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Look Who’s Back / Timur Vermes

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Hitler’s back, that’s who.  Strangely, inexplicably, Hitler reappears in modern-day Berlin, his formal uniform reeking of gasoline, seventy years after his supposed death.  The circumstances of his reappearance are reminiscent of Rip van Winkle.  He marvels at the new technology (untested avenues for his propaganda apparatus?), the multicultural face of Berlin (was there a military alliance with Turkey?), and many other aspects of modern society in a Berlin he last saw in ruins.  He soon stumbles into a career on television.  People treat him like Sacha Baron Cohen playing Borat.

Look Who's Back has become a publishing phenomenon in Germany, and has been translated for many international markets, and banned in Israel.

This book is meant as pure satire and there are some amusing passages, though there are other places where the attempt at humor seems to be pushing the boundaries of good taste.   Even though the translator provides an appendix outlining key historical figures and touchstones in the German political and social landscape, there are many references that simply will be lost on the average reader outside of Germany.  (For example, there was a pun with the name of the German magazine Der Spiegel / The Mirror, and a play on the word “Fuehrer” also meaning driver, and rather specific references to postwar German prime ministers such as Kohl and Schmidt and political leaders such as the Green Party's Joschka Fischer.)  I suspect there was a lot that just went past me. At least it seemed like I was missing something.  Maybe the text could have benefitted from the addition of some footnotes.  Look Who's Back may represent another step for a new generation of Germans coming to terms with their uncomfortable history.  It will be interesting to see how it plays overseas.

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