German

Der Reisende / The Passenger: a Novel, Ulrich Alexander Boschwitz, trans. by Philip Boehm

Lori Straus — Fri, 01 Oct 2021 20:16:30 +0000

Der Reisende / The Passenger: a Novel, Ulrich Alexander Boschwitz, trans. by Philip Boehm Lori Straus Fri, 10/01/2021 - 16:16

From the book's back cover:

Hailed as a remarkable literary discovery, a lost novel of heart-stopping intensity and harrowing absurdity about flight and persecution in 1930s Germany

Berlin, November 1938. Jewish shops have been ransacked and looted, synagogues destroyed. As storm troopers pound on his door, Otto Silbermann, a respected businessman who fought for Germany in the Great War, is forced to sneak out the back of his own home. Turned away from establishments he had long patronized, and fearful of being exposed as a Jew despite his Aryan looks, he boards a train.

And then another. And another . . . until his flight becomes a frantic odyssey across Germany, as he searches first for information, then for help, and finally for escape. His travels bring him face-to-face with waiters and conductors, officials and fellow outcasts, seductive women and vicious thieves, a few of whom disapprove of the regime while the rest embrace it wholeheartedly.

Clinging to his existence as it was just days before, Silbermann refuses to believe what is happening even as he is beset by opportunists, betrayed by associates, and bereft of family, friends, and fortune. As his world collapses around him, he is forced to concede that his nightmare is all too real.

Twenty-three-year-old Ulrich Boschwitz wrote The Passenger at breakneck speed in 1938, fresh in the wake of the Kristallnacht pogroms, and his prose flies at the same pace. Taut, immediate, infused with acerbic Kafkaesque humor, The Passenger is an indelible portrait of a man and a society careening out of control.

This book appeared in English as The Man Who Took Trains in 1939 and met with mediocre success. The author drowned when his ship was torpedoed a few years later, a revised copy of the manuscript with him. The Passenger is a new translation based on the original manuscript found in German archives. This is only the beginning of the full story. Please check out these links to learn more:

To get a copy of the book, try here:
German: Kobo, Amazon, Kindle, Onleihe (free, register via the Goethe-Institut), Bookdepository
English: Amazon, Kindle, Indigo, Kobo

Registration & COVID

***Updated November 1***

The group will meet virtually over Zoom. The link will be sent out a few days before the meeting.

Please RSVP via email to Lori Straus by November 1.

Film Series: German Filmmakers in Hollywood

James Skidmore — Thu, 04 Jan 2018 14:03:06 +0000

Film Series: German Filmmakers in Hollywood James Skidmore Thu, 01/04/2018 - 09:03

The influence of German filmmakers in Hollywood has been substantial. Genres such as the 1940s film noir or the 1950s melodrama owe a great deal to directors such as Fritz Lang, Douglas Sirk, and Billy Wilder, all of whom made their mark on Hollywood and film history.

Join us for the screening of 10 films that trace the influence of the German filmmakers who made their way to Hollywood. These films are part of a course on German film being taught by Centre director James Skidmore. All films will be in English or with English subtitles, and admission is free.

Screenings are Tuesday evenings, 6:30pm, East Campus Hall, Room 1220. East Campus Hall is located at 263 Phillip Street, behind University Shops Plaza. Parking is available in Lot Q, to the north of East Campus Hall, entrance off of Phillip Street. Cost is $5/day (flat rate). You can purchase a ticket from the pay and display machine with coin, WatCard or credit card. (Does not accept Visa Debit, MasterCard Debit or Tim Hortons Visa.)

To learn more about the films, click on the links below.

