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"The inspiration for Rainer Werner Fassbinder's epic film and that The Guardian named one of the "Top 100 Books of All Time," Berlin Alexanderplatz is considered one of the most important works of the Weimar Republic and twentieth century literature. Franz Biberkopf, pimp and petty thief, has just finished serving a term in prison for murdering his girlfriend. He's on his own in Weimar Berlin with its lousy economy and frontier morality, but Franz is determined to turn over new leaf, get ahead, make an honest man of himself, and so on and so forth. He hawks papers, chases girls, needs and bleeds money, gets mixed up in spite of himself in various criminal and political schemes, and when he tries to back out of them, it's at the cost of an arm. This is only the beginning of our modern everyman's multiplying misfortunes, but though Franz is more dupe than hustler, in the end, well, persistence is rewarded and things might be said to work out. Just like in a novel. Lucky Franz.Berlin, Alexanderplatz is one of great twentieth-century novels. Taking off from the work of Dos Passos and Joyce, Doblin depicts modern life in all its shocking violence, corruption, splendor, and horror. Michael Hofmann, celebrated for his translations of Joseph Roth and Franz Kafka, has prepared a new version, the first in over 75 years, in which Doblin's sublime and scurrilous masterpiece comes alive in English as never before"--
"Franz Biberkopf, pimp and petty thief, has just finished serving a term in prison for murdering his girlfriend. He's on his own in Weimar Berlin with its lousy economy and frontier morality, but Franz is determined to turn over new leaf, get ahead, make an honest man of himself, and so on and so forth. He hawks papers, chases girls, needs and bleeds money, gets mixed up in various criminal and political schemes in spite of himself, and when he tries to back out of them, it's at the cost of an arm. This is only the beginning of our modern everyman's multiplying misfortunes, but though Franz is more dupe than hustler, in the end, well, persistence is rewarded and things might be said to work out. Just like in a novel. Lucky Franz. Berlin Alexanderplatz is one of great twentieth-century novels. Taking off from the work of John Dos Passos and James Joyce, Alfred D.… (more)
DNF, but I'm logging it here so I remember. I couldn't get into this. Even while: I thought there were interesting things happening in the form of the writing. I thrilled in the lamest way when the character walked down my street in Berlin. I wanted to push through to read about weimar Berlin, which has its own unending appeal. Still, I have other stories of weimar that I love, other stories of Berlin I would happily relive, other stories of post-prison life or desperate cities or people struggling to find a way that I found moving and profound. So I'll be ok without this one. Side note to self: your reading level in German and your reading level in English are not the same.
My 2nd attempt to read this alleged masterpiece, this time as hörbuch.Indigestible. Lots of shouting drunkenness, talk of petty crime and prison. coming and humourless . Brecht covered the ground with more wit and aplomb.Gave up. ( )
Berlin Alexanderplatz by Alfred Doblin is one of those classic books that always seems to pop up on "must read classic" books lists on social media. I was therefore keen to read this book, but found it hard going. The book is well written, with a fine style of prose, but it is very long, and at times quite boring. The pace of the story is slow, and it focuses on the mundane aspects of every day life in 1920s Berlin. However, the book does provide a fascinating record of everyday life in a great city during a tumultuous period in its history. It is therefore an interesting classic, but hard work. ( )
I have a hard time with the stream-of-consciousness style. The translater, Michael Hofmann, argues that the random jumping around makes the novel evocative of 1920s Berlin, but I found it hard to imagine the setting, and the patter of Franz Biberkopf's thoughts were all surface level--he is just a big dumb violent guy who falls prey to even violent men. ( )
I read this after seeing Burhan Qurbani’s 2020 movie version, where he updates the story to contemporary Berlin and makes the hero an illegal migrant from Guinea-Bissau. I had some difficulty recognising any details from the movie’s plot in the novel, other than the protagonist’s arm situation, but am glad to have read it, in any event. A modernist masterpiece. Michael Hofmann’s Afterword to his translation very interesting in its own right.
He stood in front of the Tegel Prison gate and was free now.
Quotations
Last words
And get in step, and right and left and right and left, marching: marching on, we tramp to war, a hundred minstrels march before, with fife and drum, drrum, brrum, for one the road goes straight, for another it goes to the side, one stands fast, another's killed, one rushes past, another's voice is stilled, drrum, brrumm, drrumm!
"The inspiration for Rainer Werner Fassbinder's epic film and that The Guardian named one of the "Top 100 Books of All Time," Berlin Alexanderplatz is considered one of the most important works of the Weimar Republic and twentieth century literature. Franz Biberkopf, pimp and petty thief, has just finished serving a term in prison for murdering his girlfriend. He's on his own in Weimar Berlin with its lousy economy and frontier morality, but Franz is determined to turn over new leaf, get ahead, make an honest man of himself, and so on and so forth. He hawks papers, chases girls, needs and bleeds money, gets mixed up in spite of himself in various criminal and political schemes, and when he tries to back out of them, it's at the cost of an arm. This is only the beginning of our modern everyman's multiplying misfortunes, but though Franz is more dupe than hustler, in the end, well, persistence is rewarded and things might be said to work out. Just like in a novel. Lucky Franz.Berlin, Alexanderplatz is one of great twentieth-century novels. Taking off from the work of Dos Passos and Joyce, Doblin depicts modern life in all its shocking violence, corruption, splendor, and horror. Michael Hofmann, celebrated for his translations of Joseph Roth and Franz Kafka, has prepared a new version, the first in over 75 years, in which Doblin's sublime and scurrilous masterpiece comes alive in English as never before"--
"Franz Biberkopf, pimp and petty thief, has just finished serving a term in prison for murdering his girlfriend. He's on his own in Weimar Berlin with its lousy economy and frontier morality, but Franz is determined to turn over new leaf, get ahead, make an honest man of himself, and so on and so forth. He hawks papers, chases girls, needs and bleeds money, gets mixed up in various criminal and political schemes in spite of himself, and when he tries to back out of them, it's at the cost of an arm. This is only the beginning of our modern everyman's multiplying misfortunes, but though Franz is more dupe than hustler, in the end, well, persistence is rewarded and things might be said to work out. Just like in a novel. Lucky Franz. Berlin Alexanderplatz is one of great twentieth-century novels. Taking off from the work of John Dos Passos and James Joyce, Alfred D.
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Book description
Berlin in the 1920s. Franz Biberkopf has just been released from prison after serving four years for violence that resulted in the death of a girlfriend. He returns to his old neighborhood -- Alexanderplatz -- vowing to live a decent life. What he finds are unemployment lines, gangsters, prostitutes, petty thieves, and neophyte Nazis. In this sordid world there are new women -- devoted Eva, vulnerable young Mieze -- and the dangerous, near-psychotic Reinhold, who befriends him. As Franz struggles to survive, fate teases him with a little luck, a little pleasure, then cruelly turns on him.
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Wikipedia in English (2)
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Side note to self: your reading level in German and your reading level in English are not the same.