Hertha Müller and her Nobel Prize

In 2009, the Nobel Committee for Literature awarded a prize to the German poetess, prose writer Herte Müller. If the European reader is familiar with her works, few have heard of her in Russia. A German by birth, she was born in Romania and suffered all the hardships of the dictatorial regime of the general secretary of the local communist party, Nicolae Ceausescu. This is the subject of most of her books.

Romanian childhood

Hertha Müller was born in 1953 in the small town of Nitzkidorf. It is located in the historic Banat region, long divided between the three countries - Romania, Hungary and Serbia. The nearest major settlement was the third largest city of Romania, Timisoara.

Her family belonged to the Banat Swabians - a common name for the German-speaking population of this historical region. Grandfather - a farmer and merchant, his father during the Second World served in the SS troops. Mother, after the communist regime came to Romania, was deported to the camp in Ukraine because of her German origin. She managed to go free only three years before Hertha's birth.

In Timişoara, Herta Müller graduated from the Western University, a Romanian university founded in 1962. Her specialty was German and Romanian literature.

Emigration to Germany

In 1976, Herta Müller began an independent life from work as an interpreter at a tractor plant. By the time Ceausescu in power for only two years, and all the hardships of the regime are just beginning to manifest.

In the 79th, Mueller turns out to be unemployed for a trivial reason at the time - refusing to cooperate with the Romanian secret police of Securitate. After that, Gertha interrupts private German lessons, works in a kindergarten, begins to write.

The decision on emigration takes only in 1987. Together with her husband, also a writer - Richard Wagner, they are moving to West Germany, to West Berlin.

First publications

Hertha began writing shortly after the death of her father. In 1979 she finished the novel "The Lowlands", consisting of 14 small novels, united by a common main story. However, the work was published only three years later, and it was heavily censored. The original version was released only in 1984 in West Germany. After that, Hertha was not allowed to leave the country, and when she got permission to leave the country, the secret police tried to discredit her, claiming that she was an agent of Securitate.

Early work is dedicated to the Banat community in Romania, in which Herta Müller grew up. The author's biography is closely related to this topic. The traditional values that appear to the writer of the microcosm of a large repressive society are covered in detail. Her first novel "The Lowlands" describes the dying village of her childhood from the point of view of the child. One of the most memorable in this work is the image of a croaking frog, which the reader should associate with the German minority. As one of the heroes of the novel says: "Everyone brought a frog when he immigrated."

Literary recognition

In the 90's, she actively works in the literary field. In 1992, he released a novel known in Russian as "The Fox Was a Hunter", which tells of life in the Romanian province at the turn of the 80's and 90's. And a few more works, including the famous "Zverdtse", translated into Russian.

This frightening, in many ways an autobiographical book in which Herta Müller describes the fate of the young generation of immigrants from Germany in the most terrible years of the Romanian dictator Ceausescu's rule. This was the first book that brought her recognition and numerous awards in the literary world. It was written after the death of two friends of the writer, happened under mysterious circumstances, and tells about the company of young people whose friendship collapses under the influence of totalitarianism.

Most importantly, the author manages to focus on an eerie paradox: people who are oppressed find comfort in dreams of dictatorial rule. The older generation of ethnic Germans who lived then in Romania, as the author claims, kept sincere devotion to Hitler and his ideas.

Prose Muller

The general leitmotif, which Herta Muller tries to convey to the reader, is somewhat similar to the principle of Romantic literature - "an unusual hero in unusual circumstances." Only in Müller is it the art of man to survive in inhuman conditions, as well as the psychology guided by the oppressed and their oppressors. These ideas are especially bright in the novel "I wish I had not seen myself today" in 1997. In it, a young worker is attacked by a tormentor representing the law enforcement system.

In the same year, the novel "Appointment" about a trip in the tram of an ordinary factory worker comes out, which is asked by unexpected questions, like sudden changes in the tram route. A similar work on the adaptation of the personality in a totalitarian society is devoted to the earlier work "Journey on one leg," in which a young Romanian of German descent tries to adapt in life, being involved in close relations with three men at once.

"Swing of the breath"

"Swing of the breath" (in the Russian translation is often found the option "Breath-exhale") - the most famous novel, which was written by Herta Mueller. Reviews of him literary critics and readers in many ways and brought her the Nobel Prize.

The protagonist of this work is a young German, who in 1945 was deported to the USSR. He is only 17 years old, he is just beginning to understand the world and feels changes in himself - the sexual craving for men. At this time, along with all the adults of his native town, he is forced to go to the camp in Soviet Ukraine. The main character is engaged in heavy physical labor, suffers from hunger and cold. Trying to get settled in this world, builds a system of relationships with guards, free settlers, other prisoners. Above all, the Angel of Hunger hangs, and the hero finally abandons the spiritual life, giving preference to the physiological instincts of survival and the need to eat.

Nobel Prize

In 2009, Herta Müller became the winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature. Photo of the writer after that deservedly took place on the first pages of the world media.

The main theme of her work is to convey to the reader her own experience of lack of freedom and violence against the person, to tell about the collective memory, from which they often try to oust much that is unpleasant and scary to remember. For example, about the Ceausescu regime.

In addition to prose, Herta Müller releases poetry books and essay books. She draws pictures and creates photo portraits.

Hertha Müller has recently become popular in Russia. The Nobel Prize, awarded to her, played a certain role. Her books are devoted not only to all-European issues, but also to the problems of the Romanian nation. For example, Muller does not cease to reproach the Romanian people, who very quickly forgot the horrors of the dictatorship.