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Loading... The Flounder (1977)by Günter Grass
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. One of my favorite novels ever. I've devoured, with intentional puns, this one twice, the second time in tandem with my friends. This represents the purpose of literature. One's culinary awareness is doubtless to be inspired within these pages. Delicious, sinuous and robust, a divine brush paints along his narration, one timeless and laden with vibrato. He is similar to the Magical Realists, only better. Well. Uh. This is definitely something. An odd book, to put it mildly. Grass has his trademark humor and historical wisdom here. But the whole concept of the novel is something baffling - a talking fish gives advice to the reincarnations of a man and his cook-wife in the areas near Danzig, and the fish is accused by a gang of radical feminists that he has altered the course of history by instituting the patriarchy. There's also a lot of discussion on food, particularly potatoes. I have no idea what to make of this, but I will return to it. And maybe on a full stomach, as Grass' writing makes me hunger. no reviews | add a review
Belongs to Publisher SeriesKeltainen kirjasto (150) Meulenhoff editie (741) ET Tascabili [Einaudi] (647) AwardsDistinctionsNotable Lists
Based loosely on Grimm's The Fisherman and his Wife, this triumphant blend of folk tale and contemporary story takes place over the course of nine months, during which the wife of the narrator becomes pregnant and is regaled with tales of the various cooks the fisherman has met throughout his life. The emerging themes of the novel expose the periods when men made history and women's contributions went largely, in some cases gravely, unrecognized. Inventive, imaginitive and irreverent, this humorous, fundamentally brilliant novel highlights the value of modern-day myth and timeless legend. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)833.914Literature German literature and literatures of related languages German fiction Modern period (1900-) 1900-1990 1945-1990LC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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Grass clearly means well, and his conclusion isn't very favourable to the way men have run the world, but even as far back as 1977, it's still quite an arrogant task for a male writer to set himself. With hindsight, there are probably roles that his proletarian strong women of history could have filled other than as cooks, nurturers and bed-warmers, and he doesn't really do himself any favours by his gently ironic treatment of the modern women in the feminist tribunal that is trying the flounder for his crimes against womanhood. Especially since the narrator, constantly reincarnated in new male characters, seems to have slept with all of the women in the book...
As always, a tour-de-force piece of writing, clever, witty and knowledgeable, but maybe not the Grass novel you should be rushing to re-read 45 years on. Unless you are fascinated by Baltic cuisine, in which case you can just read it for the recipes (not suitable for vegetarians!). ( )