Narrative Theory Analyzation of Heinrich Böll

-Zuzanna Gos

Rubble Literature(Trümmerliterartur)

• Literary movement that occurred in response to World War II

• Very tragic and graphic• Coping mechanism for many• Mostly about the soldiers and POWs of this

time

Well-known Rubble Literature

• Wolfgang Borchert– The Man Outside (1946)– The Bread (1946)

• Heinrich Böll– The Bread of those Early Years (1955)– Stranger, Bear Word to the Spartans We... (1961)

Nietzsche & Civilization

• Böll references to Friedrich Nietzsche a number of times and even referenced Nietzsche’s common philosophy of the "repeat all events indefinitely". – Friedrich Nietzsche wrote many aphorisms that

represent this view, e.g. “Cycle of humanity“– The narrator returns to a baby-like state for he

cannot speak, feed himself, walk, or do anything at all

Irony

• Much progress in technology and in many other industries around the world

• On the contrary, civilization being destroyed by war, feeding into the return to barbarism

Pause & Stretching in Narrative Time• “There was a fresh dark yellow spot on the

wall, cross-shaped, hard and clear, which was almost seen even more clearly than the old, weak, small cross itself, which they had depended; clean and nicely remained the sign of the cross on the faded whitewash the wall”– Irony as well: contradicts Hitler’s attempts to

suppress and destroy Christianity

Narrative Perspective & Distance

• Just like the narrator, the reader knows not what happens before or what will happen.– Stretching

• Narrator describes a scene with great detail, slowing the narrative time– Pauses

• Narrator describes one single action with great detail, as if time were frozen

– Direct thoughts• Narrator “thinks” in first person – describes what he/she thinks in

present tense– Direct speech

• Narrator uses direct dialogue in present tense

Thank you!