Heinrich Böll was born on December 21, 1917 in Cologne, into a liberal Catholic family of a craftsman. From 1924 to 1928 he studied at a Catholic school, then continued his studies at the Kaiser Wilhelm Gymnasium in Cologne. He worked as a carpenter and worked in a bookstore.

In the summer of 1939, Böll entered the University of Cologne, but in the fall he was drafted into the Wehrmacht. During World War II, Böll is captured by the Americans. After the war, he returned to the University of Cologne and studied philology.

Böll began publishing in 1947. The first works were the story “The Train Arrives on Time” (1949), the collection of short stories “Wanderer, When You Come to Spa...” (1950) and the novel “Where Have You Been, Adam?” (1951, Russian translation 1962).

In 1971, Böll was elected president of the German PEN Club, and then headed the international PEN Club. He held this post until 1974.

Heinrich Böll tried to appear in the press demanding an investigation into the deaths of RAF members.

The writer visited the USSR several times, but was also known as a critic of the Soviet regime. Hosted A. Solzhenitsyn and Lev Kopelev, expelled from the USSR.

Belle Heinrich (December 21, 1917, Cologne - July 16, 1985, ibid.), German writer. Born on December 21, 1917, into a liberal Catholic family of a cabinetmaker, craftsman, and sculptor. From 1924 to 1928 he studied at a Catholic school, then continued his studies at the Kaiser Wilhelm Gymnasium in Cologne. After graduation high school in Cologne Böll, who wrote poetry and stories with early childhood, turns out to be one of the few students in the class who did not join the Hitler Youth. However, a year after graduating from school, he was subjected to forced labor work. He worked in a bookstore. After graduating from classical gymnasium (1936), he worked as an apprentice salesman in a second-hand bookstore. In April 1939, he enrolled at the University of Cologne, where he planned to study literature, but a few months later he received a draft notice from the Wehrmacht. In 1939-1945, he fought as an infantryman in France and took part in battles in Ukraine and Crimea. In 1942, Böll married Anna Marie Cech, who bore him two sons. Together with his wife, Böll translated into German such American writers as Bernard Malamud and Salinger. At the beginning of 1945, he deserted and ended up in an American prisoner of war camp. After his release, he worked as a carpenter and then continued his education at the university, studying philology. Böll's literary debut took place in 1947, when his story “The Message” was published in one of the Cologne magazines. Two years later, the aspiring writer’s story “The Train Came on Time” (1949), which told about a soldier who, like Belle himself, deserted from the army, was published as a separate book. In 1950 Belle became a member of Group 47. In 1952, in the programmatic article “Recognition of the Literature of Ruins,” a kind of manifesto of this literary association, Bell called for the creation of a “new” German language - simple and truthful, associated with concrete reality. In accordance with the proclaimed principles early stories Bella's works are distinguished by their stylistic simplicity; they are filled with vital concreteness. Bell's collections of stories “Not Just for Christmas” (1952), “The Silence of Doctor Murke” (1958), “City of Familiar Faces” (1959), “When the War Began” (1961), “When the War Ended” (1962) found a response not only among the general reading public and critics. In 1951, the writer received the Group 47 Award for the story “Black Sheep” about young man, who does not want to live according to the laws of his family (this theme will later become one of the leading ones in Bell’s work). From stories with simple plots, Belle gradually moved on to more voluminous things: in 1953 he published the story “And He Didn’t Say a Single Word,” a year later - the novel “The House without a Master.” They were written about recent experiences, they recognized the realities of the first very difficult post-war years, and touched upon the problems of the social and moral consequences of the war. The fame of one of the leading prose writers in Germany brought Bell the novel “Billiards at half past nine” (1959). Technically, it takes place over the course of one day, September 6, 1958, when the hero named Heinrich Fehmel, a famous architect, celebrates his eightieth birthday. In fact, the action of the novel contains not only events from the life of three generations of the Femel family, but also half a century of German history. “Billiards at Half Nine” consists of internal monologues of eleven characters, the same events are presented to the reader from different points of view, so that a more or less objective picture of the historical life of Germany in the first half of the 20th century emerges. Böll's novels are characterized by a simple and clear style of writing, focused on the revival of the German language after the pompous style of the Nazi regime. A unique embodiment of Germany is the grandiose Abbey of St. Anthony, in a design competition for the construction of which Heinrich Femel once won and which was blown up by his son Robert, who went into the anti-fascist underground after the death of his wife. Post-war Germany, in which the heroes of the novel live, turns out, in Böll’s opinion, not much better than pre-war: lies and money reign here too, with which you can buy off the past. A notable phenomenon in German literature was the following pain

