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A review by jennygaitskell
The Tin Drum by Günter Grass
4.0
'Or you can start by declaring that novels can no longer be written, and then, behind your own back as it were, produce a mighty blockbuster that establishes you as the last of the great novelists.'
This is a difficult, beautiful and disgusting, altogether remarkable novel.
Oskar recounts his life story from the moment of birth in pre-war Germany to the moment of writing. He's a perverse, murderous and paranoid egocentric with a Messiah complex. As we might expect, he's also an unreliable narrator, a teller of tall tales. He gives himself supernatural powers and uncanny experiences.
As Oskar tells his stories he's also telling Danzig's, Poland and Germany's. I'm sure I didn't see all of the symbolism, grasped a fraction of the references.
The structure is quite unlike anything else I've read, wandering between periods and locations, foretelling and flashbacks and flashbacks of flashbacks, but I was never once lost. There are long sections of exposition, in particular street directions and history, the purpose of which I missed entirely. There are descriptive phrases of jaw-dropping brilliance, astonishing sentences that break all the rules. There are dark jokes set up hundreds of pages before the punchline.
Though the novel has moments of playfulness, and occasionally touched me, Oskar and his Tin Drum most often sickened me. More than once I considered putting them aside - but made a conscious decision to respect the genius in the writing, and learn what Grass would do. The four stars mean my utter respect, but I could not love this book.
This is a difficult, beautiful and disgusting, altogether remarkable novel.
Oskar recounts his life story from the moment of birth in pre-war Germany to the moment of writing. He's a perverse, murderous and paranoid egocentric with a Messiah complex. As we might expect, he's also an unreliable narrator, a teller of tall tales. He gives himself supernatural powers and uncanny experiences.
As Oskar tells his stories he's also telling Danzig's, Poland and Germany's. I'm sure I didn't see all of the symbolism, grasped a fraction of the references.
The structure is quite unlike anything else I've read, wandering between periods and locations, foretelling and flashbacks and flashbacks of flashbacks, but I was never once lost. There are long sections of exposition, in particular street directions and history, the purpose of which I missed entirely. There are descriptive phrases of jaw-dropping brilliance, astonishing sentences that break all the rules. There are dark jokes set up hundreds of pages before the punchline.
Though the novel has moments of playfulness, and occasionally touched me, Oskar and his Tin Drum most often sickened me. More than once I considered putting them aside - but made a conscious decision to respect the genius in the writing, and learn what Grass would do. The four stars mean my utter respect, but I could not love this book.