In
Der Zug war puenktlich (1949;
The Train Was on Time), a haunting story of a soldier who foresees his own death while waiting to be transported to the eastern front, and
Wo warst du, Adam" (1951;
Adam, Where Art Thou"), he describes the horror and absurdity of war. As a writer, Böll reacted to the war with anger and condemnation. While revealing the complicity of respectable institutions, such as the Catholic church, in Hitler's political success in Germany, Böll points to the catastrophic consequences of Nazi policies. According to Wilhelm Johannes Schwarz, Böll's "predominant attitude to the war is disgust and vexation.... He tells only of its boredom, of filth and vermin, senselessness, and futile waste of time."
Postwar Germany is the setting of Boll's novels of the 1950s. Und sagte kein einziges Wort (1953; And Never Said a Word) relates a family man's difficulties in adjusting to civilian life. This novel received much critical attention and helped establish Böll's reputation as a master storyteller. Haus ohne Hueter (1954; The Unguarded House) is about the struggle for daily survival in a warn-torn city as experienced by two fatherless boys.
Böll's novels written in the 1950s and 1960s examine Germany's efforts to forge a new identity while exorcising the demons of its Nazi past.
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