Best of the day

Bell's best work is “Through the Eyes of a Clown” (1963). Bell's uneventful novel is, in fact, an internal monologue of the protagonist, circus artist Hans Schnier, the son of a millionaire industrialist, who recalls the years of his childhood during the war, his post-war youth, and reflects on art. After the hero was abandoned by his beloved Marie, whom Shnir considers “his wife before God,” he begins to fall out of the rhythm of life, his “two congenital diseases - melancholy and migraine” worsen. For Hans, alcohol becomes the cure for failure in life. As a result, Shnir cannot enter the circus arena and is forced to temporarily interrupt his performances. Returning to his apartment in Bonn, he calls his friends to find Marie, who became the wife of the Catholic figure Züpfner, but to no avail. From the hero’s memoirs, the reader understands that he fell out of life long before he lost his beloved - even in adolescence, when he refused to participate in the Hitler Youth exercises with his classmates and, later, at the age of twenty, when he rejected his father’s offer to continue his work, choosing the path of a free artist. The hero does not find support in anything: neither in love, nor in an established life, nor in religion. “A Catholic by intuition,” he sees how churchmen violate the letter and spirit of Christian commandments at every step, and those who sincerely follow them in conditions modern society may turn into an outcast. In 1967, Böll received the prestigious German Georg Büchner Prize. The top international recognition was the election of Böll in 1971 as president of the International PEN Club, before which he had already been president of the German PEN Club. He held this post until 1974. In 1967, Böll received the prestigious German Georg Büchner Prize. And in 1972 he was the first of the German writers of the post-war generation to be awarded the Nobel Prize. The decision of the Nobel Committee was largely influenced by the release of the writer’s new novel, “Group Portrait with a Lady” (1971), in which the writer tried to create a grandiose panorama of the history of Germany in the 20th century. At the center of the novel, described through the eyes of many people, is the life of Leni Gruiten-Pfeiffer, whose personal fate turned out to be closely intertwined with the history of her homeland. In the early 1970s, after a series of terrorist attacks carried out by West German far-left youth groups, Bell spoke in their defense, justifying the horrific actions of the unwise internal politics West German authorities, the impossibility of individual freedom in modern German society. Heinrich Böll tried to appear in the press demanding an investigation into the deaths of RAF members. His story “The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum, or how violence arises and what it can lead to” (1974) was written by Bell under the influence of attacks on the writer in the West German press, which, not without reason, dubbed him the “mastermind” of terrorists. Central problem“The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum,” like the problem of all of Böll’s later works, is the intrusion of the state and the press into personal life a simple person. Böll’s last works, “The Careful Siege” (1979) and “Image, Bonn, Bonn” (1981), also speak about the danger of state surveillance of its citizens and the “violence of sensational headlines.” In 1979, the novel “Under the Escort of Care” (Fursorgliche Belagerung), written back in 1972, when the press was filled with materials about Baader’s terrorist group Meinhof, was published. The novel describes the devastating social consequences that arise from the need to increase security measures during mass violence. Bell was the first and, perhaps, the most popular West German writer of the young post-war generation in the USSR, whose books became available thanks to the “thaw” of the late 1950s - 1960s. From 1952 to 1973, more than 80 stories, novels and articles by the writer were published in Russian, and his books were published in much larger print runs than in his homeland, Germany. Belle was a frequent visitor to the USSR. In 1974, contrary to the protest of the Soviet authorities, he granted A.I. Solzhenitsyn, who was expelled by the Soviet authorities from the USSR, times

