Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.78 AVERAGE
3.78 AVERAGE
challenging
dark
funny
mysterious
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
An odd, darkly quirky, but also amusing, story. Oskar, born fully cognizant, intentionally injures himself at three so that he never has to grow up. Set against the backdrop of the rise of Nazism in Europe and the outbreak of the war and told through Oskar's adventures and interactions with the strange characters he meets.
Моя не слишком удачная попытка выскочить за пределы своего “книжного графа”. Совершенно не представляю, как объяснить про что это... На фоне - помешательство немецкого общества в печально известный период. А на переднем плане - очень странный персонаж являющийся одновременно и взрослым и ребёнком (и это тоже типа метафора). Короче очень самобытно и было бы на 4* если бы не запредельная неспешность и обстоятельность изложения.
An absolute masterpiece and watershed of modern literature. Any comparisons to Ulysses are misplaced and ignorant, IMO. While Grass does his fair share of literary pirouettes, he also rata-tat-tats a thoroughly accessible story with an outstanding cast of characters, replete with more vivid, ingenious scenes than most writers could hope for in an entire career (I mean, c’mon, The Onion Cellar in itself is a goddamn pinnacle of imagination and storytelling).
To pay this work one last compliment: it gets better and better as it (drum) rolls forward, and by the second book has accumulated a frenzy of momentum that it maintains, cackling, until the very end.
To pay this work one last compliment: it gets better and better as it (drum) rolls forward, and by the second book has accumulated a frenzy of momentum that it maintains, cackling, until the very end.
Este romance, dividido em três partes/”livros”, narra a história, de Oskar Matzerath, um anão alemão, nascido em Danzig, na época, uma cidade sob o domínio alemão (hoje Gdänsk).
O personagem encontra-se internado num hospital psiquiátrico após ter sido acusado de um crime que não cometeu e tenta perpetuar as memórias da sua infância e juventude, do quotidiano da sua família e amigos e, claro, da guerra e suas consequências. Para tal, serve-se do seu tambor de lata, que sempre o acompanhou, desde o seu terceiro aniversário, para narrar a sua vida ao enfermeiro Bruno. E a aparente loucura de Oskar permite que a narração, na primeira pessoa, seja também feita pelo seu tambor, confundindo-se com ele próprio.
Günter Grass pretende criticar de forma irónica, por vezes surreal e grotesca, uma sociedade muito marcada pela guerra (invasão da Polónia e presença das tropas russas). Oskar com o seu tambor torna-se um instrumento do poder e a sua aparente loucura é uma forma de sobrevivência. Torna-se uma personagem fria, calculista, mas ao mesmo tempo feliz e sempre apaixonado.
O personagem encontra-se internado num hospital psiquiátrico após ter sido acusado de um crime que não cometeu e tenta perpetuar as memórias da sua infância e juventude, do quotidiano da sua família e amigos e, claro, da guerra e suas consequências. Para tal, serve-se do seu tambor de lata, que sempre o acompanhou, desde o seu terceiro aniversário, para narrar a sua vida ao enfermeiro Bruno. E a aparente loucura de Oskar permite que a narração, na primeira pessoa, seja também feita pelo seu tambor, confundindo-se com ele próprio.
Günter Grass pretende criticar de forma irónica, por vezes surreal e grotesca, uma sociedade muito marcada pela guerra (invasão da Polónia e presença das tropas russas). Oskar com o seu tambor torna-se um instrumento do poder e a sua aparente loucura é uma forma de sobrevivência. Torna-se uma personagem fria, calculista, mas ao mesmo tempo feliz e sempre apaixonado.
I enjoyed Gunter Grass' novel "The Tin Drum," both for the plot, which moved along at a nice brisk pace, and for writing, which was lively and vivid.
Set mostly in Danzig in World War II, the novel features our narrator Oskar, who says he decided to stop growing at the age of 3. He plays the drum incessantly as a sort of protest march about all he finds objectionable -- his parents' marriage, his two possible fathers, life growing up in a grocery store. He becomes locked up in a mental institution for a murder he did not commit (as opposed to the ones he did.)
I thought the book was clever without being annoyingly so.
Set mostly in Danzig in World War II, the novel features our narrator Oskar, who says he decided to stop growing at the age of 3. He plays the drum incessantly as a sort of protest march about all he finds objectionable -- his parents' marriage, his two possible fathers, life growing up in a grocery store. He becomes locked up in a mental institution for a murder he did not commit (as opposed to the ones he did.)
I thought the book was clever without being annoyingly so.
dark
emotional
reflective
A disturbing recollection of WWII by an unreliable narrator.. Obsessed with tin drums and an adult who thinks like a child the philosophical analysis and perspectives of the war and evils of Nazis are layers critical reflections that both disturb and sadden to be read but also cause a philosophical bend in the perception of the world on breaks away from the book... It stays with the reader and disturbs reality.. Relationships and sex and life are disturbing and overwhelming in this book to the not- innocent yet disturbingly youthful narrator, trapped in his observations, lust and disturbed misperceptions of reality.. Yet realer in their blunt unfiltered expression and unconnected sometimes unaffected retelling.. a very very very long war story.. Good but complex and fairly dreary in the entrapment a child's mind stuck in an adult unable to escape in a war represents the complex layers of ideas and philosophy this book elicits
A true tour de force. I have a feeling that much as you must read Dostoyevsky to understand Russia or Joyce to understand Ireland, you must read The Tin Drum to understand Poland, especially Poland during and in the aftermath of the World Wars. Here we have Poland as an exiled dwarven drummer in a mental institution; bastard grandchild of Kashubian potato farmers and emigrant arsonists, bastard child of lapsed Catholics and cowardly nationalists, raised by German Nazis, refusing to grow past the age of three and yet hiding incredible powers to condemn and redeem. I can only think that when Lech Wałęsa organized the Gdańsk shipyard workers, Gunter Grass smiled to see Oskar drumming again, with his zersingen revived.
