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93rd out of 397 books
—
667 voters
Crabwalk
Hailed by critics and readers alike as Günter Grass's best book since The Tin Drum, Crabwalk is an engrossing account of the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff and a critical meditation on Germany's struggle with its wartime memories.
The Gustloff, a German cruise ship turned refugee carrier, was attacked by a Soviet submarine in January 1945. Some nine thousand people went d...more
The Gustloff, a German cruise ship turned refugee carrier, was attacked by a Soviet submarine in January 1945. Some nine thousand people went d...more
Paperback, 252 pages
Published
April 5th 2004
by Mariner Books
(first published 2002)
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Jul 14, 2007
Farzin Takyar
rated it
5 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
those interested in not-simple stories!
It took me nearly ten days to read this not-too-long book. It was intentional. I think each and every sentence of the book is there for some reason, although I could not get the reason to some!
The story revolves around a silly happening in today's world where the Internet exists and is a common modality for communication. The happening is simple when you get it , but getting it is not so simple! The writer himself claims in one of the beginning pages that he is going to narrate in a manner that...more
The story revolves around a silly happening in today's world where the Internet exists and is a common modality for communication. The happening is simple when you get it , but getting it is not so simple! The writer himself claims in one of the beginning pages that he is going to narrate in a manner that...more
The events surrounding the biggest naval disaster in history and its tragic outcome are not an easy topic to bring to the attention of the reader of fifty-some years later. "Why only now?" is a good question and one that starts CRABWALK. The Wilhelm Gustloff, a "Strength through Joy" cruise ship turned refugee carrier, sank after a Soviet submarine attack on January 30 1945 leading to the death of more than 9,000 people, half of them children and infants. Although the details of the sinking have...more
I was initially flummoxed by the forcefully lateral, unhinged from time, sense that I got in the first third or so of this book. Grass tells a couple of different stories very incrementally, and through the use of language, blurs them together in time so that the reader is often unsure to which story he's referring at a given moment. I took this effect to be the viscerally accessible description of what happens to history when it's repeated, generation after generation, especially with regard to...more
This is the first I've read by Gunther Grass, who won the Nobel Prize for Literature.
Grass is struggling with the collective guilt of the German people. The narrator of the story is a hack journalist who is reluctantly drawn into researching the unusual circumstances of his birth, In a lifeboat, after the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff by a Russian sub in 1945.
It's cunningly written. Paul Pokriefke, the journalist, doesn't want to know about the past, and is almost vitriolic about his mother,...more
Grass is struggling with the collective guilt of the German people. The narrator of the story is a hack journalist who is reluctantly drawn into researching the unusual circumstances of his birth, In a lifeboat, after the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff by a Russian sub in 1945.
It's cunningly written. Paul Pokriefke, the journalist, doesn't want to know about the past, and is almost vitriolic about his mother,...more
I went to a cottage in Cornwall on holiday, and saw this book on their shelf, started to read it and couldn't put it down.
Grass weaves together the stories of three people who share a single point in history - the sinking of a refugee ship in 1945. In a single sentence he will update each of the three stories; and make it work. His way of writing alone makes this book worth reading.
He also weaves together the story of a little known tragedy and the way that modern Germany is dealing with World W...more
Grass weaves together the stories of three people who share a single point in history - the sinking of a refugee ship in 1945. In a single sentence he will update each of the three stories; and make it work. His way of writing alone makes this book worth reading.
He also weaves together the story of a little known tragedy and the way that modern Germany is dealing with World W...more
Number of casualties in the Titanic: 1,500
Number of casualties in the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff: 9,000
So how is it that I had never ever heard of this event before?
The story line of "Crabwalk" revolves around the sinking of the Gustloff, exploring its relevance in the lives of three generations.
The eldest is the writer's mother, who was on board the Gustloff when it was attacked.
The story teller himself, a writer who was born at the time of the sinking of the Gustloff and would prefer to p...more
Number of casualties in the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff: 9,000
So how is it that I had never ever heard of this event before?
The story line of "Crabwalk" revolves around the sinking of the Gustloff, exploring its relevance in the lives of three generations.
The eldest is the writer's mother, who was on board the Gustloff when it was attacked.
The story teller himself, a writer who was born at the time of the sinking of the Gustloff and would prefer to p...more
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I'm a big fan of Gunter Grass as I love his style of writing. I often find myself cherishing his sentences as he is so good at drawing you in. There is a slow, but determined pace to this book and it has a really strong ending.
