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Red Love: The Story of an East German Family

Maxim Leo,

Shaun Whiteside (Translator)

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Oct 09, 2020 Travellinckx rated it really liked it

Shelves: non-fiction, memoir, history-sejarah, sosialisme

Red Love is a kind of an autopsy of a dead country through its microscopic entity, a family. A couple who have every reason to believe that their country was build based on their parent's dreams, their hopes and their common goal to make sure the Nazis would never again have a chance.
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I admire Maxim Leo - - the writer-- who unflinchingly asked (taboos, unquestionable) questions to his parents and his grandparents. He tried to trace back why and how his parents, who were madly in love, who basica Red Love is a kind of an autopsy of a dead country through its microscopic entity, a family. A couple who have every reason to believe that their country was build based on their parent's dreams, their hopes and their common goal to make sure the Nazis would never again have a chance.
.
I admire Maxim Leo - - the writer-- who unflinchingly asked (taboos, unquestionable) questions to his parents and his grandparents. He tried to trace back why and how his parents, who were madly in love, who basically had the same vision, ended up in divorce. What seems like a personal quests lead him to the incredible materials related to the rise and the fall of GDR, the ex East Germany.
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Leo's lineage, in a way, is the image of the founding fathers of GDR. His maternal grandfather is the son of wealthy jewish lawyer, an haute bourgeoisie family, turned into a resistance fighter and a war hero, a true believer in the socialist cause. His paternal grandfather is a factory worker, a real proletar who knew exactly what it means to be poor but had a quite good life under the Nazis until he was sent to war.
The two grandfathers, who never met each other, principally, built the same state, were in the same party, and believed the same things at some point, but were circulating in very different background. Henceforth, even though they believed in the same principles, Leo's parents, Anne and Wolf raised in completely different circumstances. Anne, a journalist and a fiery fighter for socialism and have faith in socialist system from bourgeoisie pov. Wolf, a rebellious artist who always sceptical about how the state turned socialism into paranoid system. He lived the socialist system from proletarian pov. Politics is always been a sensitive subject between the two. Wolf breaks the rules that Anne always respects.
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Leo revealed all the secrets of his family while trying to keep enough distance from his subject. His sources for this book is not limited to interviews but mostly from all the notes that the GDR had on them. While doing his research, he realized, the state knows almost all, all their movements and activities. Red Love is the result of Leo's personal quests combined with extensive research, that goes beyond his expectations. It is a combination of John Le Carré's Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and Nicolas Sparks' The Notebook. And the book is a beautiful homage to his parents as well as to his (now dead) country. ...more

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Dec 27, 2014 Daisy marked it as to-read

Shelves: ddr

Feb 26, 2016 Kristin marked it as to-read

Shelves: memoir-bio-testimony, germany

Oct 23, 2019 Lizzy Siddal (Lizzy’s Literary Life) rated it really liked it

Shelves: read-2019, german-literature

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