Analysis Of Stasiland By Anna Funder

Improved Essays
Anna Funder’s literary journalist text Stasiland explores the lingering impact that the former German Democratic Republic had upon its citizens. Through investigating the struggles faced by individuals in rebuilding their lives within unified Germany, Funder acknowledges that the horrors of the GDR are still controlling those who once lived under its communist regime. Through the victims Funder interviews, she identifies that as East Germany is rebuilt, so too are its people, as they attempt to find a place within a society once characterised by suppression and oppression.

Funder acknowledges the lingering impact of the GDR through depiction of her experiences in unified Germany. Through her characterisation of herself as Anna, Funder contrasts
…show more content…
Through Hagen Koch’s “preservation of historical monuments”, and attempts to maintain his guard tower, Funder demonstrates how some individuals struggle to move on from the GDR, as they are still nostalgic for it despite the horrors of what occurred. This is also explored as Koch ensures that developers can’t destroy his tower and instead must “build apartments around it”, demonstrating that although some members of unified Germany have attempted to rebuild and remove the past, individuals who are “against forgetting” are preventing them from doing so. In contrast to this, Funder also explores how a new “sanitised, disney version” of the wall is built, in order to identify the city’s attempt to rebuild. Although the state acknowledges that the wall existed, they have removed all the graffiti in order to create an “airbrushed” history, that is clean from the impact of the GDR on individuals. Furthermore, this idea is supported as Anna visits the Noremeninfejnfkjsn headquarters, where the cleaner is unable to remove “the smell of old men”, and the grease mark off the wall. Through this, Funder displays how Germany is attempting to clean away all the personal history and the impact of the Stasi, whilst still remembering the past. Ultimately, this fails as the cleaner “still can’t get [the mark] off” displaying how even in post GDR …show more content…
During the time of the GDR, Julia was unable to “conform to the fiction” and was “edged out of the reality” of East Germany, resulting in her being excluded from all aspects of the GDR. Furthermore, the collapse of East Germany had further impact on Julia, as she was raped “just after the wall fell”, and as a result of being failed by both old and new Germany, feels that she doesn’t belong in either society. This prevents Julia from rebuilding her life, despite seeing a psychotherapist, as she is only “part-attached” to the world. Her inability to move on, and the impact that the Stasi and the collapse of the GDR had on her is also heightened by Anna’s direct comparison of herself to Julia. As they were “born in the same year” and lived in “parallel universes”, the reader is able to view the impact that the GDR had on its people as Julia who was victim to the stasi is “unable to go forward into her future” whereas Anna, who was not under the communist regime, has “relative luck in life”. This comparison displays how victims of the Stasi are still unable to fully succeed in the new, unified Germany, despite its attempts to rebuild a functioning

Related Documents

  • Superior Essays

    A Night Divided Summary

    • 937 Words
    • 4 Pages

    The main focus in “A Night Divided” is a historical fiction informing life in East Germany during the time of the Berlin Wall. This novel was about a 12-year-old girl, Gerta, which had her family divided due to the Berlin Wall. Gerta, her mother, and her brother, live in the Eastern side of Germany, controlled by the Soviets. Gerta’s dream is to be united with her family and leave this place they all once called home. But one day Gerta’s hopes got up.…

    • 937 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    An individual is powerless against the larger power of society, ultimately it is something they will succumb to and face. In The Book Thief the story follows Liesel and her life in Nazi Germany as she encounters several victims and abusers of power. The poem The next war is a soldiers poem during describing his experience with death and fatality. Finally in an interview The Sins of the Father is both an interview that gives us insight into the psyche and trauma of Martin Burnham. Power demonstrative in the texts through a series of techniques that reflect the victims and users of power.…

    • 1186 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Stasiland is a non-fiction narrative authored by Anna Funder that entails the life, in East Germany, of both victims and members of the Stasi and the German Democratic Republic (GDR). It explores the life ‘behind the iron curtain’ through personal anecdotes and interviews. Via Funder’s investigation it becomes apparent that only some of the victims of the Stasi have not fully recovered and that many of their inflictions can be attributed to influences other than the Stasi. Anna’s first interviewee, Miriam Weber, was clearly disadvantaged by the Stasi’s involvement in her life and it is clearly obvious that she still hasn’t fully recovered. Miriam “became an enemy of the state at the age of sixteen” and this led her through a traumatic chain…

    • 1055 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    On the 12th of June, 1987, President Ronald Reagan delivered a powerful and emotional speech in west Berlin, Germany. This speech was addressing the Berlin Wall, and all of the political issues that came with it. 26 years prior to Reagan’s speech, the Berlin wall was built to separate the communist East from the “Allied” west, this wall was extremely controversial and kept any people from leaving west Berlin without great difficulty. Reagan’s speech had immense impact on Berlin, 2 years after his speech, the Berlin Wall was taken down and both East and West Berliners couldn’t have been happier. Reagan successfully motivates his audience to continue their fight for freedom and unity by appealing to pathos using vivid imagery and contrasting…

