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2 internautes sur 2 ont trouvé ce commentaire utile :
5.0étoiles sur 5
"... because I wanted a new life . . ., Mars 15 2008
but did not know what it should be like."
Most children growing up knowing little about an absent father will at some stage seek clues from the past in order to comprehend their own persona. The quest to fill gaps and to identify with their own behaviour may reveal unpleasant surprises. These can be especially disturbing for those growing up after a war during which their fathers may have condoned or even committed atrocities. In "Homecoming", Bernhard Schlink translates this complex theme into an engaging, multilayered tale, focusing on another sensitive topic of recent German history.
After "The Reader's"[1995] worldwide success, expectations for this follow-up novel have been predictably high. In the earlier book, the protagonist was presented as an accidental spectator and partaker in an older woman's exposure as a concentration camp guard. Here, Schlink couches the uncovering of an older generation's deceitful behaviour within a first-person's account of an active, at times obsessive, pursuit of a fictional character, its author, and indirectly of the protagonist's father. The author creates in Peter Debauer a modern-day Odysseus, who roams from place to place, unable to accept his life and "come home". Will he, eventually, find out what he was searching for - about the unknown figures and, especially, about himself?
Peter recalls his childhood memories fluctuating between those of his reserved and strict mother and of idyllic vacations at his grandparents' place in Switzerland. The mother avoided her son's questions about his father beyond the bare minimum: he had died during the war. His father's parents were not much better, and while sharing stories from their son's childhood, they omitted any reference to him beyond his student years. The lack of information had disturbed the boy, yet he had felt incapable of asking for more. On the other hand, he enjoyed his grandfather's tales of military campaigns and soldiers' homecoming stories. Schlink uses the grandfather's authority to raise contentious issues like honour and valour explained to the boy in the context of recent history. Accounts of German soldiers' tortuous travels in reaching home after escaping Russian POW camps were popular at the time and featured in the pulp fiction series that the grandparents published.
Despite prohibiting instructions, Peter secretly read parts of one such story on the galleys his grandparents had given him as scrap paper. Unfortunately, several chapters and the ending were missing. What had happened after the hero, Karl, reached home only to find his wife with young children and another man? Was it fiction or the author's personal experience? Coming across the fragment as an adult during a discontented period in his life, Peter's curiosity is reawakened to find the rest of the story and to trace its author. Coincidences facilitated his task as he put his mind to compiling the diverse pieces of evidence. Some clues challenged his up till then laissez-faire attitude to his emotional life, while others tested his political frame of reference. The more he found, the more he sensed some familiarity with the place to which Karl returned. Peter's new romantic interest, while adding new pieces to the puzzle, nonetheless also interfered with his pursuing the mystery.
In addition to applying Ulysses' Odyssey as a metaphor for Peter's quest, Schlink applies its structure to different levels of the narrative. As Peter's own life emulates the fictitious Odysseus, Peter's personal character adapts and changes as the situation or his obsession appear to require. Not surprisingly, given Schlink's own dedication to the profession and the specific topic he discusses, his protagonist joins the league of legal researchers. Schlink places Peter into historical contexts such as the fall of the Berlin Wall. In its aftermath archives were opened that brought much disturbing evidence to light. Mirroring the author's own experience, Berlin has a profound impact on Peter. It reveals another facet of his personality. Continuing his search there, he becomes aware of correlations between the composition of the fiction fragment and some academic legal texts, justifying fascistic ideology. This in turn leads him to new clues as to the author's identity. Drawing on several known contemporary cases of successful ideological turncoats, Schlink develops one such character into the primary counterpart to Peter. While he feels more repulsed by than attracted to this potential opponent, Peter devises a scheme to unmask him that takes him eventually to New York.
The author doesn't shy away from touching on some weighty topics that have been close to his jurist's heart for many years. He draws attention to some dubious legalistic philosophy and practice prevalent during the Third Reich and still persisting in some quarters, which, for example, argue for shifting guilt from the perpetrator to the victim, or from actor to commentator.
"Homecoming" is a complex and profound book and despite its fluid conversational style, should be read carefully with attention to the clues that, while appearing haphazard and scattered at first, combine into a meaningful whole. Peter Gebauer may not come across as a strong or likeable character, yet Schlink has succeeded in creating in him an excellent example of the type of person confronted with the challenges of his time. The topical political and philosophical controversies that are brought to light are well integrated into the narrative. They encourage pause for reflection without losing or sidelining the pre-eminent theme of the story. [Friederike Knabe]
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de Bernhard Schlink
de Hans Fallada
de Bernhard Schlink
de Hans Fallada
de Ron Leshem