a shelter in his house in Cologne (in the previous period, Belle illegally exported the dissident writer’s manuscripts to the West, where they were published). As a result, Böll's works were banned from publication in the Soviet Union. The ban was lifted only in the mid-1980s. with the beginning of perestroika. In 1981, the novel “What will happen to the boy, or Some business regarding the book part” (Was soll aus dem Jungen bloss werden, oder: Irgend was mit Buchern) was published - memories of his early youth in Cologne. In 1987, the Heinrich Böll Foundation was created in Cologne, a non-governmental organization that works closely with the Green Party (its branches exist in many countries, including Russia). The Foundation supports projects in the field of development of civil society, ecology, and human rights. Böll died on July 16, 1985 in Langenbroich. Also in 1985. The writer’s very first novel is published, “The Soldier’s Inheritance” (Das Vermachtnis), which was written in 1947, but was published for the first time.

Heinrich Theodor Böll was born on December 21, 1917 in Cologne in large family cabinetmaker. From early childhood he wrote poetry and stories. After graduating from high school, Belle, unlike most of his classmates, did not join the Hitler Youth. The young man wanted to go to university, but he was denied this. For several months he studied bookselling in Bonn and was then forced into forced labor. Bell then became a student at the University of Cologne, but in 1939 he was drafted into the army. He served as a corporal on the Eastern and Western Fronts and was wounded several times. In 1942, Belle married Anna Marie Cech. In 1945, he was captured by the Americans and spent several months in a prisoner of war camp in the south of France.

After the war Belle returned to Cologne. He studied at the university, worked in his father's workshop and in the city bureau of demographic statistics. Already in 1947 he began to publish his stories. In 1949 it was published and received positive feedback critics first story “The Train Arrived on Time,” a story about a young soldier who faces a return to the front and a quick death.

In 1950, Bell became a member of the "Group 47" - an association of progressive young writers. In 1952, in the article “Recognition of the Literature of Ruins,” a kind of manifesto of this literary association, he called for the creation of a “new” German language - simple and truthful, associated with concrete reality, opposing the pompous style of the Nazi regime. In the stories “Wanderer, when you come to Spa” (1950), “Where have you been, Adam?” (1951), “Bread of the Early Years” (1955) Belle described the meaninglessness of war and the hardships of post-war life. Then, from stories with simple plots, he gradually moved on to more voluminous things “And He Didn’t Say a Single Word” (1953), “A House without a Master” (1954).

In the future, Bell's works become more and more complex in composition. The novel “Billiards at Half Nine” (1959) tells the story of a family of Cologne architects. Although the action is limited to just one day, the text, based on internal monologues, is structured in such a way that the life of three generations is presented, a look at half a century of German history from recent years the reign of Kaiser Wilhelm actually before the time of writing the novel. This novel brought Bell the fame of one of the leading prose writers in Germany.

The action of the story “Through the Eyes of a Clown” (1963) also takes place over the course of one day. This is the internal monologue of the main character, a circus performer, recalling his wartime childhood and post-war youth. He finds no support in anything - neither in love, nor in an established life, nor in religion; in everything he sees the hypocrisy of post-war society.

Resistance to official power and official norms is a characteristic theme of Bell. It sounds in “Absent without leave” (1964), “The end of one business trip” (1966).

The pinnacle of international recognition was Bell's election in 1971 as president of the International Pen Club. In 1972, he was the first of the German writers of the post-war generation to be awarded the Nobel Prize. The decision of the Nobel Committee was largely influenced by the release of a large and complexly constructed (consisting of interviews and documents) novel “Group Portrait with a Lady” (1971), in which the writer tried to create a grandiose panorama of the history of Germany in the 20th century.

In the early 1970s. gg., after a series of terrorist attacks carried out by West German ultra-left youth groups, Bell spoke in their defense, justifying the horrific actions by the unreasonable internal policy of the West German authorities and the impossibility of individual freedom in modern German society. The story “The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum, or How Violence Happens and What It Can Lead to” (1974) was written based on personal impressions of attacks on the writer in the West German press, which, not without reason, dubbed him the “mastermind” of terrorists. The central problem of the story (like all of Bell's later works) is the invasion of the state and the press into the personal life of the common man. The story caused a great public outcry and was filmed.

