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The Train Was on Time
The hauntingly beautiful first novel by Nobel Prize winning author Heinrich Boll
Twenty-four-year-old Andreas, a disillusioned German soldier, is travelling on a troop train to the Eastern Front when he has an awful premonition that he will die in exactly five days. As he hurtles towards his death, he reflects on the chaos around him - the naïve soldiers, the painfully thin girl who pours his coffee, the ruined countryside - with sudden, heart-breaking poignancy. Arriving in Poland the night before he is certain he will die, he meets Olina, a beautiful prostitute, and together they attempt to escape his fate...
'His work reaches the highest level of creative originality and stylistic perfection' Daily Telegraph
'Boll combines a mammoth intelligence with a literary outlook that is masterful and unique' Joseph Heller, author of Catch-22
'My most-admired contemporary novelist' John Ashbery
115 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1949
120 people are currently reading
4392 people want to read
About the author
Heinrich Böll
569 books1,652 followersDer deutsche Schriftsteller und Übersetzer gilt als einer der bedeutendsten deutschen Autoren der Nachkriegszeit. Er schrieb Gedichte, Kurzgeschichten und Romane, von denen auch einige verfilmt wurden. Dabei setzte er sich kritisch mit der jungen Bundesrepublik auseinander. Zu seinen erfolgreichsten Werken zählen "Billard um halbzehn", "Ansichten eines Clowns" und "Gruppenbild mit Dame". Den Nobelpreis für Literatur bekam Heinrich Böll 1972; er war nach 43 Jahren der erste deutsche Schriftsteller, dem diese Auszeichnung zuteil wurde. 1974 erschien sein wohl populärstes Werk, "Die verlorene Ehre der Katharina Blum". Durch sein politisches Engagement wirkte er, gemeinsam mit seinem Freund Lew Kopelew, auf die europäische Literatur der Nachkriegszeit. Darüber hinaus arbeitete Böll gemeinsam mit seiner Frau Annemarie als Herausgeber und Übersetzer englischsprachiger Werke ins Deutsche...
Heinrich Böll became a full-time writer at the age of 30. His first novel, Der Zug war pünktlich (The Train Was on Time), was published in 1949. Many other novels, short stories, radio plays, and essay collections followed. In 1972 he received the Nobel Prize for Literature "for his writing which through its combination of a broad perspective on his time and a sensitive skill in characterization has contributed to a renewal of German literature." He was the first German-born author to receive the Nobel Prize since Hermann Hesse in 1946. His work has been translated into more than 30 languages, and he is one of Germany's most widely read authors.
Heinrich Böll became a full-time writer at the age of 30. His first novel, Der Zug war pünktlich (The Train Was on Time), was published in 1949. Many other novels, short stories, radio plays, and essay collections followed. In 1972 he received the Nobel Prize for Literature "for his writing which through its combination of a broad perspective on his time and a sensitive skill in characterization has contributed to a renewal of German literature." He was the first German-born author to receive the Nobel Prize since Hermann Hesse in 1946. His work has been translated into more than 30 languages, and he is one of Germany's most widely read authors.
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April 16, 2024
We cannot imagine the date of our demise, for a sense of foreboding encapsules us. The thought of an impending death is about to engulf you makes you numb and makes you unable to respond to daily existential ordeals of life. How do you muster courage to keep going when you know you are bound to leave your earthly abode soon? Aren’t you already dead when are told that just a few hours to live, haven’t you already become a ‘living corpse’ then? What is the purpose of life then, for what difference does it make to the world, or to you in the first place? Wouldn’t the life seem to be too nihilistic to carry on? Just when you realize that you are about die, the will to live gets its act together and gather courage of the entire universe to become all the more stronger and to rise as the most compelling human instinct. You image your world, the existence you have created for yourself (the tiny universe you have devised for you), will be annihilated into fragments of nothingness, a strange but formidable unease and restlessness starts choking our soul so that it becomes onerous just to breathe.
The feeling of imminent death strangely brings up so many things out of obscurity to settle, how does we have so many things to resolve when death awaits us and if those are of utmost important then why we left them till our death. Perhaps the death acts as a deterrent in the continuum of our life because we are never given notice about the forthcoming death, probably we require an afterlife too for settling our affairs with life. But the question holds its ground strongly is that why we need to settle any affair with the life, in this first place; perhaps we an intense and vigorous desire to unburden our soul, as if its heaviness may crush the prospects of our afterlives or progenies, or perhaps it is due to the uneasiness we feel towards our existential ordeal.
There is always so much to repent in life no matter how we live it and the guilt, the shame of entire humanity transforms into a feeling utter remorse as if our entire life has been an epitome of penitence. Why do we repent so much at the end of our life? Is it a way of resurrecting ourselves in eyes of the world or in our eyes? Or perhaps the ghost of morality engulfs us in the end, and we try to conform with our accepted norms of the same. But if it is essential then why not early when our life might have been blossoming in full swing, why do we only need to transform a wick when it is about to be extinguished. The proximity of death forces you to behave in an unique (or seemingly better) way, perhaps it humbles you. Although we always know that end of life is certain but probably the timeline between our birth and death gives us the luxury of being ignorant and indifferent. Do our religions or more essentially morality have anything to do with it? When we delve deeper into our conscience, perhaps we realize that it is our nature that in the aftermath we always feel we could have made better choices.
link: source
There may be infinite ways if dying, and what about the death of a soldier, does it lead to glory or nothingness? The effect of fascist state on or lives is such that the glory of dying in war does not allow a man to get free from the guilt of desire to live, for life loses it worth against the honour a death in the war may bring. The pride a war may bring to a state, may crush the feeble soul of an individual under its brutal severity. The basic human instinct to live confronts with the choice to die (and that too at the suffocating hands of war) and brings you to the terrible realization that perhaps you can’t carry on. At that condemned juncture perhaps it would be a mercy to lose one’s mind and go insane. So, does it mean that essentially, we are just consciousness and want to get away from that nagging uneasy feeling to choose consciously? War also takes away the life one might have devised, for you are being robbed off the world you have created for you and existence is shred into nothingness and thereby to burn your soul in the hell of non-existence. Our protagonist also wanted to a pianist, but that pianist has been long lost in the insanity of war.
The seeds of death instilled in the childhood become an ominous cloud that overshadows everything in the life of Andreas, as if he gets stuck in the powerful and assured claws of death. Is there any way to escape the ordeal of war or life, for that matter? We have our promises, pledges and a dark uncertainty over which we have to plunge to find a security to keep moving in life as we say life eventually takes what it needs to keep moving. Andreas makes attempts to grasp the reality of his life amidst chaos going around him, but it proves too much for him to comprehend, forcing him to question as if he is not already dead and so putting his own existence in jeopardy. How could a man be saved from such hell of non-existence? Does love have power to do so? But aren’t we essentially alone? Perhaps we become acquainted with someone to share our joy, our happiness, our pain and our darkness (could we also share our darkness with others?) too, and thereby form a bond which is like looking at oneself in the mirror as if two souls (and bodies too, of course) fuses to one, is it love or just a sympathetic ear which addresses our existential inkling to express and to seek validation. Perhaps we don’t know but the bliss it provides may sheds away our guilts and repentances of uneasiness over the uncertainty in life.
Are we capable of sharing our darkness too, for our share of darkness resides deep in the corner of our consciousness wherein sometimes it is even difficult for us to reach. Perhaps we can communicate through our darknesses as well since essentially, we all are same so may it lead to the birth of love. Love makes us realize the tears could be life as they can soothe a soul crying incessantly for years to find someone to confide himself and can fill him with a happiness which flows out through eyes. But after there is nothing left to share or communicate, we crawl back to our den of melancholy and pain, and the solitude of our existence once again becomes our dark reality. Perhaps we have to traverse our journey on our own, to deal with our existential horrors, eventually to accept that life is a value in itself.
link: source
August 4, 2021
It is not good for man to be alone.
Unhappiness is life, pain is life.
I am a human being and I can’t stand it alone
It was Bach. It was like a tower that was spiralling upwards from within, piling level upon level, fiercely shooting its way past the gloom of centuries into the light. An aching happiness filled him as, against his will yet knowlingly and consciously he was borne upwards on level after level of that pure upthrusting tower, as if borne on a cloud of fantasy, wreathed in what seemed a weightless, poignant felicity, he was yet made to experience all the effort and the pain of the climber: this was spirit, this was clarity, little remained of human aberration, a fantastically clean playing of compelling force. It was Bach.
The debut novel of Heinrich Böll (1949)
Read in German.
Review under construction.
Unhappiness is life, pain is life.
I am a human being and I can’t stand it alone
It was Bach. It was like a tower that was spiralling upwards from within, piling level upon level, fiercely shooting its way past the gloom of centuries into the light. An aching happiness filled him as, against his will yet knowlingly and consciously he was borne upwards on level after level of that pure upthrusting tower, as if borne on a cloud of fantasy, wreathed in what seemed a weightless, poignant felicity, he was yet made to experience all the effort and the pain of the climber: this was spirit, this was clarity, little remained of human aberration, a fantastically clean playing of compelling force. It was Bach.
The debut novel of Heinrich Böll (1949)
Read in German.
Review under construction.
April 20, 2019
Deathly Ironies
Impending death certainly concentrates the mind. In 1943 a German soldier returning to his unit on the collapsing Eastern front, has good reason to anticipate death. His thoughts are not about the past or of loved ones or a life he has left. Rather, he thinks about his war experiences and the present as it streaks by outside his railway carriage. He believes that what he sees and smells is the last time he will see and smell these things - the cities, the girl-volunteers serving coffee at the stations, the autumnal German sky, the trees, the air of the countryside.
The soldier knows his destination is in Poland, a place called Przemysl, and then onward past Lviv in a heavily Polish part of the Ukraine. This is the area of the former Austrian-Hungarian province of Galicia which bordered the 19th century Jewish Pale of the Russian Empire. About 10% of Galicia, 1 million people, was Jewish in 1940. By 1943 almost all had been murdered, many by the Einsatzgruppen, and others were victims of the death camp at Janowska which had been established in 1941 by the SS in a northeastern suburb of Lviv.
What the soldier does not know, and the reader is not informed about directly, is that the railway journey that he is on is, although in relatively much more comfortable conditions, exactly the same as that for the millions of Jews who had already been deported from Germany and the rest of Nazi-occupied Europe on their way to Janowska and the other camps in Eastern Poland and Western Ukraine. He, like those Jews, is being sent to his death. The principal difference is that he is aware of his likely fate; the Jews were not.
Boll’s intentional irony is signalled, I think, very early on when he notes that “Now and again what appears to be a casually spoken word will suddenly acquire a cabalistic significance.” The soldier becomes obsessive about the word ‘soon’ in relation to his death, and conducts a sort of existential analysis to determine when and where ‘soon’ could be. Consulting a map given him by a fellow-soldier, he intuitively estimates that his death will occur in about four days time just past Lviv, that is, in the region of the Janowska camp.