Silent Films
- 9 January - The Last Laugh (F.W. Murnau, 1924) - how do you cope when your job is your identity, and you lose your job?
- 16 January - Sunrise (F.W. Murnau, 1927) - won some of the first Oscars ever awarded!
Film noir
- 23 January - M (Fritz Lang, 1931) - Lang's first sound film, and he uses it brilliantly.
- 30 January - Ministry of Fear(Fritz Lang, 1944) - based on the Graham Greene novel.
Melodrama
- 6 February - La Habanera (Detlef Sierck, 1937) - a Third Reich melodrama.
- 13 February - All That Heaven Allows (Douglas Sirk, 1955) - a 1950s America melodrama.
Exiles
- 27 February - Casablanca (Michael Curtiz, 1942) - a classic, filled with a who's who of the German expat acting community.
- 6 March - Sabrina (Billy Wilder, 1954) - Audrey Hepburn, Humphrey Bogart - what more do you need to know?
Larger than life
- 13 March - Fitzcarraldo (Werner Herzog, 1982) - Herzog's monumental Amazon film. Watch the actors pull a boat over a mountain!
- 20 March - Grizzly Man (Werner Herzog, 2005) - Herzog's groundbreaking documentary about a man who thought he could live with bears.

1st Annual Golden Boar Awards

Lori Straus — Fri, 01 Dec 2017 16:12:55 +0000

1st Annual Golden Boar Awards Lori Straus Fri, 12/01/2017 - 11:12

This is the first annual (can it be annual if it's the first?) Golden Boar Awards. Far from boring, these short films were produced by students in German 101 and 102 and will be showcased this evening.

Refreshments will be provided, and please note: this is a semi-formal occasion, celebrating these students' success as budding German filmmakers and speakers.

The award ceremony is named for Porcellino, the bronze statue of a boar that sits outside Modern Languages and is the mascot of the Faculty of Arts. It represents courage and bravery in the face of adversity, which is something these students have certainly dealt with by producing these shorts in their new foreign language.

Reading: Carl Skoggard Reads From his Translation of Siegfried Kracauer's "Georg"

Lori Straus — Mon, 30 Oct 2017 17:27:31 +0000

Reading: Carl Skoggard Reads From his Translation of Siegfried Kracauer's "Georg" Lori Straus Mon, 10/30/2017 - 13:27

Join us at Open Sesame, downtown Kitchener's distinctive gift shop/gallery/book store, for a reading by Carl Skoggard, translator of the novel Georg by Siegfried Kracauer. Best remembered today for his exploration of early German cinema (From Caligari to Hitler: A Psychological Study of the German Film), Siegfried Kracauer (1889-1966, pictured left) was the editor for cultural affairs at Germany’s leading liberal newspaper during the Weimar Republic.

Georg is a panorama of those pre-Nazi years as seen through the eyes of a rookie reporter. In a defeated nation seething with extremism right and left, young Georg is looking for something to believe in. For him, the past has become unusable; for nearly everyone he meets, paradise seems just around the corner. But which paradise? Kracauer’s grimly funny novel takes on a confused and dangerous time which can remind us of our own. The style is briskly cinematic.

About the Translator

Carl Skoggard enjoys reading German literature and for many years was an editor for the Repértoire International de la Littérature Musicale, with responsibility for German materials. His translation of Ein Jahr in Arkadien, an 1805 gay fiction by the eccentric Duke August of Saxe-Gotha and Altenburg, appeared as Year in Arcadia(Atropen Verlag) in 1999. Skoggard has also produced translations and commentaries for Walter Benjamin's Berliner Kindheit um 1900 (Berlin Childhood circa 1900); Berliner Chronik (The 'Berlin Chronicle' Notices); and all of Benjamin's little known 73 "Heinle sonnets," along with the original German and line-by-line commentary. Previously he served as staff writer for Nest: A Quarterly of Interiors.

Event Details

This event is co-sponsored by Open Sesame, Publication Studio Hudson, and the ��ݮ��Ƶ Centre for German Studies at the University of ��ݮ��Ƶ. Centre Director James Skidmore will moderate a Q&A after the reading. Light refreshments will be served, and those attending will receive a 20% discount on anything they purchase at the store. Copies of Georg will also be available for sale.

For further information, please contact Open Sesame (519.954.7722).

