The romantic forested landscape of southwest Germany is the setting for the birth of a friendship that will haunt sixteen-year-old Hans Schwarz for the rest of his life. Hans is Jewish, the son of a doctor who is confident that the rise of the Nazis is only 'a temporary illness' afflicting his beloved country. Hans's new classmate, Konradin von Hohenfels, is a dazzling young aristocrat whose mother keeps a portrait of Hitler on her dressing-table. Hans is immediately drawn to Konradin, and thrilled when a close bond forms ...
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The romantic forested landscape of southwest Germany is the setting for the birth of a friendship that will haunt sixteen-year-old Hans Schwarz for the rest of his life. Hans is Jewish, the son of a doctor who is confident that the rise of the Nazis is only 'a temporary illness' afflicting his beloved country. Hans's new classmate, Konradin von Hohenfels, is a dazzling young aristocrat whose mother keeps a portrait of Hitler on her dressing-table. Hans is immediately drawn to Konradin, and thrilled when a close bond forms between them, forged by common interests that set them apart from the other boys. But their loyalties are soon tested in ways they could not have imagined. Three decades later, from the vantage point of New York City, Hans once again confronts this life-shaping episode from his youth, through a stunning revelation that he stumbles upon by chance. In its story of friendship undone by History, Reunion combines the explosive compression of a fable with the emotional depth of an epic novel many times its length.
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Seller's Description:
Good in Fair jacket. Size: 8x5x0; Gift inscription from the previous owner. Publication of 112 pages. The dust jacket is worn, closed tears, chipped pieces and old tape residue marks on the inner part of the jacket. The boards are slightly marked, remain in good condition. Internally the pages are clean and complete. The text is legible. Tightly bound and presented in cellophane. The binding is excellent. GK.
This novella, Fred Uhlman's entry into the world of fiction, was first published in 1970 when it went largely unnoticed. It was published again in 1977 and this time it captured the hearts of millions.
This is powerful stuff about what friendship is about: the story of two boys attending the same school, one comes from an aristocratic family, the other one is Jewish and from a middle-class family. Yet their friendship is over within a couple of years. This is Germany in the 1930s and this is a poignant story.
In his introduction, Arthur Koestler (1976) says: "When I first read Fred Uhlman's 'Reunion' some years ago, I wrote to the author (whom I only knew by reputation as a painter) that I considered it a minor masterpiece." Coming from Koestler, who wrote another such masterpiece 'Darkness at Noon' this is a compliment of the highest order. Both books are worthy of being read in the same light. Koestler, like a few others, recognized the book's merits when it was first published.
The opening lines of 'Reunion' are telling: "He came into my life in February 1932 and never left it again. More than a quarter of a century has passed since then, more than nine thousand days, desultory and tedious, hollow with the sense of effort or work without hope - days and years, many of them as dead as dry leaves on a dead tree. I can remember the day and the hour when I first set my eyes on this boy who was to be the source of my greatest happiness and of my greatest despair."
This novella is worth reading at least twice to grasp the significance of what Uhlman says in this short masterpiece, something that many writers fail to do in works of fiction three or four times its size. What Uhlman says, in this beautifully written work, affects us all.
