No, he could offer no proof of his claim nor did he want to, he even said he did not need to, he could still rely on his sense of smell and he had simply smelled that Blum was
The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum is a book that was written by a woman. In 1947, she was killed whilst trying to escape from the USSR. Despite the great secrecy and danger of Communism in the Western world, she maintained an active role in her life, particularly in her first book in 1949, ‘The Left Hand of Fate (1949). She was later awarded the prestigious position of honorary chairwoman for the work which she carried out, and at the time of her death, she had been a member of the German socialist government and a member of the parliament for 20 years.
Her personal life is set to stand as a tragedy to the great people of East Germany. She was a member of the BSD and was on the leadership team of the communist party in West Germany at the time of her death. She was a revolutionary socialist, which made her the most powerful socialist in the country with the largest social democratic support in the country, to the benefit of all of the people she represented. In the 1970s, she and her husband, Hans, became involved in Communist propaganda, which was directed against the Soviet Union and Germany in the years following of the Nazi party’s defeat.
When the Nazis invaded East Germany in October 1944, Kathyarina Blum joined forces with other socialists and communist parties in order to establish a socialist government there. The communist campaign ended in 1945, when she fell to the Communists after a mass revolt from East Germany. However, the communists who had united the West German left with her proved to be of great influence and helped bring her country closer to German socialism from the 1930s. Kathyarina Blum’s death is the only book that has been written in the German context which stands as a tragedy and a tragic point of view.
The tragic story of what happened to Katharina Blum is only the beginning and as many of the other books listed above tell, this is a significant story of what happened to East German Communists and the loss of their socialist tradition. It is highly important for readers to know that for East German Communists it was to become a national symbol of the socialist movement and a means of organizing, defending and preserving their country.
, The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum – from her former personal biography:
Jérôme M. Blum’s death continues to be a terrible tragedy for East Germans. We must remember that the West German socialist party of the 1930s never could have dreamed that the tragedy that this tragic heroine had suffered would become a rallying cry for socialist workers. The West German socialist party of the 1930s took as its ideal the social revolution and communism in East Germany and, in particular, we must not forget that the socialist party of 1945 was born off a similar idea. In fact, the socialist party of 1945 became the most popular socialist party of East Germany and, while it failed to win over significant numbers of its supporters and their support. All the events that led to this disaster are remembered by East German socialists on a national level by the fact that their socialist party was only founded in 1940, before it began to be given a mandate by the Reichstag. It has gone through many twists, but we must remain steadfast in our convictions that socialism in East Germany is the genuine and most powerful socialist movement of
The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum is a book that was written by a woman. In 1947, she was killed whilst trying to escape from the USSR. Despite the great secrecy and danger of Communism in the Western world, she maintained an active role in her life, particularly in her first book in 1949, ‘The Left Hand of Fate (1949). She was later awarded the prestigious position of honorary chairwoman for the work which she carried out, and at the time of her death, she had been a member of the German socialist government and a member of the parliament for 20 years.
Her personal life is set to stand as a tragedy to the great people of East Germany. She was a member of the BSD and was on the leadership team of the communist party in West Germany at the time of her death. She was a revolutionary socialist, which made her the most powerful socialist in the country with the largest social democratic support in the country, to the benefit of all of the people she represented. In the 1970s, she and her husband, Hans, became involved in Communist propaganda, which was directed against the Soviet Union and Germany in the years following of the Nazi party’s defeat.
When the Nazis invaded East Germany in October 1944, Kathyarina Blum joined forces with other socialists and communist parties in order to establish a socialist government there. The communist campaign ended in 1945, when she fell to the Communists after a mass revolt from East Germany. However, the communists who had united the West German left with her proved to be of great influence and helped bring her country closer to German socialism from the 1930s. Kathyarina Blum’s death is the only book that has been written in the German context which stands as a tragedy and a tragic point of view.
The tragic story of what happened to Katharina Blum is only the beginning and as many of the other books listed above tell, this is a significant story of what happened to East German Communists and the loss of their socialist tradition. It is highly important for readers to know that for East German Communists it was to become a national symbol of the socialist movement and a means of organizing, defending and preserving their country.
, The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum – from her former personal biography:
Jérôme M. Blum’s death continues to be a terrible tragedy for East Germans. We must remember that the West German socialist party of the 1930s never could have dreamed that the tragedy that this tragic heroine had suffered would become a rallying cry for socialist workers. The West German socialist party of the 1930s took as its ideal the social revolution and communism in East Germany and, in particular, we must not forget that the socialist party of 1945 was born off a similar idea. In fact, the socialist party of 1945 became the most popular socialist party of East Germany and, while it failed to win over significant numbers of its supporters and their support. All the events that led to this disaster are remembered by East German socialists on a national level by the fact that their socialist party was only founded in 1940, before it began to be given a mandate by the Reichstag. It has gone through many twists, but we must remain steadfast in our convictions that socialism in East Germany is the genuine and most powerful socialist movement of