The deception

by Nicolas Born

The ravaged streets of Beirut are the backdrop for The Deception -- the story of one man's sojourn in the daily terror and atrocities that Beirut has come to symbolize. Georg Laschen, a journalist in that war-torn city, faces violent death every time he investigates a story. Yet more frightening to him is his inability to describe that violence, to grasp a dependable reality, and to relieve his internal torment with a fulfilling romance.

At thirty-nine, Georg Laschen is running from a loveless marriage. Assigned to Beirut in 1976, at the height of the Lebanese civil war, he soon finds it impossible to convey the true horror around him in the conventional reports his newspaper requires. Every palatable sentence he writes in his hotel room is a distortion and betrayal of the slaughter and blight he witnesses outside.

Laschen seeks escape from a creeping paralysis and self-reproach through a love affair with Ariane, the young German widow of a Christian Lebanese. His fantasies of starting a new life with her are threatened by her obsession with a newly adopted child. The further discovery of her infidelity leads Laschen to enter, with deliberate bravado, a nighttime battle zone under shell fire. There at last the professional observer of war becomes a participant in its terrible realities.

Distinguished by its unflinching evocation of mortal conflict within and without, The Deception is an impressive addition to the literature of war and redemption.

"It reads like an anticipation of his, our sickness - the absurdity of the normal. Accidents that have ceased to frighten us. The exploitation of horror. The sophistries of madness. The closeness that alienates. Love, that will-o'-the-wisp. The narrowing of our condition."
- Gunter Grass

"I found Born's novel unusually exciting and stimulating, partly because of the light it casts on recent events in Beirut (and on their coverage by the press and TV), but mainly because it goes so directly to the heart of its subject matter, which is the conscience of words, The Deception that is waged in the name of 'objective reporting' and the real nature and ultimate logic of that ghastly entertainment we refer to as 'the news'. "
- JoelAgee

238 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1979

About the author

1937’de doğdu. İlk romanı Der Zweite Tag (İkinci Gün) ile Förderpreis Nordrhein-Westfalen edebiyat ödülünü kazandı. 1963-1964 yıllarında Berliner Literarisches Colloquium’dan burs kazandı. Burada Günter Grass, Peter Ruhmkorf, Peter Weiss gibi yazarlardan ders aldı. 1969-1970 yıllarında Iowa yazarlar atölyesinde bulundu. Charles Bukowski ile tanıştı, Allan Ginsberg ile arkadaşlık etti. 1972 yılında toplu şiirlerini Das Auge des Entdeckers (Kâşifin Gözü) adıyla yayımladı. 7 Kasım 1979’da yaşama veda etti.

Reviews

[Paul Uhde · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nach erster Sicht ist der Roman "Die Fälschung" von Nicolas Born aus dem Jahr 1979 ein Buch über den Journalismus und Krieg und Gewalt. Beirut und Damur im Libanon Mitte der 1970-er Jahre die Schauplätze. Zwei Reporter (Laschen und Hoffmann) als Zeugen des verbitterten und brutalen Kampfes zwischen Christen und Palästinensern. Aber mit unterschiedlicher Wahrnehmung, Betroffenheit und Einstellung. Die "Nebenfigur" Hoffmann ("eine Existenz ohne Nebengedanken") als, heute vielleicht als zu klischeehaft manifastiert, stereotyper Sensationsreporter charakterersiert scheint unfähig, über seinen Beruf, den Hintergründe und Ursachen hinaus zu reflektieren, was er fotografieren und dokumentieren soll. Er und einige andere Randfiguren, wie auch Rudnik der Lufthansa-Pilot und ehemealiger MIlitärflieger im Zweiten Weltkrieg, verfolgen das Kriegsgeschehen derart pragmatisch mit mörderischer Objektivität, dass bei ihnen jeglicher Funke Einfühlungsvermögen nichtmal im Keim entstehen kann. Professionell pflegen Sie zu allen Partien gleichgute Kontakte, arrangieren Treffen und handeln stets im Eigeninteresse ihres Anliegens. Als kleiner Antagonist der Ich-Erzähler Laschen, der im Inneren längst mit dem Dasein als Journalist gebrochen hat und mit erheblichen Zweifel in den Libanon aufgebrochen ist.