13th Germanic and Slavic Studies Conference

Lori Straus — Fri, 20 Oct 2017 16:46:38 +0000

13th Germanic and Slavic Studies Conference Lori Straus Fri, 10/20/2017 - 12:46

The program for the 13th annual Germanic & Slavic Studies Conference has been announced!

Conference Program

Part I: Who Are You to Talk to Me Like That?

Chair: Alexander Sullivan

9:45-11:00

Welcome (Jana Köpcke, Barbara Schmenk, Alexander Sullivan)
Laughter and Identity Display in Everyday Group Conversations (Jonas Heintz)
Laughter in Family Interaction (Konrad Gaerdes)

Coffee Break

11:00-11:30

Part II: Red Carpet and Beyond

Chair: Jana Köpcke

11:30-1:00

Anatomy of an Evil Laugh - Studying Character through Transcription, Scene Analysis, and Measurement of Laughter Particles (Nicole Orminski)
Die Rolle der Nuss und warum der Nussknacker ein Nussknacker ist (Sabrina Wuttke)
A Theory of Indigenization: Wim Wender's Der Scharlachrote Buchstabe (Rebekka Corneil)

Lunch

1:00-2:00

Part III: Einmal um die Welt

Chair: Barbara Schmenk

2:00-3:30

Laughter in a Student-Led Classroom - A Conversation Analytic Study of Multi-Party Institutional Interaction (Sara Marsh)
Bobby Bär, meet Bobby Bear: The British Origins of an Austrian Comic Strip in the 1920s (Paul Malone)
Adapting, Covering and Re-Mixing Lorelei's Song (Elizabeth Milne)

Post-Conference Reception and Buffet

5:00-7:00

@ the Grad House

Program Committee

Jana Köpcke

Alexander Sullivan

Barbara Schmenk

Zwischen Übungssprechen und dialogischem Lernen: Kommunikative Didaktik im „Sprachnotstandsgebiet A“

Lori Straus — Thu, 05 Oct 2017 13:23:52 +0000

Zwischen Übungssprechen und dialogischem Lernen: Kommunikative Didaktik im „Sprachnotstandsgebiet A“ Lori Straus Thu, 10/05/2017 - 09:23

Die ersten Monate des Fremdsprachenunterrichts zu gestalten, stellt für Lehrende eine große Herausforderung dar. Mit dem Begriff des „Sprachnotstandsgebiets A“ hat Rösler (2013) all die Schwierigkeiten treffend charakterisiert, die sich gerade mit dieser Phase des Lernprozesses verbinden. Auf keiner anderen Niveaustufe treten die Widersprüche einer kommunikativ orientierten Fremdsprachendidaktik deutlicher zu Tage: So kollidiert das Streben nach selbstbestimmten Lernprozessen und authentischer Interaktion im Klassenraum mit der Künstlichkeit der Situation, mit den Vorstellungen der Beteiligten, wie Lernen auf A1/A2 funktionieren sollte und insbesondere mit der Lücke, die zwischen den fremdsprachlichen Fähigkeiten der Lernenden und ihrem intellektuellen Potenzial klafft.

Das dialogische Lernen gehört zu den zahlreichen Ansätzen, die seit den 1980er Jahren entwickelt wurden, um den genannten Problemen entgegenzuwirken. Der Vortrag beschreibt anhand von Unterrichtsmaterialien und Transkriptionen unterrichtlicher Interaktion das dialogische Lernen mit Studierenden im ersten Lernjahr in einem Programm für Deutschlandstudien an einer japanischen Universität. Der Vortrag möchte auf der Grundlage von empirischen Daten aus Plenums- und Gruppenarbeitsphasen zu einer Diskussion über die Vor- und Nachteile dieses Ansatzes anregen.

Novalis' "Lehrlinge zu Sais"

Lori Straus — Tue, 03 Oct 2017 13:47:03 +0000

Novalis' "Lehrlinge zu Sais" Lori Straus Tue, 10/03/2017 - 09:47

Novalis drafted The Novices at Sais between 1798 and 1799, with plans to reconceive it as a “truly symbolic novel of nature” in 1800, but left the work incomplete on his death.

