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Just read Closely Watched Trains,” a tiny masterpiece (undeservedly forgotten) by Czech writer Bohumil Hrabal. It tells the story of a few days at a train station in Czeoslovakia during WWII. Toward the end they receive a train load of refugees from Dresden, which is being fire-bombed not too far away. The drained souls stand huddled in the terminal. Out of the shock, one begins to weep until before long the entire crowd is convulsed.
Then the other day I heard a German woman on the radio talking about a book she’d written on German suffering in WWII, with Dresden as emblem. And learned that the British bombing of Iraq in the early 20th century was overseen by the same man who later became the architect of the Dresden fire bombing campaign. Guess I’ve got Dresden on the brain, and your guy seems to be climbing right out of it.
November 14th, 2005 at 4:40 pm
Just read Closely Watched Trains,” a tiny masterpiece (undeservedly forgotten) by Czech writer Bohumil Hrabal. It tells the story of a few days at a train station in Czeoslovakia during WWII. Toward the end they receive a train load of refugees from Dresden, which is being fire-bombed not too far away. The drained souls stand huddled in the terminal. Out of the shock, one begins to weep until before long the entire crowd is convulsed.
Then the other day I heard a German woman on the radio talking about a book she’d written on German suffering in WWII, with Dresden as emblem. And learned that the British bombing of Iraq in the early 20th century was overseen by the same man who later became the architect of the Dresden fire bombing campaign. Guess I’ve got Dresden on the brain, and your guy seems to be climbing right out of it.