Dealing With The Future In Anna Funder's 'Stasiland'

870 Words4 Pages
‘You know, they want to stop thinking about the past, they want to pretend it all never happen.’ How does Funder show that thinking about the past is necessary to move on with the future? In Anna Funder’s ‘Stasiland’, a literary journalistic text, she explores the delicate concept of how individuals respond to and cope with a horrific and unbelievable past and how they embrace unified Germany. Each character within Funder’s text has their unique way of dealing with the Stasi oppression against its own citizens, and the sudden fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989. While some individuals give the reader some hope and optimism for they are able to accept their unfortunate past to move on, other characters fail to recognise this and are stuck in the past. Yet there are also some who have accepted their past but are trapped in the…show more content…
Ex-Stasi men, such as Herr Winz, Von Schnitzler, and Herr Bock are so affirmed by their past that they refuse to move on. Their dedication and commitment to the past have left them wanting to go back in time. Even after seven years since the fall of the Berlin Wall, Herr Winz still maintains his Stasi tradition of his role as a ‘spy’. Von Schnitzler exudes with pride regarding his work, his actions and his achievements when he operated ‘The Black Channel’. His attachment to his work makes it difficult for von Schnitzler to forget about his past. Herr Bock also sustains his ‘Spezialdisziplin’ skill evident at the end of his chapter where Funder is left in his dark ‘conspiratorial’ room. He ‘enjoyed having me at his mercy.’ Funder clearly develops these ex-Stasi men as strong believers of the Stasi’s ideology and its philosophy. They are all waiting for the ‘Second Coming of socialism’. For these Stasi men, they lost their power in the new Germany. Although these three Stasi men constantly recall their past, they are unable to embrace unified
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