Literature and the Fall of the Wall

The fall of the Berlin Wall and reunification of the two Germanys in 1989 was an event of epochal historic and political significance. It comes as no surprise that this event has found a strong echo in contemporary German literature, in the works of both east and west German authors. Uwe Telkamp’s most recent novel, Der Turm, (i.e, the tower) highlights the fact that the increasing distance to this historic event after the passage of twenty years is making new avenues of approach possible.

The present dossier seeks to delineate the thematic context of “Literature and Reunification” by means of an introductory text and selected author profiles, and to present short introductions to individual works.