Word: rehder
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...German, or at least the West German, character was laid bare to me, when I bought what has yet to be recognized as one of the more influential volumes of our time: German--unassuming title--by the two greatest students of national numina since Hegel, Herrn Helmut Rehder and Freeman Twaddell...
...Germans, believe Rehder and Twaddell, are a simple, happy affluent people. They are gemuetlich. They live in small, unnamed towns (each one has one Post--links um die Ecke--two Hotels--of which one is ein gut buergerliches Haus--and a Bahnhof--geradeaus). Their names are, primarily, Schmidt, Steinhauer, Limberger and Reiff. Their men are proud of various civic monuments; their women are proud of their TVs and VWs; they all gossip an awful lot; none of them ever mentions World...
These at least are Rehder and Twaddell's preliminary and tentative observations. A bustling, active country: trains come and go; Kinos start; hundreds of Wiener Schnitzels (auch etwas Salat) are consumed at every meal. And the people talk about all of these things freely, and with a morbid intensity. And yet Rehder and Twaddell are not blinded by this voluble happiness; honest men that they are, they have recorded other more ominous conversations. Consider this exchange (found in chapter...
Sadly, Kultur is shunned in modern and western Germany. A man named Grunert (some out-of-towner) does quote a line of poetry in a conversation preserved in Chapter 26, but he confesses he thinks it's "schmalxig." Rehder and Twaddell have in fact found only one man who is culturally aware (he is, I think, one of the Schmidts). Herr Schmidt has written a book Ueber den Untergang der Weltl, he announces with pride. But Schmidt is resolutely cold-shouldered by average-man Steinhauer, who remarks (witheringly) "So? Das ist ja sehr interessant...
...Rehder and Twaddell's faithful transcription of Mrs. Reiff's remarks has undoubtedly the modern German Volksgeist encaptured. And that is a major service. Zum wohl, die Herrnl