Description: Friebert's stories glide between first and last person, as memoir in 1949, a student in Germany. To ancestors: Eddie and spunky fiancé Gertie. To stories of campus life, fishing, and translations in Czechoslovakia. Stuart's book echoes the early James Joyce and reminds us that war and intelligence continue.
Brief description: Born in Wisconsin, STUART FRIEBERT spent an undergraduate year in Germany as one of the first U.S. exchange students after WW II, after which he finished a B.A. at Wisconsin State College/Milwaukee and took an M.A. and a Ph.D. at U. Wisconsin/Madison in German Language & Literature. He began teaching at Mt. Holyoke College, then at Harvard, and finally settled at Oberlin College, where he taught German and founded and directed Oberlin's Creative Writing Program until retiring in 1997. Along the way, he co-founded Field Magazine, the Field Translation Series, and Oberlin College Press. Friebert has published fifteen books of poems (including volumes in German), thirteen volumes of translations, anthologies, and more recently prose (stories, memoir pieces, and critical essays). He has held an N.E.A. Fellowship in poetry and received numerous awards for poems and translations, including the Four Way Book Award for Funeral Pie and the Ohioana Book Award for Floating Heart.
Review Quotes:
Praise for The Language of the Enemy, to which this book is a companion collection, visiting similar themes, situations, and characters:
"These tightly wrapped and generous stories are reminiscent of Nabokov's short stories for the author's ability to allow subtle metaphors and sometimes seemingly ordinary details to accumulate ... toward some resonant and powerful insights about who we really are behind our masks of social convention. Wide-ranging in their attempts to make sense of our lives, held together ... by a richly thoughtful cross-referencing of characters and their extended circle of family and friends. A sheer joy to read, and to watch these lives unfold before us." --Bruce Weigl, author of The Circle of Hanh
"Stuart Friebert gives us something precious: a detailed view of the past that is wondrously free of sentimentality. Friebert's stories are simply told, but each has a bite. They illuminate--over and over--how cultural, natural, and historical forces can threaten an individual or community. The people pick their way through a landscape filled with small joys and big dangers. Friebert imbues his characters with a beautiful dignity. I love this book."--Martha Moody, author of Best Friends
"An interwoven group of German-Jewish characters, carried from the first world war through the second--with comedy, sadness, and vivid nostalgia. The reader gets the sense of fate and lives and families crisscrossing and unfolding through time. Poet and translator Stuart Friebert beautifully captures the intimacies of his characters' thoughts against the backdrop and relentless progression of the twentieth century. This is a wonderful, thought-provoking collection.--Julie Schumacher, author of The Body of Water