The Short End of the Sonnenallee

Brussig's novel is a wonderful instance of self-conscious "Ostalgie." Here we have a group of teenage boys growing up, quite literally, in the shadow of the Berlin Wall and wanting nothing more than to get out and be free (to listen to the Rolling Stones). Ultimately though, there is no way for them to possibly escape, because what they want to leave is their home and their past - things that will always be part of them and that have made them who they are. A cynic could claim that Sonnenallee attempts to romanticize Stasi surveillance and the repression of the GDR, but it seems from my readings that it instead romanticizes the past in general. In the end, we all miss our home town... even if we never want to go back. The novel itself is part school-novel, part teenage romance, and part everything else. Quite postmodern in its inter-relation to music and film (not to mention the Haussmann film starring Alex Scheer), it is a very enjoyable read. Even intermediate German students should be able to read it with little difficulty. I reserved the final star only because it's a little too short, in my opinion, to really reach beyond "cute" or "novel accompanying hit film" and make an interesting statement about our relationship with our past. I highly recommend this novel to all... hopefully a translation will appear soon for the Anglo/American audience (I know at least one person working on one, but who knows if it'll be published).