Of the German port instead of romantic love, obscene acts of sexual exhibitionism, instead of a beautiful hero, one who is made grotesque by the ludicrous feature of his over-large Adam's apple and throughout there is an all-pervading,īitter irony about the situation of Mahlke and his schoolfellows in totalitarian times.Īll the same, the purpose of "Cat and Mouse" is not to expose idealism, but rather to deepen it, to show that the theme of hero worship can be immersed in the oil-and-tar squalor of the war time and place that he has chosen, and emerge strengthened
Instead of the nostalgic French landscape, we have the realism It may be a deliberate exercise in putting the theme of Alain-Fournier's masterpiece into an entirely different setting - a harbor in North Germany during World War II. The fact that Günter Grass in his second novel, "Cat and Mouse," calls the adolescent hero of these adventures, described through the eyes of a friend who has fallen completely under his spell, "the Great Mahlke" makes me think Personality the least known yet most profoundly chivalrous qualities of young Frenchmen who were sacrificed in World War I. Hirty years ago many readers were - and perhaps many still are - enchanted by Henri Alain-Fournier's "Le Grand Meaulnes" (available in the United StatesĪs "The Wanderer"), the narration by one boy of the mysterious adventure of another boy whose poetic and unconventional qualities gave him the strange name which was the title of this novel.
Beneath the Adam's Apple, the Tin Drum Beats OnĪugBeneath the Adam's Apple, the Tin Drum Beats On By STEPHEN SPENDER
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