Heinrich Böll
Foto Di Gruppo Con Signora

The proverb says that all that glitters is not gold. "All that glitters," in this case, is a novel that is unanimously recognized as a masterpiece and that gathers awards and accolades. Published in 1971, "Gruppenbild mit Dame" (this is its original title) proves to be a best-seller and earns its author, Heinrich Böll, the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1972. It is undoubtedly an imposing and ambitious work: the mature Böll, already over fifty at the time, channels all his efforts and talent to surpass himself, probably aware that he had achieved stylistic completeness with the extraordinary, unmatched "Opinions of a Clown" (1963), and brings this "Group Portrait with Lady" to press. My opinion is that the Rhinelander did better. It's unfortunate to say, especially when one is aware that the work in question is the author's attempt to do his utmost. Perhaps ambition doesn't always rhyme with perfection, perhaps "Opinions" isn’t a simple novel, but an indispensable piece of twentieth-century literature that, in any case, would represent the unassailable pinnacle of Böll's production. But let's go in order.

Böll sheds the guise of the omniscient narrator and the first-person narrator to embark on a new form of writing: the narrator, who in the book simply calls himself A. (author), is a chronicler who collects testimonies and quotes and reports official documents (some actually existed). The investigation aims to outline a sort of impartial biography (though A. will not always manage to conceal his viewpoints) of Leni Pfeiffer, a beautiful and sensual woman, who at the time of the research, conducted in 1970, is forty-eight years old. Thus, we learn that Leni, born Gruyten in 1922, is a daughter of a respectable bourgeois family. She spends her youth attending, without particular dedication, a religious institute, where she is fascinated by the figure of Sister Rahel, an eccentric and non-conformist nun who will become her friend and spiritual guide over time.

Also significant is the deep friendship with her peer Margret, one of the most sought-after witnesses despite her poor health condition (having contracted some venereal diseases through prostitution). Leni has always harbored a deep admiration for her brother Heinrich and, as a teenager, she becomes infatuated, reciprocated at that, with her cousin Erhard, without ever actually realizing this feeling. At the dawn of the war, Heinrich and Erhard head to the front and die: it marks the beginning of a series of calamities that will plummet the Gruyten family into the abyss. Leni marries Alois Pfeiffer, a paymaster of the army: a rather convenient and loveless union, at least on her part. At about the same time as Alois's death, who also fell in the war, Leni's father, a construction entrepreneur, is accused of profiteering. The girl finds herself compelled to seek work and finds it in a garland and funeral wreath factory.

Her employer, Pelzer, falls madly in love with her, but Leni starts a tumultuous relationship with Boris, a Soviet political refugee. For her love, nonetheless, Pelzer will defend the two new lovers from the workplace's jealousies and gossip, make their union possible, and even be a witness at the baptism of their son Lev: all this at the end of the war, amid bombing and executions. In the immediate post-war period, a time when the dramatic division between East and West and consequent hostilities commence, Boris is discovered by the authorities, who punish his "clandestinity" by transferring him to a stone quarry, where, needless to say, he meets his death. Leni closes herself more and more in a melancholic solitude and will always be an object of ridicule and malicious gossip over her relationship with a "enemy" of the West.

Placing particular emphasis on the years of the Second World War, A. does not allocate much space to the last two decades: it is nevertheless known that Leni lives with a young couple, referred to for privacy reasons as Hans and Gretel, that her son Lev is serving a sentence in prison for fraud, that she, increasingly impoverished and abandoned, is under heavy threat of foreclosure, and that she has recently begun a new romantic connection with a Turkish immigrant named Mehmet, from whom she is expecting her second child.

Böll once again distills his obsession: the war and its devastating effects on people's lives, tired, annihilated, and tested by an endless series of bereavements. It's no coincidence that all the characters described, apart from the two young tenants of Leni, Hans and Gretel, and the twenty-five-year-old son, have lived through the full years of the Second World War. Still, it is a sprawling novel that, while focusing more on the years of wartime, by following the protagonist's life, sketches out half a century of German history from the Weimar Republic to the Sixties. Yet, if one focuses solely on reading, Böll appears so "monumental", as Bevilacqua defined him, so deliberately challenging that it seems at times unnatural.

His narrative has always been refined, always required a certain commitment, but this book at times proves to be a real test of the reader's patience. It cannot be ruled out that Heinrich Böll, so important and authoritative for future generations, was himself influenced by another important name in post-war German literature, Günther Grass, ten years younger than him. But the overly abundant and incredibly detailed prose for Grass is a natural and original stylistic inclination, whereas in "Group Portrait with Lady" it gives a layer of pedantic calligraphy. For instance, I find it ambiguous to attribute notable dialectical skills and a refined vocabulary to all the witnesses, without distinguishing by age, profession, or education, so that the interventions seem more like monologues of intellectuals than simple life stories. It naturally leads one to ask: why? For what reason render certain characterizations so sociologically improbable? At this point, a certain self-satisfaction becomes apparent.

So far, we've enumerated the flaws, if they can be called that. And the merits? Well, in truth, the very reasons that make this novel controversial and not entirely successful contain its own charm. It may not have the spontaneity of "And Never Said a Word", it may not be as painfully honest as the already mentioned "Opinions of a Clown", but it remains an admirable work, especially for its formal completeness. It should also be considered that these unprecedented and partially debatable stylistic choices were not undertaken merely for whims: it wasn't easy, in the midst of the Cold War, to convey one's viewpoints without reservations and not risk censorship or even political persecution, especially in Germany, which was the fulcrum of both blocs. The choice of entrusting the narration to an impartial voice and presenting different viewpoints allows the author not to take too many stands and thus expose himself to such dangers. It is well known, however, that the writer was outraged by the prejudices and tensions prevailing at that time: he was accused of sympathizing with terrorism because of his friendships with intellectuals of the Soviet bloc.

"Group Portrait with Lady" presents the author in a renewed guise: yes, caustic and incisive as always, but in a more subtle and implicit manner than in the past. It is, undoubtedly, yet another great demonstration of high intellectual caliber. It is time to decide: is "all that glitters" once again gold? Yes, though not of the purest and most exquisite Böll brand. Therefore, it is impossible, even with a bit of reverential fear, not to round up and give the highest marks.