A good story to this one. A generational conflict which asks, for how long should Germans feel ashamed about the second world war? The need for Germans to feel shame about the war has prevented many from not confronting it, not wanting to talk about it seriously and in a g...more
A good story to this one. A generational conflict which asks, for how long should Germans feel ashamed about the second world war? The need for Germans to feel shame about the war has prevented many from not confronting it, not wanting to talk about it seriously and in a g...more
Tug lib throw out. .60cents
2 likes · like · see review
Somehow, simoultaneously, compelling reading because of the subject matter, skilfully authored and yet at the same time lacking a certain spark, in a way that's hard to define. Maybe it's best read in the original German....
Also, I suspect this book is probably more strongly meaningful to a German audience. As well as an examination of the world's worst maritime disaster - the sinking of the German refugee-carrying ship Wilhelm Gustloff by a Russian submarine resulting in the loss of around 10,0...more
Also, I suspect this book is probably more strongly meaningful to a German audience. As well as an examination of the world's worst maritime disaster - the sinking of the German refugee-carrying ship Wilhelm Gustloff by a Russian submarine resulting in the loss of around 10,0...more
Germans were victims too--a different perspective. You learn about the biggest maritime disaster, which is the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff. In this book, the main characters which span three generations are directly/indirectly affected by this disaster.
A man tries to deal with the past. Born on the night when the "Gustloff" (a ship used by the Germans during WW2 to secure wounded people, women, children and refugees) was sunk by a submarine of the Red Army, the protagonist examines his current and past life, ranging from his divorce, his son and most importantly: his mother.
I understand, why so many people hate this book in particular. Günther Grass is very analytical in his writing and examnination of the topic at hand, even treating it as a...more
I understand, why so many people hate this book in particular. Günther Grass is very analytical in his writing and examnination of the topic at hand, even treating it as a...more
I always look forward to a Gunter book, though in his now later
years he's taken full advantage of his wealth, fame, and age
to blabber on at times with whatever decadent West vs East
agendas he has in the background.
In Crabwalk Grass examines how the Germans dealt, or not,
with their grief over the war. Grass incorporates flashbacks
and the internet and even inserts himself into the tale.
I find his 'interneting' a little self-conscious, trying
to hard to be contemporary, -see I'm still a hip d...more
Excellent. Reminds me a little of Kundera in the way the author feels so comfortable allowing his story to ramble; not at all worried how it will ultimately turn out....
1 like · like · see review
A great novel for individuals interested in understanding Germany's suffering during the second world war, Crabwalk delves into the complex and painful history of a war that is far larger, far more dreadful, and far more brutal than most people of this side of the Atlantic realize. What I most appreciated about this novel was the manner in which history assumed flesh in the present, both in characters but also in the situations. The structure of the book was jarring for me at times, and I didn't...more
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
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Le 30 janvier 1945, un sous-marin russe coule non loin de Dantzig un ancien paquebot de croisière allemand, le « Wilhelm Gustloff », qui emporte vers l’ouest des milliers de réfugiés terrorisés par l’avancée de l’Armée rouge.
Plus de quatre mille enfants périssent, sans compter les femmes et les vieillards. Seules quelques centaines de fugitifs survivent. Le naufrage du « Titanic » était peu de chose à côté.
Ce fait historique, refoulé par les Allemands vaincus, est la matière, pour l’auteur, d’...more
Plus de quatre mille enfants périssent, sans compter les femmes et les vieillards. Seules quelques centaines de fugitifs survivent. Le naufrage du « Titanic » était peu de chose à côté.
Ce fait historique, refoulé par les Allemands vaincus, est la matière, pour l’auteur, d’...more
A minor Grass novel that lacks the humor and complexity of his earlier masterpieces. However, it offers a fine history lesson concerning the little-known sinking, during WW2, of the German cruise ship turned refugee carrier, the WILHELM GUSTLOFF: about 9,000 people drowned in the icy Baltic Sea, making it the deadliest maritime disaster of all time, worse even than the much obsessed-upon TITANIC.
The GUSTLOFF's sinking has a personal significance to the narrator of CRABWALK, and it haunts him and...more
The GUSTLOFF's sinking has a personal significance to the narrator of CRABWALK, and it haunts him and...more
This is probably a minor novel by Grass, but still it's often breathtaking.
I particularly liked the work of historic research that made the basement of the novel. Unless the tragedies of Titanic and Lusitania, quite a few people knew about the shipwreck of the Wilhelm Gustloff.
The scene of the sunken ship built with Lego bricks is unforgettable.
