Works of Grass -- Vast Plains

Author: (German) Grass
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-03-01
Features: "Depicting the forgotten side of history through playful black fables" is a major characteristic of Nobel Prize-winning author Grass in his literary creation in the 20th century. This book continues to employ his writing technique. During World War II, Frenzi, as a war correspondent, went to the front lines to interview and met the French girl Martha. Under her influence, he joined the radio work of the resistance movement. After the war, Frenzi worked as an elementary school teacher in the Soviet-occupied zone, assisting the government in ideological education and receiving multiple awards. However, he later faced purging within the party and was dismissed due to his advocacy of freedom, especially after his three sons "defected to the West." After the reunification of the two German states, he was rehired and appointed as an advisor by the Treuhand. At this time, he couldn't help but sigh, "Our republic is finished," expressing his reluctance to part with the workers' and peasants' regime. In the cheers of the celebration at the Reichstag for the fall of the Berlin Wall and the reunification of the two German states, people once again heard Frenzi's discordant voice, "A full moon is good, but a waning moon is even better." As time passed, Frenzi's disappointment with the reunified Germany grew. The tycoons from the West, under the guise of "cleaning up," engaged in large-scale opportunistic exploitation and forced thousands of East German citizens onto the streets, pushing them into the ranks of the unemployed. In people's minds, "cleaning up" became a synonym for "murder." At this point, Frenzi was given a new task: to find a new term to replace the infamous "cleaning up." Frenzi finally came to realize: the freedom and democracy people pursue are actually like this! Later, he quietly escaped from Berlin with his French granddaughter and drove into a vast wilderness.