47 pages • 1 hour read
Stasiland
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Essay Topics
What is the significance of Hagen Koch being the “lone warrior against forgetting?” Does it necessarily matter if one’s reasons for remembering are pure, or motivated by toxic ideology?
How does the book approach the difference between the psychological importance of remembering and the sociological/national importance thereof?
Orwell is evoked frequently by Funder and others in their discussion of life in East Germany. To what extent is East Germany Orwellian, and does it ever go beyond Orwell’s dystopian visions?
What does Frau Paul’s story tell us about the lasting effects of the regime, both in her relationship with her son and the details she omits from her story?
How does the sense of smell function as a way of representing memory?
What is Funder’s personal relationship with the stories of East Germany, and how does this relationship evolve over the course of the book?
How do the interviews with the Stasi men offer a portrait of normalized cruelty?
The literal Berlin Wall features as an impermeable entity of the Communist regime, but there is also the metaphorical Mauer im Kopf (the ‘Wall in the Head’) that Funder refers to. While the physical Wall has been torn down, how does the book portray the lingering division between east and west in the present day?
What lasting effect does Stasi propaganda have on each of the people whom Funder interviews?
10. To what extend do Funder’s interview subjects make their past “shiny and smooth as a pearl?”
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