What is the status of the text’s incompletion? Is it simply contingent on Novalis’ untimely demise, or does it have a more profound significance, given its composition alongside his collections of fragments?

The text offers not only multi-perspectival views of nature, but also different means of approaching and understanding nature. The different conversations between novices, between the novices and their teacher, between visitors, provide no assured orientation for inquiry, and instead offer a series of alternatives — from philosophical speculation to simple empiricism, from craft traditions to scientific investigation. Is Novalis suggesting any one provides insight into nature?

The text also introduces a mixture of literary forms encompassing dialogues, monologues and fairy tale, and shifting narrative voices between first and third person; indeed, the work is composed of a series of disjunctions and interruptions. The text opens with reflections on nature as comprised not of things but of figures. Is nature mediated through language, with poetry then the true friend of nature? The central figure of the text is the veiled statue of Isis. What is the goddess meant to represent? What is the significance of her veiled presence and her unveiling? Novalis’ The Novices at Sais offers a rich series of questions to explore.

Join us for this afternoon workshop on Novalis' unfinished work. Details and schedule to follow shortly. Registration is required, though, so please email Alice Kuzniar by Friday, November 17th, if you plan to attend.

About the Workshop Leader

Joan Steigerwald is Associate Professor in the Department of Humanities, and the Graduate Programs in Humanities, Science and Technology Studies, and Social and Political Thought, at York University. She has just completed a book entitled Experimenting at the Boundaries of Life: Organic Vitality in Germany around 1800. She has edited two special issues for Studies in the History and Philosophy of the Biological and Biomedical Sciences, “Entanglements of Instruments and Media in Exploring Organic Worlds” in 2016, and “Kantian Teleology and the Biological Sciences” in 2006. She has published numerous articles on Goethe, Humboldt, Kant, Schelling and the German life sciences. Her new project is Object Lessons of a Romantic Natural History.

Download a Copy

You can download an electronic copy of Die Lehrlinge zu Sais or The Novices at Sais to read before the workshop.

Reading Group Fall 2017: Winnetou, by Karl May

Lori Straus — Tue, 03 Oct 2017 13:17:17 +0000

Reading Group Fall 2017: Winnetou, by Karl May Lori Straus Tue, 10/03/2017 - 09:17

We're going back to the Wild West, German style, with Karl May's Winnetou I (1893) and the Brubacher House.

We'll begin the evening with a short tour of the historic, Mennonite home and then sit down for our book discussion in its stone-walled basement, next to a cozy fire.

Because the book is no longer subject to copyright protection, you can download English and German digital copies for free. Hard copies are easy to come by at major online bookstores if you prefer to have a book in your hand.

Please RSVP by November 15 to confirm your spot. However, don't wait too long - RSVPs are accepted on a first come, first served basis, and spaces are limited. Free parking is available on the lot beside the home, or across the street at OpenText.

If you can't make it to this meeting but wish to stay informed about upcoming ones, sign up to our reading-group-only email list. You'll be able to offer input into upcoming titles and meeting dates and be among the first to hear about the finalized details.

For any questions, please contact the Centre. We hope to see you out!

Reading Group: Book Swap & Reading Discussion

Lori Straus — Mon, 12 Jun 2017 14:49:58 +0000

Reading Group: Book Swap & Reading Discussion Lori Straus Mon, 06/12/2017 - 10:49

Choose Your Own German Book!

This semester, instead of the Centre stipulating the book, we're leaving it up to you! So, read whatever German-related book you'd like, be it written by a German/Swiss/Austria author in whatever language you can easily read, or a novel that really interests you that's been translated into German, and bring it along to the meeting.

We'll do a "go-around" and introduce our books and share what we thought about them, and then we'll see where the conversation goes from there.

And More Books

We're incorporating a book swap with this meeting, so please feel free to bring along any other German books you think others might like to read and which you'd like to give away. (Whatever doesn't get chosen, though, has to go back home with you.)

