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Ms. Sehrish Tariq Ms. Amna Haider German Literature 02 April 2013 History: Rewritten, Revised or Re-visited Since 1960s and 1970s the critical approach of new historicism and cultural materialism towards the literary piece of work was done through the rejection of both the autonomy and individual genius of the author and the autonomy of the literary work and see literary texts as absolutely inseparable from their historical context (Bertens 177) . According to this approach, the authors role is to a large extent determined by historical circumstances (Bertens). In this regard, the works of Gunter Grass can also be seen as being replete with historical insights. For Grass, the history or, to be more precise, the history we Germans have repeatedly mucked up, is a clogged toilet. We flush and flush, but the shit keeps rising. (Grass 122) Grass is considered to be the conscience of the society of German people for voicing and representing the essential forces at work in German history. As the conscience pricks, Grass, being the product of his historical context, emphasizes to confront the past that has been either not allowed or repressed by the state. As Jean Paul Sartre highlights the need of a person to simply confront the situation and take responsibility and suitable action for avoiding the clutches of bad faith, many German writers especially belonging to Gruppe 47 including Martin Walser, Heinrich Boll, Peter Weiss and Gunter Grass, tried to represent national consciousness (Bullivant 3). On the other hand, this process of re-visiting the past is not only painful but also

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evokes a strong sense of frustration in the inability to portray the historical reality (Mason). The point has been also reaffirmed in a recent pronouncement of denunciation by Micheal Wyschogrod:
I firmly believe that art is not appropriate to the holocaust. Art takes the sting out of suffereing. . . It is therefore forbidden to make fiction of the holocaust. . . . Any attempt to transform the holocaust into art demeans the holocaust and must result in poor art. (Bloom)

This poor art can be easily seen in the efforts of Grass narrators to grasp the historical reality which always ends up in either refutation or concealment of the facts. These such self-conscious narrators whose anguish is reflected in such devices as the endless repetition of thoughts without clarification or resolution, evasions and circumlocutions and labyrinthine analyses that are designed to conceal or admit only indirectly an involvement in the Nazi activities or a former belief in Nazi propaganda. In Crabwalk, Paul is depicted as under pressure to dig up past that has been buried by the rest of the society. He repeatedly says I kept my distance, not wanting to be questioned. Even the novel starts with narrators saying that Im doing someone elses bidding showing that his will is not included in the authors task of re-visiting history. On the other hand, the process is not only to re-visit history and further enhance the sense of collective guilt and entrapment; it is one way of rewriting as well. Literature is not simply a product of history; it also actively makes history (Brenten). Grass has employed different modes of representation, for example, books, films, internet etc in Crabwalk. According to Peter Barry, new historicism is a method based on the parallel reading of literary and non-literary texts, usually of the same historical period. (Barry 170) This is what the readers confront while reading the novel that different medium of texts has been used not only for its didactic purpose but also with the aim of bringing new aspects and form an absolute truth about the real facts.

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From the exposition, the reader is faced with modern technology through which information is snared. Both Paul and his son, Konny, is shown to be embarked on the search for truth that lies behind the history of the cruise named Wilhelm Gustloff. Using the technique of collage, Grass presents the happenings of internet website giving the insight into the life history of the important personnals, Wilhelm Gustloff , David Frankfurter and Aleksandr Marinesko, linked with KDF cruise, Gustloff. In this way, Konny revised the history attached with the cruise, initiating with its appraisal and glory for Strength Through Joy cruises to Norway after the Nazi Takeover in 1933, and concluding with the war, when the cruise was turned into refugee ship which sank after being hit by torpedoes. On the contrary, Paul maintains the objective stance towards this biased view by declaring that it was not only a refugee ship but also the boat where there were 300 auxiliary nurses and which has been later turned to floating barracks Beside the source of internet, Gunter Grass has also referred to other medium of texts as well like a film named Night Fell Over Gotenhafen. This was a film by Rolf Lyssy who presents the facts quite accurately (Grass 70). The whole film was based on the murder of Gustloff by David Frankfurter. The aim behind different modes of representation of history is to bring to surface the discrepancies between different sources. Konny in his website glorifies the way the coffin of Gustloff was brought from Switzerland to his own hometown. Salutes were not given with the raised right hand rather people gathered to present the final salute(33). While in the movie adaptation, contrary to the actual reports, only a few civilians salute the coffin with raised right arms. The film also showed the prisoner Frankfurter, who, with the passage of time, gradually recovers from his bone disease and that his continuing residence in jail is making him well (33). The idea projected in this process of remaking is that even the history is not reliable. There is no absolute truth attached to the facts obtained.

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This wartime romance was banned in the East Germany as the written works of the revised version of history by Heinz Schon are not welcomed in the GDR. Those who had read his accounts kept mum. On both sides of the German border, n fact, Schons information was not in demand. (33) Hence the process of re-visiting ended in a taboo. On the contrary, on the internet with the discovery of a ship that not only sank but also, because the whole story was repressed, became the stuff of the legend, it was attracting thousands of the hits and more everyday.(35) This further elaborates the dichotomy between the use of art in the Nazi era and the deNazification period. All the means of communication and representation were in the hands of Hitler. People have internalized this power dynamic that even so many years after the war; they are still reluctant to re-visit it. On the other hand, the incorporation of different modes of representation of history also maintains what Derrida views that everything about the past is thrice-processed (Barry 175) first through the ideology, or outlook, or discursive practices of its own time, then through those of ours, and finally through the distorting web of language itself. Whatever is represented in the text is thereby remade. . . for the aim is not to represent the past as it really was, but to present a new reality by re-situating it. Hence, we see that on the apparent level, there is a search for the ultimate reality or the truth, yet we witness the narrators explicit evasion of the truth. The thrice cursed date of 30th Januaury that repetitively emerges in the pursuit of his life is intensified as it is the same date when Gustloff sank in 1945, the same date of Nazi Takeover in 1933 and it is the same date of birth of David Frankfurter and the narrators himself. The narrator is seen to be living with the huge guilt of surviving. I keep having these episodes of hating the simple fact that I survived, for if you, Mother, had gone overboard like thousand of others when the . . .

