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The Dead Girls' Class Trip
The Dead Girls' Class Trip: Selected Stories | Anna Seghers
4 posts | 3 read | 1 to read
A new translation of the best and most provocative short stories by the author of Transit and The Seventh Cross. Best known for the anti-fascist novel The Seventh Cross and the existential thriller Transit, Anna Seghers was also a gifted writer of short fiction. The stories she wrote throughout her life reflect her political activism as well as her deep engagement with myth; they are also some of her most formally experimental work. This selection of Segherss best stories, written between 1925 and 1965, displays the range of her creativity over the years. It includes her most famous short fiction, such as the autobiographical The Dead Girls Class Trip, and others, like Jans Is Going to Die, that have been translated into English here for the first time. There are psychologically penetrating stories about young men corrupted by desperation and women bound by circumstance, as well as enigmatic tales of bewilderment and enchantment based on myths and legends, like The Best Tales of Woynok, the Thief, The Three Trees, and Tales of Artemis. In her stories, Seghers used the German language in especially unconventional and challenging ways, and Margot Bettauer Dembos sensitive and skilled translation preserves this distinction.
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review
BarbaraBB
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Mehso-so

I chose this book for #TitlesAndTunes #DramaQueen because of its title but it doesn‘t fit the prompt at all 🤷🏻‍♀️ The drama is real in Segher‘s short story collection, which mostly is about nazism and the war.
In the title story, for example, a woman imagines herself with her old schoolmates on a class trip. She intersperses her descriptions of the children in the years before the war with the lives they grew up to endure. A tough read.

Librarybelle That does sound like a tough read. 7mo
Cinfhen Sounds really uncomfortable 🙁oh well, next month‘s choice sounds really promising ( and it‘s short🙃) 7mo
Suet624 Oh my. 7mo
59 likes4 comments
review
charl08
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Mehso-so

I finished it! Finally!
A real mix: some I found beyond tedious (long wallow in a family's awful poverty, I assume linked to her views on capitalism?).

The ones that stuck out for me were rooted in her experience of Nazi oppression, from the beautiful story about a son who writes to his father even after his death, to the title story which mixes a pre-war class trip with an account of how each girl's life changed with Hitler.

BookDragonNotWorm Too bad it doesn't sound worth trying - I love the title! 2y
charl08 @BookDragonNotWorm I'd say your mileage may vary. Maybe the best option (as always!) is pick and choose from a library copy? But would definitely recommend her 2y
56 likes2 comments
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charl08
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Finding this one hard work! Anyone else read this?

#NYRBClassics

merelybookish No but the title is so intriguing! 2y
jlhammar Not yet, but it is on my shelf waiting. 2y
BarbaraBB I got my copy too. The title is ao good that I have been looking forward to it but now I temper my expectations! 2y
charl08 @merelybookish @jlhammar @BarbaraBB to be honest, the whole book is worth it for the title story. The stories range from weird fables to realist stories about oppression - those reminded me of 2y
BarbaraBB @charl08 I did like Transit! 2y
54 likes5 comments
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charl08
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What a title!

LeahBergen Great title! 3y
BarbaraBB Intriguing! Is it a new NYRB title? 3y
charl08 @LeahBergen yes, isn't it! @BarbaraBB no, not a new one. I got a copy through the NYRB book club subscription scheme (I treated myself!). https://www.nyrb.com/pages/the-nyrb-classics-book-club 3y
BarbaraBB Oh wow I have that subscribtion too, so will probably receive this book too. I enjoyed other work by Anna Seghers! 3y
46 likes1 stack add4 comments