The soldier is a Catholic. He finds himself praying. Remarkably “he said a special prayer for the Jews of Cernauti and for the Jews of Lvov, and no doubt there were Jews in Stanislav too, and in Kolomyya …” And, although he has several opportunities to desert, he stays on the train. Whatever his country has become, it is no longer his: “I don’t want to go back, I never want to go back.…” he says.
After a sumptuous ‘last meal’ and other after-dinner entertainments in an up-market brothel in Lviv, the soldier’s intuition becomes even more precise about his death: “Just this side of Stryy I shall die.…” he says to a Polish prostitute who is also a partisan spy. Stryy had been a largely Jewish city an hour’s train journey from Lviv. Certainly the Jews had been eliminated from the place by 1943, and he includes them in his prayers as well. He is meant to board the train, which will undoubtedly be running on time with German efficiency, early in the morning.
The soldier does not make the train to Stryy. It leaves without him.
Impending death certainly concentrates the mind. In 1943 a German soldier returning to his unit on the collapsing Eastern front, has good reason to anticipate death. His thoughts are not about the past or of loved ones or a life he has left. Rather, he thinks about his war experiences and the present as it streaks by outside his railway carriage. He believes that what he sees and smells is the last time he will see and smell these things - the cities, the girl-volunteers serving coffee at the stations, the autumnal German sky, the trees, the air of the countryside.
The soldier knows his destination is in Poland, a place called Przemysl, and then onward past Lviv in a heavily Polish part of the Ukraine. This is the area of the former Austrian-Hungarian province of Galicia which bordered the 19th century Jewish Pale of the Russian Empire. About 10% of Galicia, 1 million people, was Jewish in 1940. By 1943 almost all had been murdered, many by the Einsatzgruppen, and others were victims of the death camp at Janowska which had been established in 1941 by the SS in a northeastern suburb of Lviv.
What the soldier does not know, and the reader is not informed about directly, is that the railway journey that he is on is, although in relatively much more comfortable conditions, exactly the same as that for the millions of Jews who had already been deported from Germany and the rest of Nazi-occupied Europe on their way to Janowska and the other camps in Eastern Poland and Western Ukraine. He, like those Jews, is being sent to his death. The principal difference is that he is aware of his likely fate; the Jews were not.
Boll’s intentional irony is signalled, I think, very early on when he notes that “Now and again what appears to be a casually spoken word will suddenly acquire a cabalistic significance.” The soldier becomes obsessive about the word ‘soon’ in relation to his death, and conducts a sort of existential analysis to determine when and where ‘soon’ could be. Consulting a map given him by a fellow-soldier, he intuitively estimates that his death will occur in about four days time just past Lviv, that is, in the region of the Janowska camp.
The soldier is a Catholic. He finds himself praying. Remarkably “he said a special prayer for the Jews of Cernauti and for the Jews of Lvov, and no doubt there were Jews in Stanislav too, and in Kolomyya …” And, although he has several opportunities to desert, he stays on the train. Whatever his country has become, it is no longer his: “I don’t want to go back, I never want to go back.…” he says.
After a sumptuous ‘last meal’ and other after-dinner entertainments in an up-market brothel in Lviv, the soldier’s intuition becomes even more precise about his death: “Just this side of Stryy I shall die.…” he says to a Polish prostitute who is also a partisan spy. Stryy had been a largely Jewish city an hour’s train journey from Lviv. Certainly the Jews had been eliminated from the place by 1943, and he includes them in his prayers as well. He is meant to board the train, which will undoubtedly be running on time with German efficiency, early in the morning.
The soldier does not make the train to Stryy. It leaves without him.
September 18, 2024
4.5
I should add a shelf and call it ' The most depressing books ever!'
Every death is a murder, every death in war is a murder for which someone is responsible.
The Second World War is in full swing and Andreas, a German soldier is returning from leave, on a train heading for the Eastern front to fight.
We live on hope.
And hope is dead.
But as the train passes through the Polish landscape he becomes convinced that soon he is going to die; that he is marked for death.
I don’t want to die, that’s what’s so horrible- that I don’t want to die.
But when would this ‘soon’ be? In a second? In a few months? In one year? Where would he cease to exist? Would he die alone? Would he die unloved and unmourned?
Soon is a terrible word. This soon compresses the future, shrinks it, offers no certainty…soon is nothing and soon is a lot. Soon is everything, soon is death…
I should add a shelf and call it ' The most depressing books ever!'
Every death is a murder, every death in war is a murder for which someone is responsible.
The Second World War is in full swing and Andreas, a German soldier is returning from leave, on a train heading for the Eastern front to fight.
We live on hope.
And hope is dead.
But as the train passes through the Polish landscape he becomes convinced that soon he is going to die; that he is marked for death.
I don’t want to die, that’s what’s so horrible- that I don’t want to die.
But when would this ‘soon’ be? In a second? In a few months? In one year? Where would he cease to exist? Would he die alone? Would he die unloved and unmourned?
Soon is a terrible word. This soon compresses the future, shrinks it, offers no certainty…soon is nothing and soon is a lot. Soon is everything, soon is death…
March 29, 2025
A novella of only around 100 pages, but this is a book that should be read carefully, in my opinion. It was apparently the first novel published by the famous Heinrich Böll, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1972. I read it in English translation. As is the rule with my “reviews”, the rating reflects my personal enjoyment rather than an attempt at an objective assessment.
The novel opens sometime towards the end of 1943. Andreas is a long-serving German soldier who has already been wounded several times in the war. He has been on leave and is to take a train from his Rhineland home to return to the Russian Front. As he boards the train he has a sudden premonition that he will die “soon”. Initially the time and place are vague but as the train travels through Germany and Poland those details gradually come into focus.
This is the second book I have read recently on the theme of a man facing his own death, the other being Gentleman Overboard by Herbert Clyde Lewis, in July 2024. I think that’s probably enough for now!
There was something compelling about Andreas’ journey, but then I tend to like novels that involve a physical journey of some sort. The train travels through German cities on its way east, and Andreas looks at the houses next to the line.
“Soldiers were standing at windows, one here, one there, and each man knew when he would be on the train again, travelling back to hell …”
Andreas falls asleep for some hours, then he wakes:
“Suddenly he realized they were already in Poland. His heart stood still for a moment, missed another beat as if the artery had suddenly knotted, blocking off the blood. Never again will I be in Germany, Germany’s gone. The train left Germany while I was asleep.”
He arrives in the city of Lvov (I am using the spelling in the book), which in those days was part of Poland. With two other soldiers he ends up in a brothel, somewhat against his own wishes, and meets a young Polish woman. There follows a long scene, one that I imagine some people will find moving. For me personally, it was a little overdone, and the novel lost me a bit towards the end. Maybe I just lack the passion that tends to characterise the creative mind.
I tend to have some curiosity about writers who have won the Nobel Prize, so I’m pleased to have added Heinrich Böll to the list of those I have sampled.
The novel opens sometime towards the end of 1943. Andreas is a long-serving German soldier who has already been wounded several times in the war. He has been on leave and is to take a train from his Rhineland home to return to the Russian Front. As he boards the train he has a sudden premonition that he will die “soon”. Initially the time and place are vague but as the train travels through Germany and Poland those details gradually come into focus.
This is the second book I have read recently on the theme of a man facing his own death, the other being Gentleman Overboard by Herbert Clyde Lewis, in July 2024. I think that’s probably enough for now!
There was something compelling about Andreas’ journey, but then I tend to like novels that involve a physical journey of some sort. The train travels through German cities on its way east, and Andreas looks at the houses next to the line.
“Soldiers were standing at windows, one here, one there, and each man knew when he would be on the train again, travelling back to hell …”
Andreas falls asleep for some hours, then he wakes:
“Suddenly he realized they were already in Poland. His heart stood still for a moment, missed another beat as if the artery had suddenly knotted, blocking off the blood. Never again will I be in Germany, Germany’s gone. The train left Germany while I was asleep.”
He arrives in the city of Lvov (I am using the spelling in the book), which in those days was part of Poland. With two other soldiers he ends up in a brothel, somewhat against his own wishes, and meets a young Polish woman. There follows a long scene, one that I imagine some people will find moving. For me personally, it was a little overdone, and the novel lost me a bit towards the end. Maybe I just lack the passion that tends to characterise the creative mind.
I tend to have some curiosity about writers who have won the Nobel Prize, so I’m pleased to have added Heinrich Böll to the list of those I have sampled.
March 1, 2021
رواية قصيرة ضد الحرب وضياع قيمة الحياة في القتل والدمار
يركب جندي ألماني القطار للوصول لجبهة القتال بعد بداية الهزيمة في الحرب العالمية الثانية
ويصف هاينريش بول بدقة حالة الجندي الذهنية والنفسية وشعوره بالاقتراب من الموت
ونظرته لصداقات لن تدوم وممتلكات لا قيمة لها
أسلوب السرد بطئ لكن فكرة الرواية رائعة
يركب جندي ألماني القطار للوصول لجبهة القتال بعد بداية الهزيمة في الحرب العالمية الثانية
ويصف هاينريش بول بدقة حالة الجندي الذهنية والنفسية وشعوره بالاقتراب من الموت
ونظرته لصداقات لن تدوم وممتلكات لا قيمة لها
أسلوب السرد بطئ لكن فكرة الرواية رائعة
October 26, 2025
میخوایم راجع به اولین کتاب «هاینریش بل» عزیز صحبت کنیم : «قطار سر وقت»
کتابی که اگر پنجاه صفحه آخر رو نداشت قطعا یکی از آثار مورد علاقه من حساب می شد.
قصه درباره یک سرباز جوان هست که از پاریس با قطار باید به شمال شرقی لهستان بره تا در هولناک ترین نبرد زمان خودش بجنگه.
چیزی که داستان رو نسبت به دیگر آثار نگارش شده در برهه و یا درباره «جنگ جهانی دوم» استثنائی میکنه ، تفکرات «ضد جنگ از جانب سربازها»ست.
سرباز ما (که اسمش آندریئاس هست) تمایل و امیدی به جنگ نداره و معتقده پاش برسه به میدان نبرد کشته میشه.
چیزی که ما در داستان میبینیم یه داستان ضد جنگی نیست که ما رو بذاره در صحنه نبرد و کشتار بی رحمانه بهمون نشون بده و به واسطه همین تصویر بگه جنگ خوب نیست. بلکه ما در کل داستان یک صدای فشنگ نمیشنویم. اما سرباز میبینیم. سربازهایی که فریب ارزشمندی کشته شدن در جنگ و فریب پیروزی و شکست دادن حریف در جنگ رو خوردن ، رو میبینیم. حدود 50% داستان در یک واگن قطار میگذره. خب ، مخاطب شاید بگه چقدر کسل کننده. اما من میگم نه. تصویری که از زمانه خودش و جنگ و سربازها و امید و نشاط زندگی در اون برهه به ما میده اثر رو میتونه به اثری ماندگار تبدیل کنه.
سه شخصیت داریم که دوتا تیپان و یکی (که سرباز اصلی داستانه) شخصیت هست. دوتا تیپ اذیت نمیکنن اما جای کار داشتن و باعث می شدن ریتم داستان کند بشه. یک سری پرش های تک خطی به ذهن سرباز اصلی میبینیم که خوبه ، کار میکنه باعث شکل گیری شخصیت میشه و داستان و فضا رو برامون واقعی تر میکنه.