Other works by Böll, “The Careful Siege” (1979) and “Image, Bonn, Bonn” (1981), also speak about the danger of state surveillance of its citizens.

In 1985, on the occasion of the fortieth anniversary of the surrender of Nazi Germany, Böll published “Letter to My Sons” about how he himself experienced the end of the war. The theme of reckoning with the fascist past is also present in the last, posthumously published novel, “Women in a River Landscape.”

Belle traveled a lot. He visited Poland, Sweden, Greece, Israel, Ecuador; He visited France, England and especially Ireland many times, where he lived in his own house.

Belle was the most popular West German writer in the Soviet Union, one of the idols of the young post-war generation. His books became available thanks to the “thaw” of the late 1950s and 1960s. More than 80 stories, novels and articles by the writer were published in Russian, and his books were published in much larger print runs than in his homeland, Germany. Belle was a frequent visitor to the USSR. But in 1974, the writer, contrary to the protest of the Soviet authorities, provided A.I., who was expelled from the country. Solzhenitsyn has a temporary refuge in his home in Cologne (in the previous period, he illegally exported Solzhenitsyn's manuscripts to the West, where they were published). As a result, Böll's works ceased to be published in the Soviet Union; the ban was lifted only in the mid-1980s. with the beginning of perestroika.

In 1980, Belle became seriously ill and had his right leg amputated. At the beginning of July 1985, he was forced to go to the clinic again, and on July 16, 1985 he died. He was buried in Bornheim-Merten near Cologne; The funeral took place with a large crowd of people, with the participation of fellow writers and political figures.

In 1987, the Heinrich Böll Foundation was created in Cologne, a non-governmental organization that works closely with the Green Party (its branches exist in many countries, including Russia). The Foundation supports projects in the field of development of civil society, ecology, and human rights.

Heinrich Böll- German writer and translator.

Born in Cologne, one of the largest cities in the Rhine Valley, in a large family of cabinetmaker Victor Böll and Marie (Hermanns) Böll. Böll's ancestors fled England under Henry XIII: like all zealous Catholics, they were persecuted by the Church of England.

After graduating from high school in Cologne, Böll, who had been writing poetry and stories since early childhood, was one of the few students in his class who did not join the Hitler Youth. However, a year after graduating from school, the young man was forced into forced labor, and in 1939 he was called up to military service. Böll served as a corporal on the Eastern and Western fronts, was wounded several times and was eventually captured by the Americans in 1945, after which he spent several months in a prisoner of war camp in the south of France.

Upon returning to his hometown Böll studied for a short time at the University of Cologne, then worked in his father’s workshop, in the city bureau of demographic statistics and did not stop writing - in 1949 his first story “The Train Arrived on Time” (Der Zug war punktlich) was published and received a positive review from critics. the story of a young soldier who faces a return to the front and an imminent death. “The Train Arrived on Time” is the first in a series of books by Böll that describes the meaninglessness of war and the hardships of the post-war years; these are “Wanderer, when you come to Spa...” (Wanderer, kommst du nach Spa, 1950), “Where have you been, Adam?” (Wo warst du, Adam?, 1951) and “The Bread of the Early Years” (Das Brot der fruhcn Jahre, 1955). Böll's authorial style, writing simply and clearly, was focused on the revival of the German language after the pompous style of the Nazi regime.

Moving away from the style of “ruin literature” in his first novel, “Billiards at half past nine” (Billiard um halbzehn, 1959), Böll tells the story of a family of famous Cologne architects. Although the action of the novel is limited to just one day, through reminiscences and digressions the novel tells the story of three generations - the panorama of the novel covers the period from the last years of Kaiser Wilhelm's reign to the prosperous "new" Germany of the 50s. “Billiards at Half Nine” differs significantly from Böll’s earlier works - not only in the scale of presentation of the material, but also in its formal complexity. “This book,” wrote the German critic Henry Plaard, “brings great consolation to the reader, for it shows the healing power of human love.”

