On the Natural History of Destruction ~ W. G. Sebald 2003

On the Natural History of Destruction

W. G. Sebald

Published by Penguin Books Ltd, United Kingdom, London, 2003

The first of Sebald's non-fiction books to be translated to English, the original German title of On The Natural History of Destruction was Luftkrieg und Literatur, translating as "Air War and Literature". The book consists of a variety of essays about literature and writers, a conduit through which Sebald analyses the German processing of WWII. Sebald examines the psychological aftermath of the bombings by Allied forces and raises the pertinent question of why such trauma has been left absent from collective memory - what he describes as a sinister societal amnesia.

Amazon: Sebald's On the Natural History of Destruction explores German writers' silence about a moment of mass destruction. In the last years of World War II, a million tons of bombs were dropped by the Allies on one hundred and thirty-one German towns and cities. Six hundred thousand civilians died, and three and a half million homes were destroyed. When it has cast such a very dark shadow over his life and work, Sebald asks, how have so many writers allowed themselves to write it out of their experience and avoid articulating the horror? W.G. Sebald's On the Natural History of Destruction sparked a wide-ranging debate in the German press.

Binding:  Soft cover

Book Condition: Good condition.

Edition: Penguin 2003

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