یک قمار بازی در قطار داریم که معرکهست. هم داستان داره هم شخصیت می سازه و هم فضا رو کامل میکنه. به نظرم صحنه «قمار بازی» بیش و کم بهترین صحنه این کتابه.
اما...
یک اشتباه کتاب رو از کمر میندازه ؛ «حضور شخصیت دختر فاحشه»
دختر لکاتهای به نام «اولینا» که یک نمونه از زنان حاضر در جنگ هست متاسفانه نه تنها شخصیت ساخته نمیشه و کتاب رو از شرافت و معنایی که بهش رسیده بود منحرف میکنه ؛ داستان رو از یک داستان ضد جنگ با فضایی رئال به یک داستان احمقانه ، شنیع و بی معنا میرسونه.
دیالوگ هاش مطلقا مال یک زن لکاته نیستن و به حدی براش سنگینن که اگر «هگل» هم این دیالوگ ها رو بگه بهش نمیخوره.
یک هوس میبینیم که «هاینریش بل» بهش میگه «عشق» اینجا خطایی رو مرتکب میشه که کمتر ولی همچنان اگزوتیک ترش رو در «عقاید یک دلقک» خوندیم : عشقی ساخته نمیشه.
فضای فاحشه خونه و اون زن سرپرست لکاته ها خوبن اما حضورشون چندان محسوس نیست. پایان اثر یک پایان گسسته و نیمه تمام هست. متاسفانه نویسنده می خواد بجای یک پایان معمولی یک تراژدی بسازه و نمیدونه فرآیند شکل گیری تراژدی از خط اول باید شروع بشه ، نه اینکه در چند خط پایانی شروع کنی و با پایان داستان تموم کنی.
•°• در باب ترجمه : «سارنگ ملکوتی» بر خلاف گفته دیگران من بنظرم ، مترجم با استعدادیه ولی جای کار داره و باید تمرین کنه تا بتونه یه مترجم قلدر در زبان آلمانی بشه. و ترجمهش برای این اثر متوسطه چون هم اثر سخته و هم اولین تجربهش برای آلمانی به فارسی هست.
در مجموع ؛ «قطار سر وقت» اثر «هاینریش بُل» اثری خوبه ولی به شرطی که پنجاه صفحه آخر رو نخونیم و رسیدن به فاحشه خونه رو کات پایانی در نظر بگیریم.
کتابی که اگر پنجاه صفحه آخر رو نداشت قطعا یکی از آثار مورد علاقه من حساب می شد.
قصه درباره یک سرباز جوان هست که از پاریس با قطار باید به شمال شرقی لهستان بره تا در هولناک ترین نبرد زمان خودش بجنگه.
چیزی که داستان رو نسبت به دیگر آثار نگارش شده در برهه و یا درباره «جنگ جهانی دوم» استثنائی میکنه ، تفکرات «ضد جنگ از جانب سربازها»ست.
سرباز ما (که اسمش آندریئاس هست) تمایل و امیدی به جنگ نداره و معتقده پاش برسه به میدان نبرد کشته میشه.
چیزی که ما در داستان میبینیم یه داستان ضد جنگی نیست که ما رو بذاره در صحنه نبرد و کشتار بی رحمانه بهمون نشون بده و به واسطه همین تصویر بگه جنگ خوب نیست. بلکه ما در کل داستان یک صدای فشنگ نمیشنویم. اما سرباز میبینیم. سربازهایی که فریب ارزشمندی کشته شدن در جنگ و فریب پیروزی و شکست دادن حریف در جنگ رو خوردن ، رو میبینیم. حدود 50% داستان در یک واگن قطار میگذره. خب ، مخاطب شاید بگه چقدر کسل کننده. اما من میگم نه. تصویری که از زمانه خودش و جنگ و سربازها و امید و نشاط زندگی در اون برهه به ما میده اثر رو میتونه به اثری ماندگار تبدیل کنه.
سه شخصیت داریم که دوتا تیپان و یکی (که سرباز اصلی داستانه) شخصیت هست. دوتا تیپ اذیت نمیکنن اما جای کار داشتن و باعث می شدن ریتم داستان کند بشه. یک سری پرش های تک خطی به ذهن سرباز اصلی میبینیم که خوبه ، کار میکنه باعث شکل گیری شخصیت میشه و داستان و فضا رو برامون واقعی تر میکنه.
یک قمار بازی در قطار داریم که معرکهست. هم داستان داره هم شخصیت می سازه و هم فضا رو کامل میکنه. به نظرم صحنه «قمار بازی» بیش و کم بهترین صحنه این کتابه.
اما...
یک اشتباه کتاب رو از کمر میندازه ؛ «حضور شخصیت دختر فاحشه»
دختر لکاتهای به نام «اولینا» که یک نمونه از زنان حاضر در جنگ هست متاسفانه نه تنها شخصیت ساخته نمیشه و کتاب رو از شرافت و معنایی که بهش رسیده بود منحرف میکنه ؛ داستان رو از یک داستان ضد جنگ با فضایی رئال به یک داستان احمقانه ، شنیع و بی معنا میرسونه.
دیالوگ هاش مطلقا مال یک زن لکاته نیستن و به حدی براش سنگینن که اگر «هگل» هم این دیالوگ ها رو بگه بهش نمیخوره.
یک هوس میبینیم که «هاینریش بل» بهش میگه «عشق» اینجا خطایی رو مرتکب میشه که کمتر ولی همچنان اگزوتیک ترش رو در «عقاید یک دلقک» خوندیم : عشقی ساخته نمیشه.
فضای فاحشه خونه و اون زن سرپرست لکاته ها خوبن اما حضورشون چندان محسوس نیست. پایان اثر یک پایان گسسته و نیمه تمام هست. متاسفانه نویسنده می خواد بجای یک پایان معمولی یک تراژدی بسازه و نمیدونه فرآیند شکل گیری تراژدی از خط اول باید شروع بشه ، نه اینکه در چند خط پایانی شروع کنی و با پایان داستان تموم کنی.
•°• در باب ترجمه : «سارنگ ملکوتی» بر خلاف گفته دیگران من بنظرم ، مترجم با استعدادیه ولی جای کار داره و باید تمرین کنه تا بتونه یه مترجم قلدر در زبان آلمانی بشه. و ترجمهش برای این اثر متوسطه چون هم اثر سخته و هم اولین تجربهش برای آلمانی به فارسی هست.
در مجموع ؛ «قطار سر وقت» اثر «هاینریش بُل» اثری خوبه ولی به شرطی که پنجاه صفحه آخر رو نخونیم و رسیدن به فاحشه خونه رو کات پایانی در نظر بگیریم.
Read
August 13, 2021This is a story set during the late phase of the second world war. The main character, Andreas, is a soldier returning to his unit by train after a period of leave. Very quickly we are told that he knows that he is going to die soon. He develops an awareness of approximately where he is going to die and because the train of the title is, as revealed in that very title, is running on time, untroubled by the wrong kind of leaves or anything of the sort, he also works out when he is going to die, eventually more or less to the minute. It is always ambiguous within the story from where this knowledge comes, and this reminded me of Michael Bentine, or at least I think it was a story about him, anyway that was that during WWII he began to get visions of a skull that would appear over people before they died. He was a polite man and never attempted to profit from this by borrowing money from those people and was instead much troubled by his visions, eventually he found a sympathetic priest who conducted some priestly rite or other over him and he was not troubled by further visions.
All of which is by the by. So the story so far is young man, travelling by train, knows he is going to die, in the near future. I am reading this, wondering how it is going to work out, of course it is wartime, so the soldier might get shot, or bombed, or blown up, or maybe there will be a twisty ending; maybe he won't die - it's just a delusion, or maybe he dies just like in a story because he tries to escape his fate - perhaps you remember the story of the king who is visited by a wizard who says that the king's favourite horse will cause his death. The shocked king orders the horse immediately to be put out to pasture, years later it dies, and the king remembers the warning, he laughs and goes to the pasture with his cronies, they wander over to the skeletal remains joking about the stupid wizard as they go. When they get there the king kicks the horse's skull, immediately a highly venomous snake darts out from inside the skull and bites the king - who proceeds to die in agony.
So there I was reading and wandering what kind of twisty trick the author was going to play on me, the reader. After a while I decided to let the future be the future and focus instead on what was actually happening in the story. Well is a soldier travelling east, towards certain death, he has no weapon, he is sharing food with two comrades...sharing food is communion, they are also consuming the Holy Ghost in liquid form, they are telling stories - which is confession, the central character prays, and prays too for the Jews of any town that he becomes aware of - so we have a sense of sin and the necessity of what do you call it, making good ? Repentance? One of the men, he has senior military rank over the other two is involved in theft, he works in a military repair shop. And from the written off wrecks that they get back they manage to salvage enough good parts to make one new vehicle from every three old ones that they receive, these new machines then mysteriously find themselves on to the black market. He is returning to the front early from leave because when he got home he found his wife dressed in red pyjamas dancing on a table top with a Russian man watching (presumably some kind of forced labourer), hmm, so he is telling the younger man about a woman taken in adultery . And there is a Henkersmahlziet in Lemberg which functions both as a religious last supper and the literal final meal before execution.
So about half way through this little book it slowly dawned on me that this is all a bit...well, a bit religious, then as I mentioned in the updates the stopping points of this train, all big substantial towns, are described as stations which reminded me of the Stations of the Cross in Christian worship. Since my acquaintance with Christianity is mostly limited to taking the Lord's name in vain, I did have to resort to Wikipeadia for further detail on this, but the final journey of Jesus eastwards towards his inevitable and expected death has been divided into 14 stations, each of which is a particular event for the faithful to pray or meditate over. There certainly were a couple of parallels that I could spot - the division of the robes, or stripping of the garments (station 10) for instance.
ok then the issue was for me - do I think of Andreas as a Christ figure, the soldier as necessary sacrifice, or is this silly - if the Christian life is an imitation of Christ then all good, or at least striving, Christians are imitators of Christ, the stations of the cross then are both a way to draw closer to Christ through reflection and worship but also a mythical archetype of the last hours of human life.
Ok, so then again the issue was for me what does this mean in the context of a German story published in 1949? Are we being offered the stations of the cross as a way of processing the experience of war, the unarmed soldier is a lamb of God , a necessary sacrifice, the war dead are an atonement, walking, or in this case, reading the stations of the cross is a way of working towards understanding the sin and guilt that requires such loss.
All of which is by the by. So the story so far is young man, travelling by train, knows he is going to die, in the near future. I am reading this, wondering how it is going to work out, of course it is wartime, so the soldier might get shot, or bombed, or blown up, or maybe there will be a twisty ending; maybe he won't die - it's just a delusion, or maybe he dies just like in a story because he tries to escape his fate - perhaps you remember the story of the king who is visited by a wizard who says that the king's favourite horse will cause his death. The shocked king orders the horse immediately to be put out to pasture, years later it dies, and the king remembers the warning, he laughs and goes to the pasture with his cronies, they wander over to the skeletal remains joking about the stupid wizard as they go. When they get there the king kicks the horse's skull, immediately a highly venomous snake darts out from inside the skull and bites the king - who proceeds to die in agony.