In the 60s, Böll's works became even more complex compositionally. The action of the story “Through the Eyes of a Clown” (Ansichten eines Clowns, 1963) also takes place over the course of one day; in the center of the story is a young man who speaks on the phone and on whose behalf the story is told; the hero prefers to play the role of a jester rather than submit to the hypocrisy of post-war society. “Here we again encounter the main themes of Böll: the Nazi past of the representatives of the new government and the role catholic church in post-war Germany,” wrote the German critic Dieter Hoenicke.

The theme of “Absent without leave” (Entfernung von der Truppe, 1964) and “The End of a Business Trip” (Das Ende einer Dienstfahrt, 1966) is also opposition to official authorities. More voluminous and much more complex compared to previous works, the novel “Group Portrait with a Lady” (Gruppenbild mit Dame, 1971) is written in the form of a reportage, consisting of interviews and documents about Leni Pfeiffer, thanks to which the fates of sixty more people are revealed. "Tracing for half a century German history the life of Leni Pfeiffer,” wrote the American critic Richard Locke, “Böll created a novel that glorifies universal human values.”

“Group Portrait with a Lady” was mentioned when Böll was awarded the Nobel Prize (1972), received by the writer “for creativity that combines a wide scope of reality with high art character creation and which became a significant contribution to the revival German literature" “This revival,” said Karl Ragnar Girow, a representative of the Swedish Academy, in his speech, “is comparable to the resurrection of a culture that has risen from the ashes, which seemed doomed to complete destruction and, nevertheless, to our common joy and benefit, has given new shoots "

By the time Böll received the Nobel Prize, his books had become widely known not only in the West, but also in East Germany and even in the Soviet Union, where several million copies of his works were sold. At the same time, Böll played a prominent role in the activities of the PEN Club, an international writers' organization, through which he provided support to writers who were subjected to oppression in communist countries. After Alexander Solzhenitsyn was expelled from the Soviet Union in 1974, he lived with Böll before leaving for Paris.

In the same year, when Böll assisted Solzhenitsyn, he wrote a journalistic story “The Desecrated Honor of Katharina Blum” (Die verlorene Ehre der Katharina Blum), in which he sharply criticized corrupt journalism. This is a story about a wrongly accused woman who ends up killing the reporter who slandered her. In 1972, when the press was full of material about the Baader-Meinhof terrorist group, Böll wrote the novel Under the Escort of Care (Fursorgliche Blagerung. 1979), which describes the devastating social consequences arising from the need to strengthen security measures during mass violence.

In 1942, Böll married Anna Marie Cech, who bore him two sons. Together with his wife, Böll translated into German such American writers as Bernard Malamud and Jerome D. Salinger. Böll died at the age of 67, while near Bonn, visiting one of his sons. In the same 1985, the writer’s very first novel, “A Soldier’s Inheritance” (Das Vermachtnis), was published, which was written in 1947, but was published for the first time. "A Soldier's Legacy" tells the story of the bloody events that took place during the war in the Atlantic and Eastern Front areas. Despite the fact that some strain is felt in the novel, notes American writer William Boyd, A Soldier's Legacy, is a mature and significant work; “He exudes hard-won clarity and wisdom.”

Biography

Heinrich Böll was born on December 21, 1917 in Cologne, into a liberal Catholic family of a craftsman. He studied at a Catholic school from year to year, then continued his studies at the Kaiser Wilhelm Gymnasium in Cologne. He worked as a carpenter and worked in a bookstore. After graduating from high school in Cologne, Böll, who had been writing poetry and stories since early childhood, was one of the few students in his class who did not join the Hitler Youth. After graduating from classical gymnasium (1936), he worked as an apprentice salesman in a second-hand bookstore. A year after finishing school, he is sent to work in a labor camp under the Imperial Labor Service.

In 1967, Böll received the prestigious German Georg Büchner Prize. In Böll he was elected president of the German PEN Club, and then headed the international PEN Club. He held this post until Mr.