"We didn't leave. Instead Herr Matzerath lifted his drum as the green hats opened their coats and swung out their tommy guns-- at that same moment a nearly full moon with only a slight dent broke through the clouds, causing the edges of the clouds to gleam metallically like the jagged edge of a tin can-- and Herr Matzerath began desperately stirring his sticks on similar but undamaged tin. It sounded strange and yet familiar. Again and again the letter O rounded itself: lost, not yet lost, is not yet lost, Poland is not yet lost! But that was poor Viktor's voice, he knew the words to Herr MAtzerath's drum: Poland is not yet lost, as long as we still live. And even the green hats seemed to know that rhythm, for they cowered behind their metal guns outlined in moonlight, as well they might, since the march Herr Matzerath and poor Viktor struck up in my mother's garden plot awakened the Polish Cavalry. The moon may have helped as drum, moon, and the cracked voice of the nearsighted Viktor called forth all those stamping horsemen from the soil: hooves thundered, nostrils snorted, spurs jingled, stallions whinnied, hurrah, hooray!... but not the least, nothing thundered, snorted, jingled, whinnied, nothing cried hurrah, hooray; silently they glided over the harvested fields outside Gerresheim, yet still it was a squadron of Polish uhlans, for red and white like Herr Matzerath's lacquered drum the pennants tugged at their lances, no, didn't tug, but floated instead, just as the whole squadron floated beneath the moon, perhaps came from the moon, wheeled to the left toward our garden, floated, seemed neither flesh nor blood, yet floated, like homemade toys for children, conjured up, akin perhaps to the knotworks Herr Matzerath's keeper makes from string: a knotted Polish cavalry silent yet thundering, bloodless, fleshless, yet Polish and unbridled, heading right toward us, so that we threw ourselves to the ground, submitted to the moon and Poland's squadron as they swept over my mother's garden, over all the other carefully tended gardens, but laying waste to none, took only poor Viktor and his executioners, and were lost in the open fields beneath the moon-- lost, not yet lost, riding off eastward, toward Poland, toward the far side of the moon."
"We didn't leave. Instead Herr Matzerath lifted his drum as the green hats opened their coats and swung out their tommy guns-- at that same moment a nearly full moon with only a slight dent broke through the clouds, causing the edges of the clouds to gleam metallically like the jagged edge of a tin can-- and Herr Matzerath began desperately stirring his sticks on similar but undamaged tin. It sounded strange and yet familiar. Again and again the letter O rounded itself: lost, not yet lost, is not yet lost, Poland is not yet lost! But that was poor Viktor's voice, he knew the words to Herr MAtzerath's drum: Poland is not yet lost, as long as we still live. And even the green hats seemed to know that rhythm, for they cowered behind their metal guns outlined in moonlight, as well they might, since the march Herr Matzerath and poor Viktor struck up in my mother's garden plot awakened the Polish Cavalry. The moon may have helped as drum, moon, and the cracked voice of the nearsighted Viktor called forth all those stamping horsemen from the soil: hooves thundered, nostrils snorted, spurs jingled, stallions whinnied, hurrah, hooray!... but not the least, nothing thundered, snorted, jingled, whinnied, nothing cried hurrah, hooray; silently they glided over the harvested fields outside Gerresheim, yet still it was a squadron of Polish uhlans, for red and white like Herr Matzerath's lacquered drum the pennants tugged at their lances, no, didn't tug, but floated instead, just as the whole squadron floated beneath the moon, perhaps came from the moon, wheeled to the left toward our garden, floated, seemed neither flesh nor blood, yet floated, like homemade toys for children, conjured up, akin perhaps to the knotworks Herr Matzerath's keeper makes from string: a knotted Polish cavalry silent yet thundering, bloodless, fleshless, yet Polish and unbridled, heading right toward us, so that we threw ourselves to the ground, submitted to the moon and Poland's squadron as they swept over my mother's garden, over all the other carefully tended gardens, but laying waste to none, took only poor Viktor and his executioners, and were lost in the open fields beneath the moon-- lost, not yet lost, riding off eastward, toward Poland, toward the far side of the moon."
adventurous
challenging
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
lighthearted
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
An entire gullible nation believed faithfully in Santa Claus . But Santa Claus was really the Gasman.
--
The grim portrait of Beethoven hanging over the piano...was removed from it's nail, and an equally grim portrait of Hitler was hung on the same nail...Mama...insisted that Beethoven be placed, if not over the sofa, at least over the sideboard. This resulted in the grimmest of confrontations: Hitler and the genius hung opposite each other, stared at each other, saw through each other, yet found no joy in what they saw.
--
The grim portrait of Beethoven hanging over the piano...was removed from it's nail, and an equally grim portrait of Hitler was hung on the same nail...Mama...insisted that Beethoven be placed, if not over the sofa, at least over the sideboard. This resulted in the grimmest of confrontations: Hitler and the genius hung opposite each other, stared at each other, saw through each other, yet found no joy in what they saw.