ARTS
Thursday, August 1, 1985
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Page 6
The Michigan Doily
'Legacy' offers Boll's youthful prose
A Soldier's Legacy to know a more seasoned, mature Boll scarce livestock. But the most bitter terror, and the action of story begins.
B Heinrich Boll - to experience the passionate, enemy, as seen by the young Wenk, is As the Germans advance along the
By Hyouthful prose of the anti-war author boredom. Everyday the soldiers front, the suspense builds from
Alfred A. Knopf, at a time when the cannons of World engage in a "war against boredom." without and within the company, and
131 pages, $11.95 War II still rang loudly in his ears. In As Wenk recalls: Here everything events unfold into a searing, ironic
this story, Boll presents a compelling, was completely frozen. Night after climax.
HEINRICH Boll died last week, moving account of a young man night, thousands of soldiers stood Wenk, no doubt autobiographical of
leaving behind a rich bequest of fighting two wars: one on the battle on guard waiting for an enemy Boll, who himself experienced the
literature. A Nobel laureate and ad- field, the other within his soul. who never came .,,horror of battle as a reluctant Wehr-
vocate of intellectual freedom for At the start of the novel, Wenk, a macht soldier, is a complex charac-
writers, Boll was renowned both as a German soldier stationed in occupied Wenk immediately acquaints him- ter, displaying at once cynicism and
novelist and writer of short stories. Paris, is transferred to Normandy, self with his superior officer, idealism He says: Wherever I can
where the Wehrmacht prepares for Schelling, who, to the young soldier's cheat the state I have no scruples.
the imminent Allied invasion. Here astonishment, shares his contempt for The state has stolen six years of my
Othe young soldier encounters fatigue, the vile Hitler regime and its sen-
hunger, and boredom. The men of the seless war. Schelling, a profoundly youth. It has prevented me from
By Ron Schechter understaffed company are almost human character, is more interested learning a trade. I would call that
oh ndrstafon guard duty, and con- nobtaining fair rations for his men 'getting compensation.'
sequetantly never enjoyaandon- than in abstract war aims, and is un- At the same time, Wenk has a
Among his best-known novels are terrupted sleep. In addition, they are moved by the standard platitudes highly developed moral sense, and
Billiards at Half-Past Nine, The cheated out of their rations by are about the glory of the Fatherland. At refuses to "cheat the state" if it
Clown, and The Safety Net. His most German high command, who operate great personal risk, Schelling turns a means hurting people. Similarly,
recently published novel, A Soldier's a supplies racket. In desperation they portrait of Hitler against the wall, although Wenk is driven by loneliness
Legacy, translated from the German pilfer food from mined fields - under speculates on the possibility of the and despair to Cadette, whom he
only this year, offers a unique oppor- fire from their own troops - and Fuhrer's assassination, and declares craves desperately, he relents without
tunity for readers - who have come haggle with the local peasants over his ambivalence over which side wins struggle as soon as she says, "Je ne
the war. Schelling is menaced by t'aimepas."
another company officer, Schnecker, In Wenk we see the fears, dreams,
who suspects his conspiratorial ideas and passionate thirst for life of
propensities, an introspective soldier struggling to
Although Wenk's friendship with preserve his sanity in a most uncon-
Schelling provides him with some ducive environment. We see the
relief from the unending monotony, classic existential hero in the
his real comfort comes from Cadette, tradition of Sartre and Camus, con-
a French girl whom he loves but woos fronted by ennui, the fear of death,
unsuccessfully, and from his bottle, moral dilemmas, and the riddle of
which provides him with "the solace existence. Such characters are out of
of instant forgetfulness." vogue today, in a world where readers
When the company is transferred to have had 40 years to forget the night-
the Russian front, tedium turns to mare of the last World War, and have
numbed themselves to the possibility
of nuclear war. It is difficult in 1985 to
move readers with a Wenk, who ap-
pears pitifully naive searching for
meaning in a world torn by war, but
he is nevertheless a valuable com-
modity to modern audiences, who
have a unique chance to travel back to
1947, when the sight of destruction
brought questioning as opposed to
complacency in literature.
Boll's style, in this work as in later
ones, is succinct. There is hardly a
wasted word in the novel, and in 131
pages the author manages to cover
the wide spectrum of wartime
emotions and ideas. He makes skillful
use of dialogue, and does not waste
time describing scenes and settings
irrelevent to the story. The descrip-
tion in A Soldier's Legacy is oriented
primarily toward the thoughts of the
protagonist, and the result is a novel
rich in characterization. In addition,
the author shows a poetic flair defined
by deftly chosen images and
metaphors, making A Soldier's
Legacy not only a treatise on the ab-
surdity of war, but an aesthetically
pleasing work as well. With the help of
Leila Vennewitz, who skillfully
traverses the idiomatic roadblocks of
translation from German to English,
Boll provides his audience with an ex-
ceedingly readable novel.
Ironically, Boll's last novel was his
first. One wonders whya work of such
quality lay undiscovered for so many
years. At any rate, Boll's readers will
appreciate his Legacy. 0
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Associated Press
All wrapped up
Last year's comet across the sky Michael Jackson is accompanied by
family friend Jonathan Spence at Brotman Memorial Hospital Tuesday
afternoon in Culver City, California. You-know-who severely sprained
his right hand while filming 'Captain Eo,' a short 3-D science fiction
movie beng made by the Walt Disney Productions.
40
-ine countuown conunues
In only a matter of hours now, Big Bird, SnuffleUpagus, and the whole Sesame Street crew, along with
numerous special guests, will hit the screens of movie houses everywhere. 'Follow That Bird," a
must-see potential cult classic produced by the Children's Television Workshop, opens tomorrow
in Ann Arbor.
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