In 1969, the film directed by Heinrich Böll premiered on television. documentary film"The Writer and His City: Dostoevsky and Petersburg." In 1967, Böll traveled to Moscow, Tbilisi and Leningrad, where he collected material for him. Another trip took place a year later, in 1968, but only to Leningrad.

In 1972, he was the first of the German writers of the post-war generation to be awarded the Nobel Prize. The decision of the Nobel Committee was largely influenced by the release of the writer’s new novel, “Group Portrait with a Lady” (1971), in which the writer tried to create a grandiose panorama of the history of Germany in the 20th century.

Heinrich Böll tried to appear in the press demanding an investigation into the deaths of members of the RAF. His story “The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum, or how violence arises and what it can lead to” (1974) was written by Böll under the influence of attacks on the writer in the West German press, which, not without reason, dubbed him the “mastermind” of terrorists. The central problem of “The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum,” like the problem of all of Böll’s later works, is the invasion of the state and the press into the personal life of the common man. Böll’s last works, “The Careful Siege” (1979) and “Image, Bonn, Bonn” (1981), also speak about the danger of state surveillance of its citizens and the “violence of sensational headlines.” In 1979, the novel “Under the Escort of Care” (Fursorgliche Belagerung), written back in 1972, when the press was filled with materials about the terrorist group Baader and Meinhof, was published. The novel describes the devastating social consequences that arise from the need to increase security measures during mass violence.

In 1981, the novel “What will happen to the boy, or Some business regarding the book part” (Was soll aus dem Jungen bloss werden, oder: Irgend was mit Buchern) was published - memories of his early youth in Cologne.

Böll was the first and, perhaps, the most popular West German writer of the young post-war generation in the USSR, whose books were published in Russian translation. From 1952 to 1973, more than 80 stories, novels and articles by the writer were published in Russian, and his books were published in much larger print runs than in his homeland, Germany. The writer visited the USSR several times, but was also known as a critic of the Soviet regime. Hosted A. Solzhenitsyn and Lev Kopelev, expelled from the USSR. In the previous period, Böll illegally exported Solzhenitsyn's manuscripts to the West, where they were published. As a result, Böll's works were banned from publication in the Soviet Union. The ban was lifted only in the mid-1980s. with the beginning of perestroika.

In the same 1985, a previously unknown novel by the writer was published - “A Soldier’s Inheritance” (Das Vermachtnis), which was written in 1947, but was published for the first time.

In the early 1990s, manuscripts were found in the attic of Böll’s house, which contained the text of the writer’s very first novel, “The Angel Was Silent.” This novel, after its creation, was the author himself, burdened with a family and in need of money, “disassembled” into many individual stories for the sake of getting more money.

He was buried on July 19, 1985 in Bornheim-Merten near Cologne with a large crowd of people, with the participation of fellow writers and political figures.

In 1987, the Heinrich Böll Foundation was created in Cologne, a non-governmental organization that works closely with the Green Party (its branches exist in many countries, including Russia). The Foundation supports projects in the field of development of civil society, ecology, and human rights.

