German Writers and the Politics of Culture ― Dealing With the Stasi

Before the fall of the Berlin Wall many East German writers were praised in the Western world as dissident voices of truth, bravely struggling with the draconian constraints of living under the GDR's communist regime. However, since unification, Germany has been rocked by scandals showing the level to which the Stasi, the East German Secret Police, controlled these same writers. This is the first study in English to systematically explore how the writers have responded to the challenge of dealing with the Stasi from the 1950s to the present day.

MICHAEL BUTLER Professor of Modern German Literature, University of Birmingham, UKCAROL ANNE COSTABILE-HEMING Associate Professor of German, Southwest Missouri Satte Univesrity, USAMIKE DENNIS Professor of Modern German History, University of Wolverhampton, UKOWEN EVANS Lecturer in German, University of Wales, Bangor, UKSTEPHEN J. EVANS University of Wales, Swansea, UKKRISTIE FOELL Associate Professor of German, Bowling Green State University, Ohio, USAALISON LEWIS Lecturer, Department of German and Swedish Studies, University of Melbourne, AustraliaGEORGINA PAUL Lecturer in German Studies, University of Warwick, UKJULIAN PREECE University of Kent, UKKARL-HEINZ SCHOEPS Professor Emeritus of German, University of Illinois, USADENNIS TATE Professor of German Studies, University of Bath, UKJILL TWARK Assistant Professor of German, East Carolina University, USAREINHARD K. ZACHAU Professor of German, University of the South (Sewanee), USA