Alfred Hellmuth Andersch, Sansibar oder der letzte Grund [Flight to Afar]

Aaron Horton (Alabama State University)

Ed. by Jill E. Twark, East Carolina University
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.4.1: German-language Writing and Culture: Germany, 500-present.
Vol. editors: Gerhard P. Knapp (University of Utah), Jennifer Marston William (Purdue University), Herbert Rowland (Purdue University), Jill E. Twark (East Carolina University)

Dates

First circulation or publication 1957

Places

Germany (Country of Origin; Publication/ performance)

Genres and Modes

Novel

Resources

Save to Bookshelf

Alfred Andersch’s first and most successful novel,

Sansibar oder der letzte Grund

(

Zanzibar or the Last Reason

), features a diverse array of characters whose lives intersect at Rerik, a town on Germany’s Baltic coast, in the fall of 1938. Inspired partly by the author’s ongoing fascination with existentialism and the power of individual decisions to define one’s existence, each character confronts a difficult situation, and the narrative is largely driven by the choices they make in attempting to resolve their problems. The fictional characters face plausible circumstances in pre-World War II Nazi Germany: Gregor is an idealistic young communist working for the underground resistance; Judith is a young Jewish woman seeking a means of escaping the country; the curmudgeonly Herr…

Please log in to consult the article in its entirety. If you are a member (student of staff) of a subscribing institution (see List), you should be able to access the LE on campus directly (without the need to log in), and off-campus either via the institutional log in we offer, or via your institution's remote access facilities, or by creating a personal user account with your institutional email address. If you are not a member of a subscribing institution, you will need to purchase a personal subscription. For more information on how to subscribe as an individual user, please see under Individual Subcriptions.

1123 words

Citation: Horton, Aaron. "Sansibar oder der letzte Grund". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 11 March 2015 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=35544, accessed 23 April 2024.]

Save this article