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# Günter Grass: Die Blechtrommel
- URL: https://www.ivarhagendoorn.com/blog/2012/08/26/gunter-grass-die-blechtrommel/
- Published: 2012-08-26T20:13:00.000Z
- Updated: 2019-08-12T20:16:21.000Z
- Description: I didn't read it in high school because someone told me it was dreadful. He was right.
- Author: Ivar Hagendoorn
- Tags: Blog, Literature

I finally read *The Tin Drum* (*Die Blechtrommel*) by Günter Grass. It is generally considered one of the best German language novels of the 20th century and it is compulsory reading at many German and Dutch high schools. I didn't read it at the time because an elderly gentleman, a friend of my parents, whom as a child I greatly respected because he had a large library and exuded an air of great erudition, once said that he considered it a dreadful novel. Now that I have read it I have to admit that he was right: It is indeed pretty hard going. Even so I did finish it, because I didn't want to give up, because despite everything and even though I found him a pretty annoying character, I was curious how Oskar would get along and because the final chapter of book 1, Glaube Hoffnung Liebe (I read it in German) is brilliant and I was hoping that at least some later chapters would reach the same heights, which unfortunately they didn't.

I understand why *The Tin Drum* is considered a classic of post-World War II German literature. Through the eyes of Oskar Matzerath Günter Grass manages to give a vivid portrayal of pre- and post war Germany. Its lightness of tone distinguished it from much post-war German literature, which struggled with the question of how to write after Auschwitz. Grass is particularly successful in his depiction of small town petty-bourgeois Germany. I pity the high school students who have to plough through the entire novel though.