SIBLINGS

In this 1963 novel by award-winning East German author Reimann (1933-1973), family love is tested by idealism and ideology in a divided Germany.

Elisabeth and her brother Uli have been close since their shared childhood marked by World War II and the arrival of the Red Army. In their 20s now, something has come between them: “I’ll never forgive you,” Uli tells his sister as the book opens. Narrated from Elisabeth’s point of view, the novel artfully omits his reason, flashing back instead to show us who they are and how they arrived at this impasse. An artist, Elisabeth leads a workers art group at a briquette factory. Uli’s an engineer. Neither are members of the Communist Party. Though Elisabeth has had conflicts with the party at her job, she believes in socialism and is committed to their country. Their eldest brother, Konrad, who defected to the West two years before, calls the German Democratic Republic “a few square kilometres of impoverished countryside. A government propped up by the Soviets.” Elisabeth can’t stand him: “I told myself that the whole myth of sibling love, that blood runs thicker than water, was just mystical nonsense...I was not going to put my arms around a defector, just because he happened to be my brother.” She wishes her peers had higher ideals: In the years just after the war, she thinks, “we had eyes to see the rise of the new red order.” Uli is less convinced: “We were ridiculously young and ridiculously passionate and ridiculously ignorant.” Now, he says, “I feel like a prisoner trapped behind bars, just stupidity and bureaucracy everywhere.” Detailed and nuanced, Reimann’s work brings a historical moment convincingly to life. Endnotes provide helpful context.

Politics are personal in this dramatic story of a sister determined not to lose her brother to the capitalist West.