Essays

• Aus der "Vorzeit".
• Die Botschaft. (Message; 1957)
• Der Mann mit den Messern. (The Knives Man; 1957)
• So ein Rummel.
• Der Zug war pünktlich. (The Train Arrives on Time; 1971)
• Mein teures Bein. (My Dear Foot; 1952)
• Wanderer, kommst du nach Spa…. (Traveler, when will you come to Spa...; 1957)
• Die schwarzen Schafe. (Black Sheep; 1964)
• Wo warst du, Adam?. (Where Have You Been, Adam?; 1963)
• Nicht nur zur Weihnachtszeit. (Not Just for Christmas; 1959)
• Die Waage der Baleks. (Balekov Scales; 1956)
• Abenteuer eines Brotbeutels. (The Story of a Soldier's Bag; 1957)
• Die Postkarte. (Postcard; 1956)
• Und sagte kein einziges Wort. (And Never Said a Word; 1957)
• Haus ohne Huter. (House Without a Master; 1960)
• Das Brot der fruhen Jahre. (Bread of the Early Years; 1958)
• Der Lacher. (The Laughter Provider; 1957)
• Zum Tee bei Dr. Borsig. (At a cup of tea with Dr. Borzig; 1968)
• Wie in Schlechten Romanen. (Like Bad Novels; 1962)
• Irisches Tagebuch. (Irish Diary; 1963)
• Die Spurlosen. (Elusive; 1968)
• Doktor Murkes gesammeltes Schweigen. (The Silence of Dr. Murke; 1956)
• Billard um halb zehn. (Billiards at half past nine; 1961)
• Ein Schluck Erde.
• Ansichten eines Clowns. (Through the Eyes of a Clown; 1964)
• Entfernung von der Truppe. (Absent without leave; 1965)
• Ende einer Dienstfahrt. (How one business trip ended; 1966)
• Gruppenbild mit Dame. (Group portrait with a lady; 1973)
• "Die verlorene Ehre der Katharina Blum . The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum
• Berichte zur Gesinnungslage der Nation.
• Fursorgliche Belagerung.
• Was soll aus dem Jungen bloß werden?.
• Das Vermächtnis. Entstanden 1948/49; Druck 1981
• Vermintes Gelande. (Mined area)
• Die Verwundung. Frühe Erzählungen; Druck (Wound)
• Bild-Bonn-Boenisch.
• Frauen vor Flusslandschaft.
• Der Engel schwieg. Entstanden 1949-51; Druck (Angel was silent)
• Der blasse Hund. Frühe Erzählungen; Druck
• Kreuz ohne Liebe. 1946/47 (Cross Without Love; 2002)

• Heinrich Bell Collected works in five volumes Moscow: 1989-1996
  • Volume 1: Novels / Tale / Stories / Essays; 1946-1954(1989), 704 pp.
  • Volume 2: Novel / Stories / Travel diary / Radio plays / Stories / Essays; 1954-1958(1990), 720 pp.
  • Volume 3: Novels / Tale / Radio plays / Stories / Essays / Speeches / Interviews; 1959-1964(1996), 720 pp.
  • Volume 4: Tale / Novel / Stories / Essays / Speeches / Lectures / Interviews; 1964-1971(1996), 784 pp.
  • Volume 5: Tale / Novel / Stories / Essays / Interviews; 1971-1985(1996), 704 pp.

For the sincerity of his works and political activity, Heinrich Böll was called “the conscience of the nation.” “He was the advocate of the weak and the enemy of those who are always confident in their own infallibility. He stood for freedom of spirit wherever it was threatened,” so ex-president Germany's Richard von Weizsäcker described Böll in a letter of condolences to the writer's widow.

Böll was the first German writer since Thomas Mann to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature. He always felt German, but at the same time sharply criticized the government's "public hypocrisy" and the "selective amnesia" of his countrymen.

Life on the border of eras

Böll's house in the Eifel

Böll's life spanned several periods of German history. He was born a subject of Emperor Wilhelm II, grew up in the Weimar Republic, survived Hitler's times, the Second world war, occupation, and finally actively participated in the formation of West German society.

Heinrich Böll was born in 1917 in Cologne into the family of a sculptor and cabinetmaker. Böll's parents were very religious people, however, it was they who taught their son to make a clear distinction between Christian faith and the organized church. At the age of six, Böll begins to attend Catholic school, and then continues his studies at the gymnasium. After the Nazis came to power, Böll, unlike most of his classmates, refused to join the Hitler Youth.

After graduating from high school in 1937, Böll intended to continue his studies at the university, but he was denied this. For several months he studied bookselling in Bonn, and then for six months he had to perform labor duty digging trenches. Böll again tried to enter the University of Cologne, but was drafted into the army. Böll spent six years at the front - in France and Russia; He was wounded four times and tried several times to evade service by feigning illness. In 1945, he finds himself in American captivity. For Böll, it was truly a day of liberation, so he always maintained a feeling of gratitude towards the Allies who saved Germany from Nazism.

