Another Christmas Tale

Erich Kästner, author of witty and wise poems and some of the most beloved books for children in German literature, about whom I’ve written before, also wrote one of the saddest Christmas stories I know, but not in any of his works of fiction. It’s from his book about his childhood, Als ich ein kleiner Junge war („When I was a little boy“), and I was reminded of it recently, when encountering, not for the first time, a complaint that Das doppelte Lottchen, aka the work that was later bastardized into US movies called The Parent Trap (which I still haven’t watched, mostly because I’m told that the hard working Munich journalist mother of the original becomes a Boston society lady there, and that’s just not on!), is clueless and/or screwed up about marital enstragement and divorce, presenting it as something easily overcome for the sake of the nuclear family. Now, Das doppelte Lottchen was one of the earliest children’s books to deal with divorce at all in Germany, and you won’t get any argument from me re: the lack of realism of its central premise, but that wasn’t because Kästner himself didn’t know that some couples really are (or would be) better off separated, or that „for the sake of the child(ren)“ can ring hollow. (And no, not because one of them is a wife beater or an ax murderer.) Case in point: his parents. Which brings me to that autobiographical Christmas story of his, translated here into English by yours truly. (Some additional background notes: Kästner’s father Emil had started out as a saddle maker and then had become a carpenter; his mother Ida started as a maid and later became a hair dresser, mostly because they needed the additional money so young Erich could afford to stay at school and then go to college instead of becoming a workman himself. Oh, and in Germany, presents are given on Christmas Eve, in the evening, not on Christmas Day in the morning.)

„My parents were, out of love for me, jealous of each other. They tried to hide it, and often they succeeded. But on the most beautiful day of the year, they never managed. Otherwise they tried to pull themselves together as best they could, for my sake, but on Christmas Eve, they couldn’t do it very well. I knew that, and had to pretend I didn’t for all our sakes.

( Why Erich Kästner hated Christmas more than Scrooge ever did )

Kästner published this book only after his mother had died (though his father was still alive), and in it, he tried to explain her further. Here’s the thing: Als ich ein kleiner Junge war actually wasn’t one of Kästner’s „adult“ books (like Fabian). It was explicitly a memoir aimed at children (ending with the beginning of WWI, not so coincidentally). Now, in Kästner’s novels some dark stuff happens now and then, but as far as I recall nothing as harrowing as this (though there is something of it in some of the darker poems):

( Norma Bates in Dresden )

If you're wondering where the fact the children in Kästner's novels tend to be the "adults", taking care of their parents or making them see reason comes from - wonder no longer.

This timeline sucks, part the Nth

The Turkish Minister of foreign affairs claims Individual 1 has promised to extradite Gülen to Turkey. While anything the Erdogan government claims, especially re: the attempted coup, is worth some scepticism, I could believe this one, since the Orange Menace loves autocrats and never understood all the bother raised a bit of torture there and prison for one's political enemies here. Maybe he'll send a bone saw along with Gülen.


If US politics have taken on a Tarantino flair, then British politics... honestly, I don't know what to compare them to anymore. Spitting Image, back in the 80s? Seems like understated hardcore realism by comparison. Ivan Rogers, who was the UK's representative to the EU until recently, dissected all the Brexit delusions in this great speech given in Liverpool. Choice quote:

It still amazes me that virtually the entire British political class still thinks that it’s free movement obsessions are about to be shared in the 27. They aren’t.

BUT…. once you leave the EU, you cannot, from just outside the fence, achieve all the benefits you got just inside it.

First, there will, under NO circumstances, be frictionless trade when outside the Single Market and Customs Union. Frictionless trade comes with free movement. And with the European Court of Justice. More later on that.

Second, voluntary alignment from outside – even where that makes sense or is just inevitable – does NOT deliver all the benefits of membership. Because, unlike members you are not subject to the adjudication and enforcement machinery to which all members are.

And that’s what Brexiteers wanted, right? British laws and British Courts.

Fine. But then market access into what is now their market, governed by supranational laws and Courts of which you are no longer part – and not, as it used to be, yours – is worse and more limited than before.

That is unavoidable. It is not, vindictive, voluntary, a punishment beating, or any of the other nonsense we hear daily. It is just ineluctable reality.

And finally, the solidarity of the club members will ALWAYS be with each other, not with you. We have seen that over the backstop issue over the last 18 months. The 26 supported Dublin, not London. They still do. Nothing the Prime Minister now bids for will change that.

This may be the first Anglo-Irish negotiation in history where the greater leverage is not on London’s side of the table. And the vituperation aimed at Dublin politicians tells one just how well that has gone down with politicians and apparatchiks who had not bothered to work out that this was no longer a bilateral business, and are now appalled to find they are cornered.

Well, just wait till the trade negotiations. The solidarity of the remaining Member States will be with the major fishing Member States, not with the U.K. The solidarity will be with Spain, not the U.K., when Madrid makes Gibraltar-related demands in the trade negotiation endgame. The solidarity will be with Cyprus when it says it wants to avoid precedents which might be applied to Turkey.

I could go on.


The point re: this being the first Anglo-Irish negotiation in history where the Irish have the greater leverage was realised by the Irish long before the UK, it seems: How Ireland outmaneuvered Britain on Brexit is an article devoted to this aspect in particular. Back to Ivan Rogers dissecting Brexit: he does so in a bipartisan way, no more impressed by Labour's leadership than he is with the Tories:

And even yesterday morning I listened to a Shadow Cabinet Member promising, with a straight face, that, even after a General Election, there would be time for Labour to negotiate a completely different deal – INCLUDING a full trade deal, which would replicate all the advantages of the Single Market and Customs Union. And all before March 30th. I assume they haven’t yet stopped laughing in Brussels.


If they haven't, it's only because watching people you used to respect and like commit self mutilatation is actually a painful business. Do I ever prefer fiction to reality. It just makes more sense.


Even if it's so surreal and bewildering like the tv show Legion. versaphile wrote this great glimpse at Lenny and David post Season 2 finale: All Good In The Head Now?

And here are two excellent meta posts by the same writer: Why Mr. Darcy keeps being misread as a Bad Boy Reformed (which isn't his trope), and Why the Borgias got their image as worst of the worst in the Renaissance, when objectively speaking they were no more (or less) corrupt than the rest of their contemporaries, including the families who managed to get members on the papal throne.