Almost 100 years after Hans Fallada committed himself to prison,
previously unpublished and rewritten stories by the bestselling
mid-century German author have been discovered.
It was the turning point before he became a bestselling author: Hans
Fallada handed himself in to the police in September 1925, following
repeated cases of embezzlement to finance his alcohol and morphine
addiction.
At the time, a court-appointed doctor was assigned to assess the extent
to which Fallada could be made accountable. This expert opinion, thought
to have been lost, was only recently rediscovered. It is an
extraordinary find, because it includes unpublished and rewritten
stories by Fallada that reveal his early, unparalleled insight into the
female psyche, and that focus on hitherto taboo topics such as rape and
abortion.
The title character, Lilly, is a young, untamed, headstrong girl. She
sets out to "play" with a young man, but ends up losing control of the
situation. Barely able to hide her questionable actions, she ends up in
a sanatorium, where she engages in a bizarre duel of reciprocal
manipulation with another patient. In the end, it is impossible to tell
who is victorious.
Marie and Thilde, the protagonists of two other stories, are strong
women who rebel against the pre-established patterns imposed on them by
society, while two male outsiders, Pogg and Robinson, seek refuge and
hope in a prison cell.
These stories--written while the author was relishing the opportunity in
prison to free himself of his addictions--reveal to a new generation of
readers Fallada's immense gifts and his intense battles with the
dynamics of human relationships.
