Remembering Africa: The Rediscovery of Colonialism in Contemporary German Literature by Dirk Göttsche (review)

Remembering Africa is, as its author states, “the first comprehensive study of contemporary German literature’s intense engagement with German colonialism and Germany’s wider involvement in European colonialism” (14). It focuses on German-language writings about Africa published over the past twenty years, including works that appeared as recently as 2012, and offers original commentary on a wide range of narratives, some of which have thus far not seen critical attention. The considerable corpus of texts is situated within the longer history of German literary writing about Africa, and also draws on texts from other linguistic traditions for comparison. The sheer number of fiction and nonfiction narratives that are at the center of Göttsche’s discussion—sixty-three works by forty-seven authors are listed in one of the indices, which does not include the much larger number of texts that are referenced more briefly—is impressive, and any doubts about the relevance of the topic are easily dispelled in light of the wealth and richness of the material discussed here. Göttsche does not consider German-language postcolonial literature—that is, Black German writing and writing by African immigrants—though he does refer to a number of relevant titles throughout his study (and has written elsewhere about this substantial body of texts, which continues to grow in volume; see “Recollection and Intervention: Memory of German Colonialism in Contemporary African Migrants’ Writing,” in German Colonialism Revisited: African, Asian, and Oceanic Experiences, ed. Nina Berman, Klaus Mühlhahn, and Patrice Ngangang, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2014, 245–58).

The study is almost encyclopedic in its review of the extensive corpus of texts, and provides a meticulous scholarly apparatus. Göttsche organizes his survey into an introduction, five main chapters, a conclusion, a bibliography, and helpful indices. The introduction offers a general overview of the study and articulates its main goals. Göttsche situates the literature under review in the framework of an interconnection between Germany’s engagement with its colonial past and a renewed interest in contemporary Africa. Salient fiction and life-writing are understood not only as forms of collective memory work and coming-to-terms with another chapter of violent history, but also as involving an encounter with current developments.

The first chapter charts the theoretical and methodological terrain, and reviews the emergence of postcolonial studies in Germanistik and German studies more broadly. Göttsche in fact suggests that German-language literary authors “embraced postcolonial thought and the postcolonial politics of memory earlier than (most) German, Austrian, or Swiss academics” (24). He also stresses the relevance of interkulturelle Germanistik/Literaturwissenschaft, which he translates as “cross-cultural (German) studies,” for the literary engagement with Africa. Whereas Göttsche acknowledges the limitations inherent in the approaches of some proponents of cross-cultural German studies, he also insists on the significance of some of its theoretical premises, approaches, and findings. Göttsche specifically mentions critics such as Herbert Uerlings, Norbert Mecklenburg, and Axel Dunker who have made vital contributions to the field. Göttsche also highlights the invaluable contributions of the Hanover school of African literary critics (established by Leo Kreutzer) and the University of Bayreuth to fostering a critical engagement with Germany’s colonial past in Africa and the contemporary engagement with Africa. Memory studies emerges as the third theoretical pillar central to the study; Michael Rothberg’s notion of collective memory as “multidirectional,” Jan Assmann’s idea of “communicative memory,” as well Astrid Erll’s distinction between the “memory of literature” and “memory in literature,” among others, are evoked as guiding Göttsche’s approach. The introduction also provides an overview of the longer history of German literary writings about Africa and colonialism in Africa.

The following four chapters are organized thematically, and include brief synopses and discussions of individuals texts, ranging from a couple of pages to, in one case, almost eighteen pages (Hamann’s Usambara...