So there I was reading and wandering what kind of twisty trick the author was going to play on me, the reader. After a while I decided to let the future be the future and focus instead on what was actually happening in the story. Well is a soldier travelling east, towards certain death, he has no weapon, he is sharing food with two comrades...sharing food is communion, they are also consuming the Holy Ghost in liquid form, they are telling stories - which is confession, the central character prays, and prays too for the Jews of any town that he becomes aware of - so we have a sense of sin and the necessity of what do you call it, making good ? Repentance? One of the men, he has senior military rank over the other two is involved in theft, he works in a military repair shop. And from the written off wrecks that they get back they manage to salvage enough good parts to make one new vehicle from every three old ones that they receive, these new machines then mysteriously find themselves on to the black market. He is returning to the front early from leave because when he got home he found his wife dressed in red pyjamas dancing on a table top with a Russian man watching (presumably some kind of forced labourer), hmm, so he is telling the younger man about a woman taken in adultery . And there is a Henkersmahlziet in Lemberg which functions both as a religious last supper and the literal final meal before execution.
So about half way through this little book it slowly dawned on me that this is all a bit...well, a bit religious, then as I mentioned in the updates the stopping points of this train, all big substantial towns, are described as stations which reminded me of the Stations of the Cross in Christian worship. Since my acquaintance with Christianity is mostly limited to taking the Lord's name in vain, I did have to resort to Wikipeadia for further detail on this, but the final journey of Jesus eastwards towards his inevitable and expected death has been divided into 14 stations, each of which is a particular event for the faithful to pray or meditate over. There certainly were a couple of parallels that I could spot - the division of the robes, or stripping of the garments (station 10) for instance.
ok then the issue was for me - do I think of Andreas as a Christ figure, the soldier as necessary sacrifice, or is this silly - if the Christian life is an imitation of Christ then all good, or at least striving, Christians are imitators of Christ, the stations of the cross then are both a way to draw closer to Christ through reflection and worship but also a mythical archetype of the last hours of human life.
Ok, so then again the issue was for me what does this mean in the context of a German story published in 1949? Are we being offered the stations of the cross as a way of processing the experience of war, the unarmed soldier is a lamb of God , a necessary sacrifice, the war dead are an atonement, walking, or in this case, reading the stations of the cross is a way of working towards understanding the sin and guilt that requires such loss.
October 11, 2016
دوستانِ گرانقدر، من از خواندنِ این کتاب لذت نبردم... با روحیهٔ ایرانی ها سازگار نیست... البته باز هم باید به این نکته اشاره کنم که ایرانی با ساکن ایران تفاوت های بسیار زیادی دارد... ایرانی اصیل همیشه امید به زندگی دارد.. اگر به اشعار فردوسی بزرگ دقت کنید متوجه میشوید که این بزرگمردِ میهن پرست، نه تنها درس اخلاق و ادب ایرانی را همچون "اوستا" مدام گوشزد میکند، بلکه شما را تشویق به زندگی و ایستادگی در برابرِ ظالم و تجاوزگر، میکند
و امّا در مورد این کتاب، اولین سؤالی که ممکن است برایتان ایجاد شود، این است که: چرا یک سربازِ جوان منتظر رسیدنِ مرگش میباشد؟؟... روندِ داستان در اواسط به من نوید این را میداد که پایان خوشی برایِ داستان متصور شوم.. چراکه به این موضوع اشاره داشت که سربازِ جوان یعنی <آندره> عاشق موسیقی و شادی میباشد... بعد در اواخرِ داستان با دختری سرزنده به نامِ <اولینا> آشنا میشود که پیانو مینوازد... یعنی همان چیزی که این سرباز جوان لازم دارد... ولی چرا باید پایان داستان ناامیدانه و تلخ باشد و اصلاً به ریشهٔ اصلی داستان ارتباط نداشته باشد!؟
بنظرم اشتباهی که <هانریش بل> در این داستان داشت این بود که: این نویسندهٔ بزرگ به این موضوع توجه نکرده بود که، وقتی انسانی آرزو و آمالِ گوناگونی در ذهنِ خویش دارد، نمیتواند ناامید باشد.. آرزو و نا امیدی در مقابل و برخلافِ یکدیگر قرار دارند.. در داستان، <آندره> میگوید: آخه چرا من همان کسی نیستم که او دوستش دارد؟ ......اگر میتوانستم فقط... فقط ... چشم های آن دیگری را داشته باشم، از تمام هستی خود دست میکشیدم
دوستان گرامی و خردمند، آیا ممکن است یکی در آرزوی وصال عشق باشد ولی هم زمان منتظر مرگ نیز باشد؟؟؟ میدانیم که منظور نویسنده عشق زمینی بوده است... پس چطور ممکن است که این جوان یعنی <آندره> تا این حد ناامیدانه در انتظار مرگ بنشیند؟؟... این را نیز میدانیم که "عشق" به همراه خودش امید به زندگی را می آورد، پس منطق میگوید که <آندره> باید به ادامهٔ زندگی امیدوار باشد، ولی در پایانِ داستان اینچنین نیست
بهتر است خودتان این داستان را بخوانید و از سرانجامِ آن آگاه شوید
امیدوارم همیشه شاد باشید و وجودتان سرشار از عشق و امید به زندگی باشد
<پیروز باشید و ایرانی>
و امّا در مورد این کتاب، اولین سؤالی که ممکن است برایتان ایجاد شود، این است که: چرا یک سربازِ جوان منتظر رسیدنِ مرگش میباشد؟؟... روندِ داستان در اواسط به من نوید این را میداد که پایان خوشی برایِ داستان متصور شوم.. چراکه به این موضوع اشاره داشت که سربازِ جوان یعنی <آندره> عاشق موسیقی و شادی میباشد... بعد در اواخرِ داستان با دختری سرزنده به نامِ <اولینا> آشنا میشود که پیانو مینوازد... یعنی همان چیزی که این سرباز جوان لازم دارد... ولی چرا باید پایان داستان ناامیدانه و تلخ باشد و اصلاً به ریشهٔ اصلی داستان ارتباط نداشته باشد!؟
بنظرم اشتباهی که <هانریش بل> در این داستان داشت این بود که: این نویسندهٔ بزرگ به این موضوع توجه نکرده بود که، وقتی انسانی آرزو و آمالِ گوناگونی در ذهنِ خویش دارد، نمیتواند ناامید باشد.. آرزو و نا امیدی در مقابل و برخلافِ یکدیگر قرار دارند.. در داستان، <آندره> میگوید: آخه چرا من همان کسی نیستم که او دوستش دارد؟ ......اگر میتوانستم فقط... فقط ... چشم های آن دیگری را داشته باشم، از تمام هستی خود دست میکشیدم
دوستان گرامی و خردمند، آیا ممکن است یکی در آرزوی وصال عشق باشد ولی هم زمان منتظر مرگ نیز باشد؟؟؟ میدانیم که منظور نویسنده عشق زمینی بوده است... پس چطور ممکن است که این جوان یعنی <آندره> تا این حد ناامیدانه در انتظار مرگ بنشیند؟؟... این را نیز میدانیم که "عشق" به همراه خودش امید به زندگی را می آورد، پس منطق میگوید که <آندره> باید به ادامهٔ زندگی امیدوار باشد، ولی در پایانِ داستان اینچنین نیست
بهتر است خودتان این داستان را بخوانید و از سرانجامِ آن آگاه شوید
امیدوارم همیشه شاد باشید و وجودتان سرشار از عشق و امید به زندگی باشد
<پیروز باشید و ایرانی>
February 7, 2019
This is a re-read of a book I first read 30 years ago.
It is 1943. The war is lost but Germany fights on. A soldier travels to the Eastern Front, knowing somehow that he travels to his death. This is not the painful realisation that he is unlikely to survive, but a knowledge of the exact time and place of his demise. He is resigned to his fate and in a strange way almost welcomes it.
A study of the futility of war and the way that soldiers cope, written by a man that had experienced what he has described. The ennui of an endless journey into danger in aid of a lost cause, punctuated by bouts of drinking, sleeping, whoring and interminable card games.
I found this a powerful and moving book. Odd in a sense in that we know the ending very early on.
Worth a read.
It is 1943. The war is lost but Germany fights on. A soldier travels to the Eastern Front, knowing somehow that he travels to his death. This is not the painful realisation that he is unlikely to survive, but a knowledge of the exact time and place of his demise. He is resigned to his fate and in a strange way almost welcomes it.
A study of the futility of war and the way that soldiers cope, written by a man that had experienced what he has described. The ennui of an endless journey into danger in aid of a lost cause, punctuated by bouts of drinking, sleeping, whoring and interminable card games.
I found this a powerful and moving book. Odd in a sense in that we know the ending very early on.
Worth a read.
May 26, 2017
هر مرگی جنایتی ست ،
هر مرگی در جنگ جنایتی ست ......
درد هایی در این دنیا هست به آن عظمت که دیگر در برابر آنها از اشک کاری ساخته نیست ...
هر مرگی در جنگ جنایتی ست ......
درد هایی در این دنیا هست به آن عظمت که دیگر در برابر آنها از اشک کاری ساخته نیست ...
August 12, 2019
Having now read all of the Booker longlisted books I can get my hands on, I am back to reading some that have been patiently sitting on the to read shelf for a few months. Böll has been a writer I felt I should have read for a while, and this early novella was my first experience.
The whole book is a test of the premise "what if I knew exactly when I was going to die". The book is mostly set on a German troop train in 1943, which is travelling from the Rheinland towards the front in eastern Poland over a few days. The narrator Andreas has a premonition, which he believes unshakably, that he will die somewhere between two Polish villages, at a time no more than four days away, and the book follows his thoughts and actions over those four days. He spends most of the journey in the company of two other soldiers, one of whom is determined to throw his money away after his wife has left him, mostly on food, alcohol and women.
The journey involves two changes of train in Poland, allowing the last night to be spent in the Galician capital Lvov, .
The whole vision is a rather impressive but bleak one, and I will definitely consider reading more.
The whole book is a test of the premise "what if I knew exactly when I was going to die". The book is mostly set on a German troop train in 1943, which is travelling from the Rheinland towards the front in eastern Poland over a few days. The narrator Andreas has a premonition, which he believes unshakably, that he will die somewhere between two Polish villages, at a time no more than four days away, and the book follows his thoughts and actions over those four days. He spends most of the journey in the company of two other soldiers, one of whom is determined to throw his money away after his wife has left him, mostly on food, alcohol and women.
The journey involves two changes of train in Poland, allowing the last night to be spent in the Galician capital Lvov, .
The whole vision is a rather impressive but bleak one, and I will definitely consider reading more.