On the way to professionalism

After the war, Böll returned to Cologne. And already in 1947 he began to publish his stories. In 1949, his first book was published - the novel “The Train Arrived on Time.” In his first works, which can be classified as the genre of so-called “ruin literature,” Böll talked about soldiers and their beloved women, about the cruelties of war, and about death. The heroes of Böll's works remained, as a rule, nameless; they symbolized suffering humanity; they did what they were ordered and died. These people hated war, but not enemy soldiers.

The books immediately attracted the interest of critics, but circulation sold poorly. Böll, however, continued to write. By the end of the 50s, Böll moved away from the topic of war. At this time, his writing style also improved. In Billiards at Half Nine, often considered his best novel, Böll uses complex narrative techniques to condense into a single day the entire experience of three generations of a wealthy German family. The novel "Through the Eyes of a Clown" reveals the morals of the Catholic establishment. Group Portrait with a Lady, Böll's longest and most innovative novel, takes the form of a detailed bureaucratic report in which some sixty people characterize a certain person, thereby creating a mosaic panorama of German life after the First World War. “The Lost Honor of Katharina Bloom” is an ironic sketch on the topic of tabloid gossip.

Unloved for the truth

Heinrich Böll with Alexander Solzhenitsyn

A separate chapter in the life of Heinrich Böll is his love for Russia and active support of the dissident movement.

Böll knew a lot about Russia and had a clear position on many aspects Russian reality. This position is reflected in many of the writer’s works. Böll's relationship with Soviet leadership were never cloudless. The actual ban on Russian publications of Böll lasted from mid-1973 until last days his life. The “fault” for this was the writer’s social and human rights activities, his angry protests against the introduction Soviet troops to Czechoslovakia, active support of the dissident movement.

And it all started with incredible success Böll in the Soviet Union. The first publication was published back in 1952, when the only international magazine at that time, “In Defense of Peace,” published a story by a young West German author, “A Very Expensive Foot.”

Since 1956, Russian editions of Böll have appeared regularly, in enormous circulations. Perhaps nowhere in the world have his translations enjoyed such popularity as among the Russian audience. Close friend Böll Lev Kopelev once remarked: “If they said about Turgenev that he is the most German of Russian writers, then one could say about Böll that he is the most Russian of German writers, although he is a very “German” writer.

On the role of literature in the life of society

The writer was convinced that literature is extremely important in the formation of society. In his opinion, literature in the usual sense of the word is capable of destroying authoritarian structures - religious, political, ideological. Böll was confident that a writer, to one degree or another, was capable of changing the world with the help of his creativity.

Böll did not like being called “the conscience of the nation.” In his opinion, the conscience of a nation is the parliament, the code of laws and the legal system, and the writer is called only to awaken this conscience, and not to be its embodiment.

Active political position

Heinrich Böll, Nobel Prize laureate

Böll always actively intervened in politics. Thus, he decisively spoke out in defense of such Soviet dissident writers as Lev Kopelev and Alexander Solzhenitsyn.

He was also critical of the capitalist system. When asked whether humane capitalism exists, he once replied: “In fact, there cannot be such a thing. The way the capitalist economy functions and should function does not allow for any humanism.”

By the mid-1970s, Böll's assessment of German society became extremely critical, and its Political Views. He does not accept the ideology of mature capitalism with its double morality, and sympathizes with socialist ideas about justice.

The writer does this so decisively and publicly that at some point he turns out to be almost an “enemy of the state” - at least, a figure of official censure. Until his death, Heinrich Böll participated in public life as a dissident who presented views unacceptable from an official point of view.

Fame is a means to do something for others

Böll was very popular writer. He commented on his attitude to fame as follows: “Fame is also a means to do something, to achieve something for others, and it is a very good tool.”

The writer died in 1985. At the funeral ceremony, Böll’s friend, priest Herbert Falken, concluded his sermon with these words: “On behalf of the deceased, we pray for peace and disarmament, readiness for dialogue, fair distribution of benefits, reconciliation of peoples and forgiveness of the guilt that weighs heavily especially on us , Germans."

Anastasia Rakhmanova, brow