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then again, the narrator stops for not exposing the tipping point of my own accidental existence. It came as a shock to him when this realization dawned on him that it was his own son behind the website. It struck him for he says while reflecting that but whos interested in that nowadays? You, Konny? It is not only on the individual level, but the state too is been shown as taking steps to clear away everything that is reminiscent of the past in the postwar period that might have reminded the townspeople (35) on the other hand, there are such gatherings as reunion of survivors where the people who surviced through the experience of sinking cruise and was saved by other torpedo boat, Louwe, came and revive their personal experiences. The aims and objectives of such gatherings or reunions also refer to the Gramscis concept of hegemony and Foucaults discursive practices where the power is internalized by those whom it disempowers (Barry). This also points to the efforts of Pauls mother to make his son able to raise voice for her and the past that has been repressed. Not only his mother but Jenny too reminds him that its your filial duty to tell the whole world. . . it was when Paul fails to fulfill his mothers demands, her attention shifted to her grandson who not only propagated the idea through launching a website but also took action in killing a person thinking of him as a Jew. The narrator in the diachronic mode of narration, talks about the glory, happiness and pride attached with the Nazi era and Hitler Youth with the pervading cruises of Strength Through Joy. The readers are presented with history through the metanarrative of Konny who cites in hiswebsite even the christening address of Robert Lee: The Fuhrer gave me this order: See to it that German worker gets his holidays that his nerves may remain sound, fo do what I might, it will all for naught if the German people did not haves its nerves in order. What matters is that the German masses, the German workers, be strong enough to grasp my ideas (55). It is through

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Konny that political and national history of the country is re-visited. On the contrary, the play of binary opposites is to be seen that when there is the grandeur attached with Nazi era and Hitler Youth, the readers see the impact of air raids on the capital of Reich leaving it to rubble, and also on Jenny who had been a ballerina, but due to air raid, her feet got crushed and she was reduced to shivers. This is significant I the symbolic presentation of the devastating effects of war on the art and the artist. This is the reason for Pauls mother repetitive saying that: That sea there with full of ice, and them poor little ones all floating head down. Youve got to write about it. That much you owe us, seeing as how you were one of the lucky ones and survived. Someday Ill tell you the whole story, exactly what happened, and youll write it all down. (28) Moreover, there is an obvious fact that Hitler supported the thesis of the necessity of preserving the purity of the Aryan race and German blood at the cost of Jewish blood with rising of slogans, Death to the Jews. Not only this struggle for purity, but having no opposing opponent as was the case of Gregor Strasser who resigned all his posts in 1932 after joining the left wing party. After two years, he was liquidated by his own people while his brother Otto saved his own skin by fleeing Germany. Another aspect of history is dealt with in Crabwalk, which relates to the period of deNazification. This highlights the discrepancy between East Germany and West Germany. Describing the process of personal history, Paul narrates how his mother was housed in Schwein and was called resettlers, and those who managed to land on West were termed as a refugee from the East. Hence, Paul is also shown as rewriting the postwar scenario. Grass has dealt with history not only at personal or individual level and at political and nationalist level, but also on the religious ground. The religious despair that resulted due to

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Hitlers idea of superior race, is shown to manifested in the murder of Wilhelm Gustloff by David Frankfurter which was previewed as Davids struggle with Goliath(25) Grass has shown the scenario in an ironic way where the hero of biblical proportion who hoped his clear-cut act of defiance would summon his tormented people to resistance, was juxtaposed with the martyr for the National Socialist movements. In stead of the resistance, Jews were prosecuted from the land towards the unknown destination. On the contrary, the murder of Gustloff was compensated by transforming of the names of places, streets and mainly the KDF cruise by Gustloffs own name. Moreover, this total immersion in the past, lead Konny shoots the boy he thought to be Jew. The act of breaking the model boat, he asked for in the jail, shows his attempts of appeasing his father and on the other hand, signifies the absurdity that lies behind it. The Novel ends with Paul finding another website campaigning for his son, and his reflecting that It doesnt end. Never will it end. This shows that the continuous pattern of history that is always there as a conscience to remind of the sense of collective guilt and entrapment. Grass through writing the historical perspective in Crabwalk is at times seen to be remaking, at times re-visiting and hence revising the history in order to search for the the truth which is no longer absolute but relative.

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Bibliography
Barry, Peter. Begining Theory. Manchester: Manchester UP, 1995. Print. Bertens, Hans. Literary Theory - The Basics. London: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2001. Print. Bloom, Harold. Literature of the Holocaust. Ed. Harold Bloom. Philadephia: Chelsea House Publishers, 2004. Print. Bullivant, Keith. The Future of German Literature. Oxford: Berg Publishers, 1994. Print. Grass, Gunter. Crabwalk. Trans. Krishna Winston. New York: Harcourt, Inc., 2002. Print. Mason, Ann L. "Gunter Grass and the Artist in History." The Univeristy of Wisconsin Press (1973): 347362. Web. 19 03 2013.