August 28, 2023
“ He was still dreaming, his face was all dreams, and his eyes had no longer that nasty slimy look; there was something childlike about them, and that might have been because he had a real dream, had been genuinely happy. Happiness washes away many things, just as suffering washes away many things.”
Though in his dream he was happy, in real he was fearful, fearful of his impending death, and throughout this train journey he was fearful, even at the later moment when he tried to console his soul in the company of that prostitute Olina, he was fearful, so fearful that he could not effectuate!
This was the second book of my German endeavor this month, After reading 'Thomas Mann two days back, Heinrich Boll, gave me a much-needed augment, “Buck up kid!", as if the author said to me after I finished this one. If reading a new author fills me with contentment, this is always a thing to remember with a sense of pride. Picking up a book randomly and then getting a winner is a nice game of luck and crack. You can call it the smugness of a reader!
I also recalled my last year's reading Of Alone in Berlin, which had made a convincing impact on me.
The plot was too tight; a young man, some of his co-passengers, a train, a prostitute, and the fear of that man.
What else?
Nothing,
you don’t need much stuff to write a story.
He wrote it beautifully.
In fact, the fear was no less personified throughout the plot, so ‘fear’ was also sitting near the window seat of the train along with him all the time, as if twirling its dreary mustache. The fear of death is entwined with desolation and despair when there is going on a WAR outside.
“Soon I am going to die, I’ll never see that tree again, that russet tree over there by that green house, I’ll never see that girl wheeling that bike again, the girl in the yellow dress with the black hair, these things that the train is racing past, I’ll never see any of them again…”
Andreas was his name, a young German soldier on a train journey, and the author has portrayed his inner conflict and fear in such an evocative manner that I could not put it down. Like a smooth thread being reeled off, the events will flash and die inside the memory of the protagonist, and the author escorted it from his mind to the mind of the reader in such figurative language. It was metaphorically rich text. The second part, where Andreas is with a prostitute, was written nicely, in that part I found the emotions between them were evoked gently, yet they could not propel that self-indulgent tenderness that I was expecting.
This was an evocative read with high emblematic value for me, a story that dealt with human emotions and fear of death in a war-like situation, A haunting novella!
December 23, 2025
Ein Soldat fährt nach dem Ende des Fronturlaubs 1943 zurück an die Ostfront. Er ist fest davon überzeugt, dass er dort fallen wird. Ähnlich wie der Zug die Soldaten in den Tod führt, wurden auch die Juden nach Osten gefahren. Rauchen, Essen, Alkohol ist die einzige Beschäftigung, die 3 Soldaten zusammenführt. Kurz vor der Ankunft trifft er in einem Bordell eine Prostituierte, die für den polnischen Widerstand spioniert. Die Erzählung hat ein offenes Ende. Den Tod fest vor Augen, in diese Situation kann ich mich nicht wirklich einfühlen. Das kleine Buch ergreift einen Leser.
October 15, 2015
این کتاب اولین اثر هانریش بل در زمینه رمان کوتاه به شمار میرود.این کتاب بیشتر جنبه اعتراضی به جنگ دارد نه حماسه وقهرمان پروری وتک وایه گویی های شخصیت تنهای قصه بل در جابه جای قصه نمود های زیبایی دارند کتاب پر از است اشتیاق به زندگی واحساسات ضد ونقیض یک ادم .مثل تنهایی وترس ..ترس از مرگ ....کتاب پر است از دردهای مشترک بشریت .اندریاس قصه هانریش بل جوانکی بیست وچند ساله است که جنگ باعث شده به اندازه تمام عمر تجربه اندوخته باشد .هانریش بل در این رمان با خطی مستیم مارا به همذات پنداری عمیقی با اندریاس وا میدارد وچهره کریه جنگ وپوچی ایده های نازیسم را به خوبی بیان میکند .در این رمان کوتاه او ادمهایی را به تصویر میکشد که هیچ منفعتی در جنگ برایشان نبوده وتنها لگد مال شدن روح وجسم برایشان مانده که حتی ممکن است تا نسلها تاوان انرا پس دهند ...
March 17, 2017
موضوعِ مرگ و سوالی که برای همه هست که بزودی خواهم مرد، این موضوعی است که بعد از خواندن کتاب درگیر آن می شویم. اینکه بدانی خواهی مرد و آنگاه نگاهت به جهان چکونه خواهد بود. آن هم از منظر یک سرباز آلمانی در جنگ جهانی دوم. و شاید تنها را چاره عشق باشد. حتی عشق افلاطونی یک فاحشه.
March 24, 2023
Heinrich Böll hat schon in diesem frühen Werk eine Sprache, der man sich ob der eindringlichen Bilder und der dadurch geschaffenen Atmosphäre nicht entziehen kann. Er beschreibt die Reise des jungen Soldaten Andreas mit dem Zug an die Ostfront. Es ist 1943. Andreas ist überzeugt, dass er im Krieg sterben wird. Die dreitägige Reise, die Bekanntschaften, das Spielen, das Trinken, der Bordellbesuch sind Gegenstand der Handlung. Gedanken über Sterben, Liebe, Religion oder Macht werden in diese Handlung eingeflochten.
Heinrich Böll versteht es wie kaum ein anderer die Generation der jungen Kriegsteilnehmer in einem Satz mit einem beeindruckendem Bild zu illustrieren: "Sie sind alle arme, graue, hungrige, verführte und betrogene Kinder, und ihre Wiege, das sind die Züge, die Fronturlauberzüge, die Rak-Tak-Bums machen und sie einschläfern." Sätze wie diese wirken auf mich einerseits sehr nüchtern, andererseits sind sie aber auch von einer tiefen Menschlichkeit durchdrungen.
Das Buch wird als Erzählung bezeichnet. Heute würden die in meiner Ausgabe (dtv; 8. Auflage von 1976; 3,80 DM) eng bedruckten 124 Seiten locker als Roman durchgehen. Es war das erste Werk Bölls, das veröffentlicht worden ist, und zwar im Jahr 1949. Auch knapp 75 Jahre später kann ich es mit voller Überzeugung zur Lektüre empfehlen.
Heinrich Böll versteht es wie kaum ein anderer die Generation der jungen Kriegsteilnehmer in einem Satz mit einem beeindruckendem Bild zu illustrieren: "Sie sind alle arme, graue, hungrige, verführte und betrogene Kinder, und ihre Wiege, das sind die Züge, die Fronturlauberzüge, die Rak-Tak-Bums machen und sie einschläfern." Sätze wie diese wirken auf mich einerseits sehr nüchtern, andererseits sind sie aber auch von einer tiefen Menschlichkeit durchdrungen.
Das Buch wird als Erzählung bezeichnet. Heute würden die in meiner Ausgabe (dtv; 8. Auflage von 1976; 3,80 DM) eng bedruckten 124 Seiten locker als Roman durchgehen. Es war das erste Werk Bölls, das veröffentlicht worden ist, und zwar im Jahr 1949. Auch knapp 75 Jahre später kann ich es mit voller Überzeugung zur Lektüre empfehlen.
May 30, 2019
جوان بیچارهای که عازم جبهه جنگه و در تمام طول مسیر به این فکر میکنه که قراره خیلی زود بمیره :( اون جرات هیچکاریو نداره حتی عاشق شدن چون قراره خیلی زود بمیره...
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September 25, 2015
I have spent much of my life, from around ten or eleven years old, looking for the answer, for something that would provide relief and allow me to, not exactly reconcile myself with The Fear, but at least be able to cope with those times when it sits on my chest and holds me down and pummels me in the face. Which is most days really. For years my relationship with The Fear – which for other people may mean a number of things but which for me is a fear of dying – has involved extreme panic attacks. During these attacks, which I would describe as being motivated by The Genuine Belief That One Day I Will Definitely Die, I will howl inhumanly, and tear at my hair, literally grab great chunks of hair and yank at them like an overzealous, inexperienced fisherman yanks at his rod when he sees his float disappear under the surface of the pond’s water. And I will scream, actually scream into the palms of my hands, and writhe and kick and squirm. When The Fear really takes hold, when I truly believed that at some point I am going to cease to exist – because it is a different thing to say it or know it than it is to truly believe it – it is like my head, my body, my Self, is going to suffer a kind of irrevocable breakdown, a Twin Towers-like collapse, and the writhing, the screaming, the kicking, etc is a sort of existential battle for survival, is my Self trading blows with The Fear. If anyone was ever to see me in this state, which they wouldn’t of course because The Fear is a canny bastard who will only ever step to a guy when he is at his most alone and vulnerable, they’d think, understandably, that I was possessed.
All of which should go some way to explaining why Heinrich Böll’s The Train Was on Time, which is, on the most basic level, the story of a young man who is absolutely certain that the train he is on is taking him to his death, has been an uncomfortable, and yet at times strangely comforting, reading experience for me. The novel is set in 1943, and features a German infantryman, Andreas, who is bound for the Eastern front [specifically Poland]. In these circumstances, having a premonition of one’s death is not exactly a flight of fancy. Indeed, Andreas had already come close to the ultimate departure once before, in Amiens, France. Unfortunately for him, the situation, for the Germans, has significantly worsened since then, so that losing the war seems likely. One must bear in mind that one’s chances of survival when on the winning side are, at best, in the balance, but when on the losing side? Well…
[German soldiers during WW2, waiting to board a train]
To be a soldier during wartime is to be in an extraordinary predicament, because, regardless of how that war is justified, whether it be in the name of freedom or democracy or whatever, for the people who are actively involved in it, it is literally a fight for life, a battle to stay alive; it is a state of affairs whereby death isn’t simply keeping an eye on you, it is aggressively stalking your heels. To spend weeks, months, years in such a situation must be horribly taxing. Therefore, it is no surprise that soldiers are often mentally damaged by the experience; and there is certainly evidence of that where Andreas is concerned. He is obsessively focussed on certain incidents, replaying them in his mind; he worries that he isn’t praying enough, and when he does pray it is often for the Jews; he frequently wants to cry but cannot; and, as already noted, he is convinced that his death is coming, yet not at some unspecified point in time, but on a specific day, in a specific place.
For me, Böll handles all this with great sensitivity, intelligence and skill. On the surface, the book is written in the third person, but large parts of it are actually given over to Andreas’ internal monologues. In the beginning, he is terribly afraid, he panics…it is an animal reaction, a feeling that goes beyond reason. He is tormented by the word ‘soon.’ Soon. Soon. Soon. Soon. “What a terrible word,” he thinks to himself. When is soon? Soon is uncertain, it is imprecise, it is a black hole, a nothing. Like death itself. And so, almost in order to comfort himself, to be able to get a handle on death, to make it concrete, to give himself something to hold onto, he convinces himself that his death will take place on a Sunday, between Lvov and Cernauti. He makes the uncertain certain. There is something, I think, in the unknown, in nothingness, that we simply cannot bear, because, I guess, we cannot comprehend it. I have been spending time with terminally ill people recently, and there is, in my limited experience, a kind of calmness that descends when death stops being this thing that might grab you unawares, and instead comes to sit beside you.