    • 810 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    ‘Do you still play the accordion?’ Of course, the question was really, 'Will you still help me?’”. (Page 85). By including Symbolism in his novel, Mark Zusak created a book full of meaning and emotion and depth useful to understanding the experiences of people in Germany during the second World…

    • 1072 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    In George Orwell’s 1984, women do not have a prominent role and they are portrayed in a unfeminine manner. Orwell demonstrates women as a weaker and inferior sex through the actions of Julia, Mrs. Parsons, Winston’s mother, Katharine, and the singing Prole woman. Most of the novel, Orwell focuses on Winston and the other men in 1984. However, when we do read about the women they are usually doing domestic or household chores.…

    • 1157 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Great Essays

    Berlin, like most capitals, is the jewel of the German nation. Located is a relatively centralized location of the country, the political, social and technological trends were almost always first noticed in this quickly growing city. Similar to other growing and established cities, it attracts tourists, historians, journalists and everyday people who want to document as well as experience the historical changes. This was also the case for Joseph Roth. His document on Berlin from 1920 to 1933 entailed detailed aspects of Berlin that would make readers feel as part of the changes and events as those present at the time of the documentation.…

    • 1252 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Decent Essays

    On the morning of August 15, 1961, 12 year old Gerta Lowe woke up to the sounds of sirens. Overnight communist Germany had build a barbed wire fence along the border of east and west Berlin. In the days before, Gerta and her dad had taken an exporatory trip over the border to search for work and opportunities. Now Gerta, her brother Fritz,and their moth…

    • 64 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Superior Essays

    The processes in which the Germans were involved in to overcome the tragedies of World War II were vast and long. There were many complications present when the war ended; Germans found themselves questioned politically and mentally by their own compatriots, as well as outsiders. This essay will argue that the film The Murders Are Among Us depicts the complications involved in the German process of “overcoming the past,” post-World War II, through its characters. In particular, this essay will cover the development and practice of this process by discussing the three main characters of this film, Dr. Mertens, Cpt. Bruckner, and Susanne.…

    • 1117 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Such was the case for the Germans following World War I. In “Defining Enemies, Making Victims,” Omer Bartov argues that in Nazi Germany and the subsequent Holocaust, the world has found the ultimate enemy in Nazis and the ultimate victim in Jews. Germany was broken after World War I on almost every level—financially, physically and psychologically. And, while German Jews had built a strong sense of solidarity while fighting…

    • 1909 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Essay On The Reawakening

    • 1960 Words
    • 8 Pages

    With mainland Europe left in ruins after war, civilians of the devastated countries sought to rebuild their cities, and return everything to normal. This attempt of normalisation is what drives the story lines of both Primo Levi’s ‘The Reawakening’ and Roberto Rossellini’s ‘Germany Year Zero,’ as the characters in both seek to make things as they were before the war. What differs between the two stories is how the characters went about the process of normalisation, and how each story arc concludes, with Rossellini suggesting Germany can never return to normal, and Levi showing how it could be done. World War ii destroyed massive swaths of mainland Europe, and even cities with no military or political consequence to the war were targeted as…

    • 1960 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Despite the fact that the wall is no longer exist today, and Germany has been reunited as one nation; the pain and miseries that it brought to the Germany citizens during its existence is undeniable. Approximately 130 people were killed trying to cross the wall; hundreds of families were separated for decades, along with many people risking their life to seek freedom and happiness. The dramatic life of the Berlin Wall is clearly showed in the documentary “The rise and fall of the Berlin Wall”, which makes the world again examine the war crime that has affect many people’s lives…

    • 638 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Becker invites the viewer to voyeuristically explore life in the GDR in order to promote a transformation of past assumptions. This reflects the contextual German cultural movement of ostalgie, a nostalgic impulse to rediscover aspects of the communist lifestyle, transforming readers’ perceptions about a foreign political model. The opening long establishing shot features unstylish East German furnishings, aesthetically representing the modest simplicity of late European socialism. The discoveries of the viewer and the protagonist converge when Alex struggles to recreate socialist Germany and it is through the accumulation of such visual representations that individuals and groups come to transform their beliefs. When Alex cannot find East German goods for his mother he is confronted with capitalism’s ruthless capacity to replace all traces of past inefficiency.…

    • 1046 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The fall of the Berlin Wall not only symbolized the end of the Cold War, communism, and dictatorship in Eastern Germany, but it was also a great impact on European history. The Berlin Wall, despite its monstrous purpose, brought some positive consequences to the people of Germany. During the twenty-eight years the wall stood, many friendships and families were torn apart due to a physical separation, as well as metaphorical due to stigmas, controversies, and stereotypes. As the wall was built up, lifelong relationships were torn down. For some Berliners, however, it created tighter bonds, as people supported their peers who had been separated from friends, family, and lovers.…

    • 1043 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Christa Wolf compared Nazi Germany and the GDR and said “versteinerte, vom Überwachungsstaat erdrückte Gesellschaft” ‘a fossilized society, crushed by the surveillance state’ (Mews 5). Other authors voiced their opinions as well. Different from Christa Wolf, Wolf Biermann, a singer and poet, lived in both parts of Germany (Mews 5).…

    • 701 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Superior Essays