Finding German-Language Books

If you're up to reading something in German, you have a few options:

The Kitchener Public Library has some German books you can borrow.
Many titles are also available on Kobo (Chapters) and Kindle (Amazon).
The UW Book Store may have a few in stock.
The Goethe-Institut has an e-book lending service called Onleihe. You must subscribe to participate, and the process takes about one business day.

Registration

To keep the evening on track and the discussion focused, participation is limited to 10 people. So please register by emailing us your name and confirming that you can attend. (And please email us if you aren't able to make it, so we can make room for someone else.)

German Language Film Festival Kitchener-��ݮ��Ƶ

Lori Straus — Fri, 28 Apr 2017 13:02:48 +0000

German Language Film Festival Kitchener-��ݮ��Ƶ Lori Straus Fri, 04/28/2017 - 09:02

The German Language Film Festival takes place in May and is a collection of three movies, one each from Austria, Switzerland, and Germany.

May 17 - Austria: “Stefan Zweig - A Farewell to Europe” (Vor der Morgenröte)

"'Stefan Zweig: Farewell to Europe' chronicles the years of exile in the life of one of the most celebrated Austrian authors of the 20th century. Rising to prominence at a time when Nazism was gaining a foothold across Europe, Stefan Zweig made the decision to leave his beloved homeland. As Jewish Austrian, his action is one that leaves him forever conflicted. He tries to find his place in the Americas, living for extended periods in Brazil, Argentina and the United States. But as he wrestles with the decline of European society, he still bears a hopeful affinity for the German people, unable to make a public condemnation of Hitler. The mixed emotions will haunt him forever, as external and internal pressures threaten to overwhelm him." - Awards Circuit

May 24 - Switzerland: “Someone like Me” (Eine wen iig, dr. Dällebach Kari)

“Directed by Xavier Koller (Journey Of Hope, 1990’s Best Foreign Language Film), Someone Like Me is an irrepressibly cheerful love story set in Bern in the late 1800s. A popular barber shop is home to Dällebach Kari, an amiable and entertaining fellow with a great story to tell.

“Born into a poor farming family, Kari was a fragile child, born with the additional burden of a harelip. But Kari‘s mother doted on him, and he blossomed into a cheerful young man with an unshakeable belief in the beauty of life.

“At 20, Kari (played as a young man by Nils Althaus) meets the gentle and beautiful Annemarie (Karla Juri). It’s love at first sight. While other girls had turned away from Kari, Annemarie is enraptured by his outgoing personality. But her pompous father is opposed to his daughter’s relationship with a mere barber, and has other plans for her marriage. Thus, the power of true love is pitted against the pressures of a conservative society.

“Flash forward to the grown Kari (Hanspeter Müller-Drossaart) as he regales his barbershop clients with the tale of his one great love, and cheerfully lets us know how it all turned out.” – Elefant Studios

May 31 - Germany: "Lou Andreas-Salomé"

A new film by Cordula Kablitz-Post looks at one of Europe’s most influential intellectuals—and at her complicated life.

We meet Lou Andreas-Salomé at 72 years of age, as she recounts her life story to a young admirer. Born in St. Petersburg in 1861, she fell in love with philosophy as a girl and determined to live a life of the mind, escaping bourgeois constriction by never marrying or having children.

With terrific attention to period detail, the film recounts her close ties to many of the more famous people of her era (perhaps more famous because they were men), including author Paul Rée, fellow philosopher Friedrich Neitzsche and poet Rainer Maria Rilke, who became her lover despite their age gap (she was 15 years his senior). She became close to Sigmund Freud in a relationship that caused much gossip, but without doubt contributed to her becoming an accomplished psychoanalyst.

Never dry, this biography of Andreas-Salomé shows the focus and intellect that led to her prolific output as a novelist, essayist and intellectual.

A Co-presentation by University of ��ݮ��Ƶ Centre for German Studies and the Princess Cinemas. Sponsored by the Embassies of Austria, the Federal Republic of Germany, and Switzerland.