Once death is certain, and no longer soon, Andreas’ panic subsides somewhat [which is not, by the way, the same as saying that he becomes entirely reconciled to the fate that he believes is his] and he becomes wistful and melancholy, thinking about the places he has been unable to visit, about how he will never again see the girl who serves him coffee. In this way, The Train Was on Time, as with all worthwhile literature, is universal, because we all experience the transitory nature of existence, even if we do not always link that experience to death. Whenever I am on a train I will spend some time looking out of the window, and I am always struck by a painful feeling, an understanding that I will never again see what I am seeing, that even if I take the same train, at the same time, travelling the same route, the sights will not be exactly the same. No single second of your life can ever be repeated; to all intents and purposes, you die thousands of times a day.
For a novel so preoccupied with death it is not surprising that there is a sense of wanting to escape running through it. In addition to Andreas, there are two other major characters, Willi and a blonde officer. The three men come together when Andreas is asked if he wants to play a game of cards. Of course, for the young infantryman the game, and the company, is not about avoiding boredom, as it might be for us, but about keeping busy, taking his minds off things, off, specifically, the fact that he is likely hurtling towards his final resting place. However, death itself is also a kind of escape, or it could be viewed in that way, especially if one’s life is intolerable. In the case of Willi and the blonde officer, they could be said to be running towards war, towards death, rather than away from it, as one struggles with the break up of his marriage and the other with having once been sexually abused. In fact, Willi drinks large quantities of alcohol, which, of course, also provides an escape from reality, albeit only in the short-term.
In conclusion, I seem to recall the translator and critic Michael Hofmann once writing disparagingly of Heinrich Böll, and I seldom see his work [Böll’s] in lists of great German novels. On this basis, he probably qualifies as underrated. I do not think he ever hit the heights of someone like, say, Thomas Mann or the Austrian Robert Musil, but I have yet to be disappointed with any of his books. However, I ought to point out that, in the early stages, the transitions between third person narrative and the internal monologue are a little clunky to say the least, and that I wasn’t won over by the opening scene in which Andreas speaks to a clergyman on the platform about his desire to avoid death, but these are minor quibbles overall. The Train Was on Time, which was Böll’s first published work, written when in his early thirties, is fascinating, and often beautiful and moving. Indeed, there is a passage about how the searchlights in the night air resemble fingers seeking out someone that will stay with me for a long time.
All of which should go some way to explaining why Heinrich Böll’s The Train Was on Time, which is, on the most basic level, the story of a young man who is absolutely certain that the train he is on is taking him to his death, has been an uncomfortable, and yet at times strangely comforting, reading experience for me. The novel is set in 1943, and features a German infantryman, Andreas, who is bound for the Eastern front [specifically Poland]. In these circumstances, having a premonition of one’s death is not exactly a flight of fancy. Indeed, Andreas had already come close to the ultimate departure once before, in Amiens, France. Unfortunately for him, the situation, for the Germans, has significantly worsened since then, so that losing the war seems likely. One must bear in mind that one’s chances of survival when on the winning side are, at best, in the balance, but when on the losing side? Well…
[German soldiers during WW2, waiting to board a train]
To be a soldier during wartime is to be in an extraordinary predicament, because, regardless of how that war is justified, whether it be in the name of freedom or democracy or whatever, for the people who are actively involved in it, it is literally a fight for life, a battle to stay alive; it is a state of affairs whereby death isn’t simply keeping an eye on you, it is aggressively stalking your heels. To spend weeks, months, years in such a situation must be horribly taxing. Therefore, it is no surprise that soldiers are often mentally damaged by the experience; and there is certainly evidence of that where Andreas is concerned. He is obsessively focussed on certain incidents, replaying them in his mind; he worries that he isn’t praying enough, and when he does pray it is often for the Jews; he frequently wants to cry but cannot; and, as already noted, he is convinced that his death is coming, yet not at some unspecified point in time, but on a specific day, in a specific place.
“He could no longer say, no longer even think: “I don’t want to die.” As often as he tried to form the sentence he thought: I’m going to die…soon.”
For me, Böll handles all this with great sensitivity, intelligence and skill. On the surface, the book is written in the third person, but large parts of it are actually given over to Andreas’ internal monologues. In the beginning, he is terribly afraid, he panics…it is an animal reaction, a feeling that goes beyond reason. He is tormented by the word ‘soon.’ Soon. Soon. Soon. Soon. “What a terrible word,” he thinks to himself. When is soon? Soon is uncertain, it is imprecise, it is a black hole, a nothing. Like death itself. And so, almost in order to comfort himself, to be able to get a handle on death, to make it concrete, to give himself something to hold onto, he convinces himself that his death will take place on a Sunday, between Lvov and Cernauti. He makes the uncertain certain. There is something, I think, in the unknown, in nothingness, that we simply cannot bear, because, I guess, we cannot comprehend it. I have been spending time with terminally ill people recently, and there is, in my limited experience, a kind of calmness that descends when death stops being this thing that might grab you unawares, and instead comes to sit beside you.
Once death is certain, and no longer soon, Andreas’ panic subsides somewhat [which is not, by the way, the same as saying that he becomes entirely reconciled to the fate that he believes is his] and he becomes wistful and melancholy, thinking about the places he has been unable to visit, about how he will never again see the girl who serves him coffee. In this way, The Train Was on Time, as with all worthwhile literature, is universal, because we all experience the transitory nature of existence, even if we do not always link that experience to death. Whenever I am on a train I will spend some time looking out of the window, and I am always struck by a painful feeling, an understanding that I will never again see what I am seeing, that even if I take the same train, at the same time, travelling the same route, the sights will not be exactly the same. No single second of your life can ever be repeated; to all intents and purposes, you die thousands of times a day.
“That’s something no one would ever be able to understand, why I don’t take the next train back to her… why don’t I? No one would ever be able to understand that. But I’m scared of that innocence… and I love her very much, and I’m going to die, and all she’ll ever get from me now will be an official letter saying: Fallen for Greater Germany…”
For a novel so preoccupied with death it is not surprising that there is a sense of wanting to escape running through it. In addition to Andreas, there are two other major characters, Willi and a blonde officer. The three men come together when Andreas is asked if he wants to play a game of cards. Of course, for the young infantryman the game, and the company, is not about avoiding boredom, as it might be for us, but about keeping busy, taking his minds off things, off, specifically, the fact that he is likely hurtling towards his final resting place. However, death itself is also a kind of escape, or it could be viewed in that way, especially if one’s life is intolerable. In the case of Willi and the blonde officer, they could be said to be running towards war, towards death, rather than away from it, as one struggles with the break up of his marriage and the other with having once been sexually abused. In fact, Willi drinks large quantities of alcohol, which, of course, also provides an escape from reality, albeit only in the short-term.
In conclusion, I seem to recall the translator and critic Michael Hofmann once writing disparagingly of Heinrich Böll, and I seldom see his work [Böll’s] in lists of great German novels. On this basis, he probably qualifies as underrated. I do not think he ever hit the heights of someone like, say, Thomas Mann or the Austrian Robert Musil, but I have yet to be disappointed with any of his books. However, I ought to point out that, in the early stages, the transitions between third person narrative and the internal monologue are a little clunky to say the least, and that I wasn’t won over by the opening scene in which Andreas speaks to a clergyman on the platform about his desire to avoid death, but these are minor quibbles overall. The Train Was on Time, which was Böll’s first published work, written when in his early thirties, is fascinating, and often beautiful and moving. Indeed, there is a passage about how the searchlights in the night air resemble fingers seeking out someone that will stay with me for a long time.
October 17, 2024
“But I'm standing here by the window and I feel as if I were made of lead. I can't move, I feel paralyzed, this train is part of me and I'm part of the train, this train that has to carry me to my appointed end, and the strange part about it is that I have absolutely no desire to get out here…” p17
Heinrich Böll’s “The Train was on Time”, reads like a meditation on death, or is it a meditation on life after death, as it narrates the story of Andreas, German soldier towards the end of World War 2. As Andreas boards the train destined to take him and his comrades to Eastern Europe… Przemysl, onto Lvov and ultimately Cernauti, he has a premonition that he is going to die in five days time, the train hurtling him towards his final destination.
This story is particularly poignant when I realise that Böll is German, drafted into the Nazi Wehrmacht, ultimately becoming a prisoner of war in an American camp. The book was published shortly after the end of the war, in the face of Germany’s defeat. It is a sobering and stark narrative that serves to reinforce the demise of the Nazi war machine and that the inevitable end for German soldiers was death.
While there are so many possible topics emanating from this book, the glaring one is the notion of what is it like to face your own death, to somehow have the knowledge of your imminent fate and what influence does that have on actions, thoughts, feelings? It’s a question that many have faced looking down the barrel of a terminal condition etc, but to somehow be ordained with the knowledge of the exact date and time of your death, knowing that is ‘this week’ - what impact does that have?
“Soon I'm going to die. At first it was certain, but far off; certain, but unclear, and it's been getting steadily narrower and narrower, already it's narrowed down to a few miles of road and two days away, and every turn of these wheels brings me closer.” P34
I kind of like that for Andreas, the impact is such that he still eats, sleeps, and does things that he questions and wonders why he would do such menial things when he is facing such a destiny.
“.. I've known since
Wednesday . .. and I've done nothing, I know it with absolute certainty, and I've hardly prayed any more than usual. I played cards.
I drank. I ate and really enjoyed my food, and I slept. I slept too much, and time has leaped forwards, time always leaps forwards, and now here I am only twenty-four hours away from it. I've done nothing: after all, when you know you're going to die you have all kinds of things to settle, to regret, prayers to say, many prayers to say, and I've prayed hardly any more than I usually do.” P54
The book kind of ambles along in an unstructured way, the trajectory being the railway line and the ultimate destination both geographical and metaphorical. He meets Willi, the unshaven man and the blond younger man.. each of whom he connects with in an authentic way as far as he can on a train when each is hurtling to some destination as a broken and changed war casualty. The idealised love of his life that actually existed for a tenth of a second in a glance from a girl in Paris becomes an overwhelming feeling and thought for him, both satisfying and regretful.
Finally he meets Olina, a prostitute in a brothel and there he finds the ost meaning, learning how to love without desire. It is a lesson that is so meaningful and comes right at the end of the five days and his life…. Or does it.
Beautiful and poignant read.
Heinrich Böll’s “The Train was on Time”, reads like a meditation on death, or is it a meditation on life after death, as it narrates the story of Andreas, German soldier towards the end of World War 2. As Andreas boards the train destined to take him and his comrades to Eastern Europe… Przemysl, onto Lvov and ultimately Cernauti, he has a premonition that he is going to die in five days time, the train hurtling him towards his final destination.
This story is particularly poignant when I realise that Böll is German, drafted into the Nazi Wehrmacht, ultimately becoming a prisoner of war in an American camp. The book was published shortly after the end of the war, in the face of Germany’s defeat. It is a sobering and stark narrative that serves to reinforce the demise of the Nazi war machine and that the inevitable end for German soldiers was death.
