Sanderling - Anne Weber

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Résumé :
How do you live with a history you can't escape? What did it mean to be German one hundred years ago? And what is it like today? These are the questions at the heart of Sanderling, a classic work of literary inquiry by Anne Weber, one of Germany's leading contemporary authors. Weber embarks on a personal journey into the past to uncover the life of her great-grandfather Florens Christian Rang (1864- 1924), whom she nicknames Sanderling after the darting shorebird. A Protestant pastor in Prussian-ruled Poland, Rang served a church whose mission to Germanise the local population would later be echoed in the murderous ambitions of the Third Reich. After leaving the church, Sanderling moved in the circles of Walter Benjamin, Hugo von Hofmannsthal, and Martin Buber. He joined a group of writers, artists, and philosophers who dreamed of a utopian society, even as one of his sons, Weber's grandfather, would go on to become a Nazi. By deciphering his letters and diaries, and travelling in his footsteps to Poland, Weber traces the contradictions and crises, the reckonings and departures of a complex legacy. With literary and philosophical references including Sontag, Sebald and Nietzsche, Weber combines her family history with a broader examination of ethics and morality to create a travel diary through time, reaching back to understand her ancestors....

Biographie:
Anne Weber is an author, and a translator into both French and German. She studied in Paris and has worked for several publishers. She has written a dozen books, each in a German and French version. Her book Epic Annette has been translated into 15 languages and won the 2020 German Book Prize. She has also been awarded the Annette-von-Droste-H?lshoff-Preis and the Joseph-Breitbach-Preis.

Neil Blackadder translates prose and drama from German and French. His translations have been staged in London, New York and other cities, and he has received grants from the NEA, PEN, and the Howard Foundation.
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Sommaire:
How do you live with a history you can't escape? What did it mean to be German one hundred years ago? And what is it like today? These are the questions at the heart of Sanderling, a classic work of literary inquiry by Anne Weber, one of Germany's leading contemporary authors. Weber embarks on a personal journey into the past to uncover the life of her great-grandfather Florens Christian Rang (1864- 1924), whom she nicknames Sanderling after the darting shorebird. A Protestant pastor in Prussian-ruled Poland, Rang served a church whose mission to Germanise the local population would later be echoed in the murderous ambitions of the Third Reich....