Walter Abish was born in Austria, but spent his childhood in Shanghai, where his family were refugees from Nazi-occupied Europe. In 1949 the whole family moved to Israel and he reloacted the United States in 1957, becoming an American citizen in 1960.
Abish is not a prolific writer. He has only published three novels, three collections of short stories, one book of poetry and one autobiography. His novel ‘How German Is It’ is his most famous work although when he wrote it in 1979 he had never actually set foot to Germany!
I first read this about 20 years ago and I’ve read it again after it occurred to me that it is a book that helps to define ‘hauntology’, currently something of a buzz word when discussing folk music, contemporary cinema and fiction. For Abish’s novel is strongly focused on the spectres of the past and in particular how this has an impact on national identity.
It is a book about remembering and forgetting.
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