While there are so many possible topics emanating from this book, the glaring one is the notion of what is it like to face your own death, to somehow have the knowledge of your imminent fate and what influence does that have on actions, thoughts, feelings? It’s a question that many have faced looking down the barrel of a terminal condition etc, but to somehow be ordained with the knowledge of the exact date and time of your death, knowing that is ‘this week’ - what impact does that have?
“Soon I'm going to die. At first it was certain, but far off; certain, but unclear, and it's been getting steadily narrower and narrower, already it's narrowed down to a few miles of road and two days away, and every turn of these wheels brings me closer.” P34
I kind of like that for Andreas, the impact is such that he still eats, sleeps, and does things that he questions and wonders why he would do such menial things when he is facing such a destiny.
“.. I've known since
Wednesday . .. and I've done nothing, I know it with absolute certainty, and I've hardly prayed any more than usual. I played cards.
I drank. I ate and really enjoyed my food, and I slept. I slept too much, and time has leaped forwards, time always leaps forwards, and now here I am only twenty-four hours away from it. I've done nothing: after all, when you know you're going to die you have all kinds of things to settle, to regret, prayers to say, many prayers to say, and I've prayed hardly any more than I usually do.” P54
The book kind of ambles along in an unstructured way, the trajectory being the railway line and the ultimate destination both geographical and metaphorical. He meets Willi, the unshaven man and the blond younger man.. each of whom he connects with in an authentic way as far as he can on a train when each is hurtling to some destination as a broken and changed war casualty. The idealised love of his life that actually existed for a tenth of a second in a glance from a girl in Paris becomes an overwhelming feeling and thought for him, both satisfying and regretful.
Finally he meets Olina, a prostitute in a brothel and there he finds the ost meaning, learning how to love without desire. It is a lesson that is so meaningful and comes right at the end of the five days and his life…. Or does it.
Beautiful and poignant read.
March 30, 2022
2.5 ⭐
کتا�� قطار سر وقت یا در ترجمهی دیگه قطار به موقع رسید، داستان یک سرباز آلمانی است که از جایی که مشخص نیست کجاست میدونه چه روزی میمیره، روزی که چند روز بیشتر بهش باقی نمونده و با کلمهی کلیدی به زودی توی داستان باهاش بازی میشه. من به زودی میمیرم، به زودی به زودی
هاینریش بل به نظر میاد خواسته بگه که در جنگ حتی سربازهای کشور مهاجم هم مورد ظلم واقع شده و نیازمند دلسوزی و ترحم هستند.
داستان از سه قسمت مشخص ولی در هم تنیده تشکیل شده، قسمت اول تنهایی سرباز آلمانی آندریاس، قسمت دوم آشنایی و بازی و گفتگوی اون با دو نفر دیگه در قطار و گوش دادن به داستان اونها ولی در انتها آشنایی با دختری جاسوس در فاحشه خانهای در لهستان و درگیری ماجرای عشقی.
چیزی که در داستان به وفور میشه دید احساس پشیمانی و شرم از جنگ توسط نویسنده هست و چیزی که وجود نداره امید. داستان جالب و عمیق اما گاه گاه با چیره شدن کسالت به خواننده پیش میره. در مجموع امتیاز من به این کتاب کمتر از ۳ هست و بیشتر از ۲ ولی خب نیم نداریم منم دلرحم، همون سه
کتا�� قطار سر وقت یا در ترجمهی دیگه قطار به موقع رسید، داستان یک سرباز آلمانی است که از جایی که مشخص نیست کجاست میدونه چه روزی میمیره، روزی که چند روز بیشتر بهش باقی نمونده و با کلمهی کلیدی به زودی توی داستان باهاش بازی میشه. من به زودی میمیرم، به زودی به زودی
هاینریش بل به نظر میاد خواسته بگه که در جنگ حتی سربازهای کشور مهاجم هم مورد ظلم واقع شده و نیازمند دلسوزی و ترحم هستند.
داستان از سه قسمت مشخص ولی در هم تنیده تشکیل شده، قسمت اول تنهایی سرباز آلمانی آندریاس، قسمت دوم آشنایی و بازی و گفتگوی اون با دو نفر دیگه در قطار و گوش دادن به داستان اونها ولی در انتها آشنایی با دختری جاسوس در فاحشه خانهای در لهستان و درگیری ماجرای عشقی.
چیزی که در داستان به وفور میشه دید احساس پشیمانی و شرم از جنگ توسط نویسنده هست و چیزی که وجود نداره امید. داستان جالب و عمیق اما گاه گاه با چیره شدن کسالت به خواننده پیش میره. در مجموع امتیاز من به این کتاب کمتر از ۳ هست و بیشتر از ۲ ولی خب نیم نداریم منم دلرحم، همون سه
April 14, 2023
هاینریش بل در این کتاب که ظاهرا اولین رمان این نویسنده هم هست چهرهی زشت و خشن جنگ رو با استفاده از توصیف حالات روحی سربازی آلمانی به نام آندرئاس و گاها مرور خاطرات تاریک و عذاب آورش که زادهی جنگ هستند و عشق او به یک جاسوس دشمن به تصویر میکشد.
متاسفانه ترجمه زیاد جالب نبود و داستان یه جاهایی به شدت کسل کننده میشه به همین خاطر بیشتر از 2 ستاره نمیتونم بهش بدم.
متاسفانه ترجمه زیاد جالب نبود و داستان یه جاهایی به شدت کسل کننده میشه به همین خاطر بیشتر از 2 ستاره نمیتونم بهش بدم.
June 28, 2011
my first heinrich boll; good stuff! reminded me some of anna kavan's Ice, though much more realistic. also it was strange that i read it after The Driver's Seat, as the two had very similar storylines... person travels in a straight line toward death, unwilling and/or unable to turn aside. not scathing like the driver's seat, however... sadder, haunted, beautiful.
there's a quality about post-war european books i really love; they have this air of profundity which i guess is a product of exhaustion and disillusionment; they make modern books seem histrionic.
(picked up The Clown at the same time. these melville house re-releases are beautiful. i was halfway through before i suddenly realized those shapes on the cover were a train.)
there's a quality about post-war european books i really love; they have this air of profundity which i guess is a product of exhaustion and disillusionment; they make modern books seem histrionic.
(picked up The Clown at the same time. these melville house re-releases are beautiful. i was halfway through before i suddenly realized those shapes on the cover were a train.)
September 2, 2022
هاینریش بُل رو با این کتابش بشناسید
هاینریش امشب سرنماز برات از خدا آرامش طلب میکنم و شایدم قطره ایی خون دخترکت بجای اشک رو گونم حس کنم
هاینریش امشب سرنماز برات از خدا آرامش طلب میکنم و شایدم قطره ایی خون دخترکت بجای اشک رو گونم حس کنم
May 28, 2020
"جنگ آدمهاي ساده لوح را غصه دار مي کند، تا آدمهايي به شادي برسند که خودشان هم نمي دانند چه چيزي خوشحالشان مي کند."
جنگ چيز خوبي نيست...همين.
جنگ چيز خوبي نيست...همين.
July 21, 2009
This is the first novel, written in 1947, by Nobelist Heinrich Böll, who had served in the German army for six years during WWII. The story takes place in 1944 during the five-day train ride of a young soldier from leave in Germany to the Russian front and certain death. The trip is spent inside the protagonist’s mind as he tries to figure out exactly where and when he will be killed, and as he flashes back on his brief life, especially on his one “love”—a pair of beautiful eyes (“the Eyes”) he glimpsed in France just before he was wounded for the first time and which have haunted him ever since. His ruminations and rollercoaster emotions interplay with the sights and sounds and smells of the troop train, and with his relationship with two train-met companions, fellow soldiers who also know they are doomed. Finally he figures out that he will be killed early Sunday morning in Poland between Lvov and Cherovtsky. He is right; but it happens in a somewhat improbable way.
This is a horrors-of-war book, in which a young man with artistic aspirations (he wanted to be a pianist) who knows that Hitler is a madman and the war is lost, is drawn inexorably and sometimes even passionately to a meaningless death. It is a good but gloomy read. Samples of the writing:
Our eyes met and mingled for a tenth of a second, perhaps it was even less than that, and I can’t forget her eyes. For three-and-a-half years I could not help thinking of her—and I’ve not been able to forget her. Only a tenth of a second or less and I don’t know her name or anything else about her. All I know is her eyes, her soft, sad eyes, the color of sand after rain. Unhappy eyes, with much of animal and everything of woman in them. Eyes that I have never, never forgotten, not for a single day in three and a half years.
Life is good, he thought. At least it was good. Twelve hours before I die I realize that life is good. That is too late. I have been ungrateful to Providence. I have denied the existence of human happiness. And now I know that life was good…. I have suffered every second I have worn this ghastly uniform. They have destroyed me with their deadly army chatter and they have made me literally shed my blood on their battlefields…. And I’ve seen nothing but filth and blood and excrement and smelled nothing but dirt, and heard nothing but groans of misery and bawdy talk. Only for a fraction of a second have I known real human love, the love of man and woman, which must be something beautiful—only for a tenth of a second. And now twelve hours, or eleven hours, before I die, I have to realize that life is good.
This is a horrors-of-war book, in which a young man with artistic aspirations (he wanted to be a pianist) who knows that Hitler is a madman and the war is lost, is drawn inexorably and sometimes even passionately to a meaningless death. It is a good but gloomy read. Samples of the writing:
Our eyes met and mingled for a tenth of a second, perhaps it was even less than that, and I can’t forget her eyes. For three-and-a-half years I could not help thinking of her—and I’ve not been able to forget her. Only a tenth of a second or less and I don’t know her name or anything else about her. All I know is her eyes, her soft, sad eyes, the color of sand after rain. Unhappy eyes, with much of animal and everything of woman in them. Eyes that I have never, never forgotten, not for a single day in three and a half years.
Life is good, he thought. At least it was good. Twelve hours before I die I realize that life is good. That is too late. I have been ungrateful to Providence. I have denied the existence of human happiness. And now I know that life was good…. I have suffered every second I have worn this ghastly uniform. They have destroyed me with their deadly army chatter and they have made me literally shed my blood on their battlefields…. And I’ve seen nothing but filth and blood and excrement and smelled nothing but dirt, and heard nothing but groans of misery and bawdy talk. Only for a fraction of a second have I known real human love, the love of man and woman, which must be something beautiful—only for a tenth of a second. And now twelve hours, or eleven hours, before I die, I have to realize that life is good.
September 11, 2019
Actual rating 2.5/5 stars.
Before picking this book up I had never heard of Heinrich Boll before. Upon reading the introduction I discovered that he was an extraordinary man who also won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1970. He lived through the turbulence of WWII, losing one child during it, and originally refused to join the Hitler Youth. He was later conscripted to the infantry before deserting after receiving four bullet wounds. Many aspects of this book, especially the thoughts and actions of young soldiers during wartime, could conceivably be autobiographical.
Almost the entire narrative takes place inside the mind of protagonist, twenty four-year-old German solider Andreas. He confronts the probable imminence of his own death as he travels, largely via troop train, to the Eastern front. The word ‘soon’ reverberates throughout the entire length of the novella and tinges every actions with the certainty of the future, or lack of it, that he faces.
