I'm losing myself in snapshots of 'Strength Through Joy' tourists and testaments to tender 'Boy Scout' eroticism.

perhaps the only kind of post-war german literature which could have achieved commercial success

exculpatory / banal / funny / erotic. the Party Member of the family perceived, in retrospect, as a kind of jokester. had to believe - perhaps that's how it really was/is.

agree in part with murnane (A Million Windows), the narrator is ___abdicating his obligation to the reader

but the narrator is not necessary - same for much of the plot we're sniffing through ( )

2.2

As the story opens, we find thirty-year-old Oskar Matzerath in a mental institution. He proceeds to tell the story of his life. It is set in Danzig (Gdańsk) from 1899, when his grandparents meet, to 1954. Oskar, at age three, is given a toy drum for his birthday, and decides to quit growing. What follows is a bizarre combination of the history of Germany and Poland, satire, and absurd fable.

Oskar summarizes the plot: "Born beneath light bulbs, interrupted my growth at the age of three, was given a drum, sangshattered glass, smelled vanilla, coughed in churches,… watched ants as they crawled, decided to grow, buried the drum,… learned to carve stone and posed as a model, went back to my drum and inspected concrete, made money and cared for the finger, gave the finger away and fled as I laughed, ascended, arrested, convicted, confined, now soon to be freed."

Oskar is an unreliable narrator, frequently shifting between first and third person. There is a great deal of symbolism in this book, and I am quite sure I did not “get” all of it. I spent a good amount of brain power trying to relate portions of it to WWII history. This task was only partially successful, and I found that it took more effort than it was worth. I know this is considered a 20th century classic, and I am glad I read it, but cannot say I found much pleasure in the process.

I read the 50th Anniversary English translation. The Afterword by translator Breon Mitchell is worth reading. He and other translators interacted with the author to gain insight into his intent. I could feel the rhythm, intended to simulate Oskar’s drumming, in the narrative.
( )

I got this as a gift in the summer of 1986. It was the first novel in German I read on my own. I cannot talk about it rationally at all. ( )

Frásögnin í tin trommunni er táknræn fyrir uppgang nasismans í Þýskalandi á millistríðsárnunum. Günter Grass lýsir lífi Óskars sem ákveður að hætta að vaxa þriggja ára gamall um það leiti sem nasistar komast til valda og hann fær tin trommu í afmælisgjöf. Hann upplifir stríðið og það er ekki fyrr en við fall Þriðja ríkisins sem hann stækkar aftur.
Sagan sem er full af tilvísunum og táknum er þó mun flóknari og er mér minnisstæð fyrir vikið. Hún lifir því í minningunni hægt er að velta henni fram og aftur fyrir sér.
Útgáfan sem ég hlustaði á var leikrit í flutningi BBC. Skemmtilegt og hressandi en mér er ljóst að eitthvað af atriðum bókarinnar hefur verið sleppt úr leikflutningnum. ( )