Moreover it's praiseworthy (albeit not always convincing) the way an estimated author in his eighties, like Grass is, tried to put the part played by the...more
I particularly liked the work of historic research that made the basement of the novel. Unless the tragedies of Titanic and Lusitania, quite a few people knew about the shipwreck of the Wilhelm Gustloff.
The scene of the sunken ship built with Lego bricks is unforgettable.
Moreover it's praiseworthy (albeit not always convincing) the way an estimated author in his eighties, like Grass is, tried to put the part played by the...more
Even though I had a slow slog reading this book about obsession with an actual event...it has me thinking. On one level it is about two survivors of the sinking of a German refugee carrier, the Wilhelm Gustloff, in the Baltic Sea by a Russian submarine, during WWII. But its theme of how terrible history becomes appropriated by the generations that follow is important. Also here is contemporary Germany still dealing with its past.
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
click here.
Difficult read, but a masterful blend of fact and fiction surrounding the worst maritime disaster in history, the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff in 1945 which resulted in the deaths of up to 9,000 people, including thousands of children. The book has an important message, too, so I was glad I made it to the end. I just wish it had been a more...enjoyable read. Oh well. Something may have gotten lost in translation.
I've read other Grass books that were really good - like The Tin Drum and Cat and Mouse. Very fantastical books with good humor. Crabwalk was almost a book that I didn't finish, because it was so mundane. But the actual story was kind of interesting, about a father lacking in paternal skills and his son who discreetly operates a Nazi-supporting blog.
Despite my well-known interest in German history, and how Germans deal with their past, this book managed to surprise me in how much I enjoyed it. Grass' writing style reminded me of a contemporary, who delights me, Sven Lindqvist. I found Grass' narrative gripping and just cynical enough. Again, an excellent find on my hosts' bookshelves.
I really enjoyed this. An intreaguing indightment of the fascistoid mindset that lurks behind the oh-so wonderful and politically correct facade of contemporary Germany. To all of those who construe this as an anti-German comment I would like to point out at this point that I myself am German.
Gunter Grass has a very melencoly look on the world. This is another story influenced by WWII and the Nazi movement. His characters are "everyday" people, living through the Nazi movement and how this affects their lives today. Good book, like Grass's "Tin Drum", but very sad.
Een mooie benadering van de oorlog vanuit de persoonlijke levenservaring van de auteur en vanuit de visie van de veliezer zijn volk. Een wat luchtiger geschreven werk met een minder luchtige inhoud en vraagstelling van deze eminence grise van de Duitse literatuur. Mooi.
Это первое прочитанное мною произведение Гюнтера Грасса, немецкого я не знаю, но у меня сложилось стойкое ощущение, что перевод сильно хромает.
It has been a while since I read this book. The writing is excellent and many of the historical details are well done. However, you must always remember that the book is a struggle with the guilt of a nation and that plays heavily into the plot.
Generally an unpleasant book, as intentioned, and is to be expected from a crab-like scuttle through multi-generational (neo)nazis obsessions surrounding the murder of a Nazis party leader in Switzerland, Wilhelm Gustloff, and the sinking of a German KdF ship sharing the same name.
Not a good morning metro read, since I don't like starting my mornings with *vivid* descriptions of a sinking ship and the surrounding death, the Gustloff-Frankfurter-Marinesko triptych, a spineless journalist, and hi...more
Not a good morning metro read, since I don't like starting my mornings with *vivid* descriptions of a sinking ship and the surrounding death, the Gustloff-Frankfurter-Marinesko triptych, a spineless journalist, and hi...more
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I've recently found myself preoccupied with pessimistic thoughts concerning our ability to learn from history. If you share these thoughts, and you would like to have them validated by a Nobel Prize winner, I recommend that you read this book tomorrow. The story has also made me consider the concept of entropy - in the figurative sense, of course.
"It doesn't end. Never will it end."
"It doesn't end. Never will it end."
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Günter Wilhelm Grass is a Nobel Prize-winning German author and playwright.
He was born in the Free City of Danzig (now Gdańsk, Poland). Since 1945, he has lived in West Germany (now Germany), but in his fiction he frequently returns to the Danzig of his childhood.
He is best known for his first novel, The Tin Drum, a key text in European magic realism. His works frequently have a strong left wing,...more
More about Günter Grass...
He was born in the Free City of Danzig (now Gdańsk, Poland). Since 1945, he has lived in West Germany (now Germany), but in his fiction he frequently returns to the Danzig of his childhood.
He is best known for his first novel, The Tin Drum, a key text in European magic realism. His works frequently have a strong left wing,...more
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