Scan barcode
A review by dukegregory
Berlin Alexanderplatz by Alfred Döblin
4.0
4.5
I loved reading this with my mom. She was just as bemused as I was at times and found so much of the stream of consciousness so strange and found the novel to be boring, funny, graphic, strange, strangely plotted, etc., an entire smorgasbord of reactions, which I can say I share in. I think to call this the "German Ulysses" is to inherently make this novel derivative of Joyce's work. The fact that this was a runaway bestseller, is still frequently taught in German schools, and is now being made into its third film adaptation shows its ability to employ wildly playful references and techniques without making it an overtly pretentious exercise for the academics with nothing better to do than decide every line that Joyce spits onto the page. This is genuinely fun throughout in its chaos. It feels like a fever dream of crime, sex, and gross humanity. It's utterly humanistic at times and at others has the ravaging nature of a Flannery O'Connor story. This is a socialist novel that has a slaughterhouse scene that challenges Upton Sinclair to prove that Döblin can effectively write even more graphic depictions of violence, that discusses the reality of life after prison, that challenges the nonsense of masculinity and the subjugation of women, that forces its protagonist to metamorphose under the most extreme violence, both physical and emotional, and it thrushes forward at an insane tempo. I need to watch the Rainer Werner Fassbinder miniseries soon, because this is just remarkably its own thing. The novel is truly idiosyncratic. I'll need to pick up some more Döblin in the future. Probably in German since I don't know about the availability of the rest of his bibliography in English. Sad. He's clearly a talent.
I loved reading this with my mom. She was just as bemused as I was at times and found so much of the stream of consciousness so strange and found the novel to be boring, funny, graphic, strange, strangely plotted, etc., an entire smorgasbord of reactions, which I can say I share in. I think to call this the "German Ulysses" is to inherently make this novel derivative of Joyce's work. The fact that this was a runaway bestseller, is still frequently taught in German schools, and is now being made into its third film adaptation shows its ability to employ wildly playful references and techniques without making it an overtly pretentious exercise for the academics with nothing better to do than decide every line that Joyce spits onto the page. This is genuinely fun throughout in its chaos. It feels like a fever dream of crime, sex, and gross humanity. It's utterly humanistic at times and at others has the ravaging nature of a Flannery O'Connor story. This is a socialist novel that has a slaughterhouse scene that challenges Upton Sinclair to prove that Döblin can effectively write even more graphic depictions of violence, that discusses the reality of life after prison, that challenges the nonsense of masculinity and the subjugation of women, that forces its protagonist to metamorphose under the most extreme violence, both physical and emotional, and it thrushes forward at an insane tempo. I need to watch the Rainer Werner Fassbinder miniseries soon, because this is just remarkably its own thing. The novel is truly idiosyncratic. I'll need to pick up some more Döblin in the future. Probably in German since I don't know about the availability of the rest of his bibliography in English. Sad. He's clearly a talent.