I begun this poignant short story absolutely enraptured. Boll’s creation provides the reader with the human face of war. Andreas stands for all soldiers, who are forced to fight for the glory of death and of serving the Fuhrer, yet are guiltily stricken by the thoughts of their imminent demise.
Despite worshipful of the premise, enjoying the narrative style, and acknowledging the importance of a story such as this, I failed to continue on with my early adoration. Thoughts and motions were very repetitive, which I believe may have been a deliberate decision, but it failed to continue to incite my interest. For me, this would have been a stellar read, if only made at half the length.
Before picking this book up I had never heard of Heinrich Boll before. Upon reading the introduction I discovered that he was an extraordinary man who also won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1970. He lived through the turbulence of WWII, losing one child during it, and originally refused to join the Hitler Youth. He was later conscripted to the infantry before deserting after receiving four bullet wounds. Many aspects of this book, especially the thoughts and actions of young soldiers during wartime, could conceivably be autobiographical.
Almost the entire narrative takes place inside the mind of protagonist, twenty four-year-old German solider Andreas. He confronts the probable imminence of his own death as he travels, largely via troop train, to the Eastern front. The word ‘soon’ reverberates throughout the entire length of the novella and tinges every actions with the certainty of the future, or lack of it, that he faces.
I begun this poignant short story absolutely enraptured. Boll’s creation provides the reader with the human face of war. Andreas stands for all soldiers, who are forced to fight for the glory of death and of serving the Fuhrer, yet are guiltily stricken by the thoughts of their imminent demise.
Despite worshipful of the premise, enjoying the narrative style, and acknowledging the importance of a story such as this, I failed to continue on with my early adoration. Thoughts and motions were very repetitive, which I believe may have been a deliberate decision, but it failed to continue to incite my interest. For me, this would have been a stellar read, if only made at half the length.
September 5, 2018
Δεύτερο βιβλίο του Χάινριχ Μπελ που διαβάζω, μετά το πολύ καλό "Η χαμένη τιμή της Κατερίνας Μπλουμ" που διάβασα τον Νοέμβριο του 2011. Μιας και πέρασαν τόσα χρόνια από τότε, ουσιαστικά είναι σαν να διαβάζω για πρώτη φορά βιβλίο του. Η όλη ιστορία διαδραματίζεται το 1944 και πρωταγωνιστής της είναι ο Αντρέας, ένας νεαρός στρατιώτης που ταξιδεύει με το τρένο από τη Γερμανία για το Ανατολικό Μέτωπο, όντας σίγουρος ότι θα πεθάνει σύντομα, κάπου στην Πολωνία, ανάμεσα σε δυο περιοχές. Εμείς γινόμαστε μάρτυρες όλων όσων σκέφτεται ο νεαρός για τη ζωή και το μέλλον του, με τον συγγραφέα να μας δίνει με δραματικό τρόπο να καταλάβουμε πως ήταν να είσαι στρατιώτης και να πηγαίνεις στο μέτωπο του πολέμου, από τη στιγμή κιόλας που δεν έχεις προλάβει ουσιαστικά να ζήσεις και να γευτείς όλες τις χαρές της ζωής. Πρόκειται για ένα μάλλον πεσιμιστικό έργο, καθόλου ευχάριστο, που δίνει όμως τροφή για σκέψη και προβληματισμό, ενώ φυσικά η γραφή είναι πραγματικά πάρα πολύ καλή, με μια αφήγηση χειμαρρώδη και εξαιρετικά εθιστική.
June 11, 2015
چند ساله دارم فکر میکنم چرا عقاید یک دلقک رو نتونستم تموم کنم، این کتاب رو برداشتم که گامی باشه به شروع مجدد عقاید یک دلقک، اما به نصف کتاب نرسیده باز خواستم این رو هم نیمه رها کنم
نمیدونم چرا، اما فکر کنم هیچ چیزی نداشت که من رو مشعوف کنه. شخصیت اول داستان که هیچ سیری رو طی نمیکنه، همونیه که همه میشناسیم و از قضا «قهرمانه»، تو بحبوحه جنگ از جنگ بیزاره و از کثیفی، عاشق موسیقیه و برای یهودیا دعا میخونه (کلیشه ای تر از این!؟!) توصیفش و روایتش از جنگ هم باز چیزی نیست که آدم رو بلرزونه. تجاوز، خیانت، عشق!مشکل این دو اینه که من از صفحه اول کتاب میدونم چه روالی قراره طی بشه
اما اینها هیچ کدوم میتونست مهم نباشه اگه توصیف زیبایی از جنگ و بدیهاش ارائه می شد. اما باز هم این نافرجام بود به نظرم
در مورد توصیف، دو روزه دارم فکر میکنم «زنی که دهنش شبیه قلکه» چطوری میتونه باشه!!مهم نیست توصیفش رئال نیست، اما توصیف سرراست تر از این پیدا میشه حقیقتا؟
نمیدونم چرا، اما فکر کنم هیچ چیزی نداشت که من رو مشعوف کنه. شخصیت اول داستان که هیچ سیری رو طی نمیکنه، همونیه که همه میشناسیم و از قضا «قهرمانه»، تو بحبوحه جنگ از جنگ بیزاره و از کثیفی، عاشق موسیقیه و برای یهودیا دعا میخونه (کلیشه ای تر از این!؟!) توصیفش و روایتش از جنگ هم باز چیزی نیست که آدم رو بلرزونه. تجاوز، خیانت، عشق!مشکل این دو اینه که من از صفحه اول کتاب میدونم چه روالی قراره طی بشه
اما اینها هیچ کدوم میتونست مهم نباشه اگه توصیف زیبایی از جنگ و بدیهاش ارائه می شد. اما باز هم این نافرجام بود به نظرم
در مورد توصیف، دو روزه دارم فکر میکنم «زنی که دهنش شبیه قلکه» چطوری میتونه باشه!!مهم نیست توصیفش رئال نیست، اما توصیف سرراست تر از این پیدا میشه حقیقتا؟
June 27, 2020
Σας έχει τύχει ποτέ να σας ελκύει ένας/μια συγγραφέας, χωρίς να τον έχετε ποτέ διαβάσει, αλλά καταφέρνετε και έχετε ήδη 3-4 βιβλία του, και μόνο όταν τον/την διαβάζετε να λέτε «ναι, δικαιώθηκα»;
Κάτι τέτοιο συνέβη και εδώ.
Σύμφωνα με κάποιον (νομίζω η Χάνα Άρεντ το είχε πει), το Ναζιστικό καθεστώς, δημιουργήθηκε, εδραιώθηκε και προέβη στα εγκλήματα που προέβη, όχι λόγω μιας χαρισματική ηγεσίας, η μιας μαζικής παραπλάνησης του λαού, αλλά λόγω του ότι «τα τραίνα έφευγαν στην ώρα τους» και πως κάποιοι αξιωματούχοι, «έκαναν απλώς την δουλειά τους».
Η πρώτη μου επαφή με το έργο του Böll και το αμετάφραστο ακόμη στα ελληνικά «Το τραίνο ήταν στην ώρα του», μπορεί να θεωρηθεί ιδιαίτερα επιτυχής. Πρωταγωνιστής αυτής της νουβέλας, Ο Άντρεας ένας στρατιώτης όπου ξεκινάει για το ανατολικό μέτωπο για να πολεμήσει για την «Μεγάλη Γερμανία», μόνο που γνωρίζει με μαθηματική ακρίβεια, πως θα πεθάνει «σύντομα», και ποιό συγκεκριμένα μέσα σε 3 μέρες.
Ο Μπελ καταφέρνει και συνδυάζει την ματαιότητα του πολέμου, με την βεβαιότητα του θανάτου, πάνω στο πρόσωπο του πρωταγωνιστή του και τον εξανθρωπίζει, σε τέτοιο βαθμό μάλιστα που σε πιάνει άγχος για την μοίρα του. Νομίζω πως αυτός ήταν και ήταν ο στόχος του συγγραφέα: να μας δείξει το παράλογο του πολέμου, την σύνθλιψη του ατόμου μέσα σε αυτόν, και την ελπίδα διαφυγής, απο αυτόν με τον έναν ή με τον άλλον τρόπο. Χαρακτηριστική η στιγμή όπου μετά απο μέρες ταξίδι, οι στρατιώτες θυμούνται πως είναι άνθρωποι, κάνοντας ένα μπάνιο. Και ναι, είναι μερικές στιγμές σαν αυτές που αρκούν για να σου υπενθυμίσουν πως είσαι κάτι παραπάνω απο αυτό που προστάζει η στολή που σου φόρεσαν. Αυτές, και ένα χάδι, ένα φιλί ίσως και ένα όνειρο.
Αυτά τα λίγα.
Κάτι τέτοιο συνέβη και εδώ.
Σύμφωνα με κάποιον (νομίζω η Χάνα Άρεντ το είχε πει), το Ναζιστικό καθεστώς, δημιουργήθηκε, εδραιώθηκε και προέβη στα εγκλήματα που προέβη, όχι λόγω μιας χαρισματική ηγεσίας, η μιας μαζικής παραπλάνησης του λαού, αλλά λόγω του ότι «τα τραίνα έφευγαν στην ώρα τους» και πως κάποιοι αξιωματούχοι, «έκαναν απλώς την δουλειά τους».
Η πρώτη μου επαφή με το έργο του Böll και το αμετάφραστο ακόμη στα ελληνικά «Το τραίνο ήταν στην ώρα του», μπορεί να θεωρηθεί ιδιαίτερα επιτυχής. Πρωταγωνιστής αυτής της νουβέλας, Ο Άντρεας ένας στρατιώτης όπου ξεκινάει για το ανατολικό μέτωπο για να πολεμήσει για την «Μεγάλη Γερμανία», μόνο που γνωρίζει με μαθηματική ακρίβεια, πως θα πεθάνει «σύντομα», και ποιό συγκεκριμένα μέσα σε 3 μέρες.
Ο Μπελ καταφέρνει και συνδυάζει την ματαιότητα του πολέμου, με την βεβαιότητα του θανάτου, πάνω στο πρόσωπο του πρωταγωνιστή του και τον εξανθρωπίζει, σε τέτοιο βαθμό μάλιστα που σε πιάνει άγχος για την μοίρα του. Νομίζω πως αυτός ήταν και ήταν ο στόχος του συγγραφέα: να μας δείξει το παράλογο του πολέμου, την σύνθλιψη του ατόμου μέσα σε αυτόν, και την ελπίδα διαφυγής, απο αυτόν με τον έναν ή με τον άλλον τρόπο. Χαρακτηριστική η στιγμή όπου μετά απο μέρες ταξίδι, οι στρατιώτες θυμούνται πως είναι άνθρωποι, κάνοντας ένα μπάνιο. Και ναι, είναι μερικές στιγμές σαν αυτές που αρκούν για να σου υπενθυμίσουν πως είσαι κάτι παραπάνω απο αυτό που προστάζει η στολή που σου φόρεσαν. Αυτές, και ένα χάδι, ένα φιλί ίσως και ένα όνειρο.
Αυτά τα λίγα.
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