Patterns of Childhood, by Christa Wolf
Kindheitsmuster (Patterns of Childhood), by Christa Wolf
Translated by Ursule Molinaro & Hedwig Rappolt
Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1980
Patterns of Childhood, by Christa Wolf
The Jews, legless in Nelly’s memory because of their long caftans, went into their destroyed synagogue at the risk of their lives and rescued their holy, golden treasures. The Jews, old men with gray beards, lived in the miserable little houses on Synagogue Square. Their wives and children were perhaps sitting behind the tiny windows, crying (Blood, blood, bloood, blood must be flowing thick as thick can be...) The Jews are different from us. They’re weird. Jews must be feared, even if one can’t hate them. If the Jews were strong now, they’d do away with us all.
It wouldn’t have taken much for Nelly to have succumbed to an improper emotion: compassion. But healthy German common sense built a barrier against it: fear. (Perhaps there should be at least an intimation of the difficulties in matters of “compassion”, also regarding compassion toward one’s own person, the difficulties experienced by a person who was forced as a child to turn compassion for the weak and the losers into hate and fear. This only to point out the later consequences of previous events, which are often wrongly summarized merely by the correct but not exhaustive account: 177 burning synagogues in 1938 make for ruined cities beyond number in 1945.)
The edition I read was titled in translation as A Model Childhood, not Patterns of Childhood as shown on the 1001 books list; however, I’ve checked, and both titles are listed as translations of the original Kindheitsmuster, so this is the right book.
Never having heard of Wolf before being assigned this one, I went into it knowing absolutely nothing about it, except that it was an autobiography in the form of a novel. It begins with the author, an East German native in her 40s, visiting her hometown in a formerly German part of Poland with her husband and daughter. It is 1973. As the author starts to talk about the importance of explaining her childhood to others, the back of my mind is doing a little subconscious math and sending warning signals. I take a closer look at the cover photograph, which shows several laughing, happy girls in schoolgirl uniforms, the leader of whom has one arm flung out in front of her in what I had thought at first, from her expression, was a wave or similar exuberant gesture.
Oh, shit....
So begins the true story of one of humanity’s greatest evils, seen through the eyes of a young innocent who doesn’t understand the scope of what’s happening. Anne Frank in reverse, Christa (or “Nelly”, as she calls herself in the book) is one of the lucky ones, good looking and athletic and groomed to be part of the Master Race, as long as she’s a good girl and follows directions.
Her teachers are Nazi propagandists on a mission to indoctrinate all children into obedient followers of The Reich. Her family is troubled by events, but try to keep their thoughts to themselves, as Bad Things tend to happen to those who talk. “Nelly” just tries to live a normal childhood, conflicted between her conscience and what the adults are telling her. The local Synagogue is destroyed. Her senile aunt is taken away to be euthanized. Eventually the family has to join the town in fleeing the Russian army, "Nelly" ends up being sheltered and hidden in a farmhouse from Russians known to rape teenage German girls as war trophies, and her home town is made into a part of Poland after the war.
Wolf attempts to draw lines between the rise and fall of Hitler and some sinister things happening in the 1970s (the present, at the time of her writing). Pinochet’s rise in Chile, aided by the United States. Vietnam. President Nixon. This was the part that moved me the most, not because they’re actual parallels to Hitler (they’re not), but because Nixon’s corruption, drawn here as the shocking abuse of power it was at the time, seems so small-scale as to be forgettable today.
No, the Teapublicans aren’t a parallel to Hitler either, but Patterns of Childhood is a relevant book today more than ever, as it forces us to ask difficult questions about how those of us with Stars on our bellies can and should act when their own government attempts to make official the second-class status of the Bare-bellied. If you’re white, male, educated, middle class, Christian and/or heterosexual, what will you do in the face of the marriage police, the show-your-papers police, the forced-birth police, the union-busting police, the Christianity police and the Creationist police? Christa Wolf can warn you about the consequences of choices.
Translated by Ursule Molinaro & Hedwig Rappolt
Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1980
Patterns of Childhood, by Christa Wolf
The Jews, legless in Nelly’s memory because of their long caftans, went into their destroyed synagogue at the risk of their lives and rescued their holy, golden treasures. The Jews, old men with gray beards, lived in the miserable little houses on Synagogue Square. Their wives and children were perhaps sitting behind the tiny windows, crying (Blood, blood, bloood, blood must be flowing thick as thick can be...) The Jews are different from us. They’re weird. Jews must be feared, even if one can’t hate them. If the Jews were strong now, they’d do away with us all.
It wouldn’t have taken much for Nelly to have succumbed to an improper emotion: compassion. But healthy German common sense built a barrier against it: fear. (Perhaps there should be at least an intimation of the difficulties in matters of “compassion”, also regarding compassion toward one’s own person, the difficulties experienced by a person who was forced as a child to turn compassion for the weak and the losers into hate and fear. This only to point out the later consequences of previous events, which are often wrongly summarized merely by the correct but not exhaustive account: 177 burning synagogues in 1938 make for ruined cities beyond number in 1945.)
The edition I read was titled in translation as A Model Childhood, not Patterns of Childhood as shown on the 1001 books list; however, I’ve checked, and both titles are listed as translations of the original Kindheitsmuster, so this is the right book.
Never having heard of Wolf before being assigned this one, I went into it knowing absolutely nothing about it, except that it was an autobiography in the form of a novel. It begins with the author, an East German native in her 40s, visiting her hometown in a formerly German part of Poland with her husband and daughter. It is 1973. As the author starts to talk about the importance of explaining her childhood to others, the back of my mind is doing a little subconscious math and sending warning signals. I take a closer look at the cover photograph, which shows several laughing, happy girls in schoolgirl uniforms, the leader of whom has one arm flung out in front of her in what I had thought at first, from her expression, was a wave or similar exuberant gesture.
Oh, shit....
So begins the true story of one of humanity’s greatest evils, seen through the eyes of a young innocent who doesn’t understand the scope of what’s happening. Anne Frank in reverse, Christa (or “Nelly”, as she calls herself in the book) is one of the lucky ones, good looking and athletic and groomed to be part of the Master Race, as long as she’s a good girl and follows directions.
Her teachers are Nazi propagandists on a mission to indoctrinate all children into obedient followers of The Reich. Her family is troubled by events, but try to keep their thoughts to themselves, as Bad Things tend to happen to those who talk. “Nelly” just tries to live a normal childhood, conflicted between her conscience and what the adults are telling her. The local Synagogue is destroyed. Her senile aunt is taken away to be euthanized. Eventually the family has to join the town in fleeing the Russian army, "Nelly" ends up being sheltered and hidden in a farmhouse from Russians known to rape teenage German girls as war trophies, and her home town is made into a part of Poland after the war.
Wolf attempts to draw lines between the rise and fall of Hitler and some sinister things happening in the 1970s (the present, at the time of her writing). Pinochet’s rise in Chile, aided by the United States. Vietnam. President Nixon. This was the part that moved me the most, not because they’re actual parallels to Hitler (they’re not), but because Nixon’s corruption, drawn here as the shocking abuse of power it was at the time, seems so small-scale as to be forgettable today.
No, the Teapublicans aren’t a parallel to Hitler either, but Patterns of Childhood is a relevant book today more than ever, as it forces us to ask difficult questions about how those of us with Stars on our bellies can and should act when their own government attempts to make official the second-class status of the Bare-bellied. If you’re white, male, educated, middle class, Christian and/or heterosexual, what will you do in the face of the marriage police, the show-your-papers police, the forced-birth police, the union-busting police, the Christianity police and the Creationist police? Christa Wolf can warn you about the consequences of choices.