Dieckmann, Dorothea 1957–

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Dieckmann, Dorothea 1957–

PERSONAL:

Born 1957, in Freiburg, Germany.

CAREER:

Literary critic and author.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Hamburg Prize for Literature, 1990, for short stories; Marburg Prize for Literature, 1996, for Die schwere und die leichte Liebe; Germany Culture Foundation stipend, 1997; Ledig House fellow, 2004.

WRITINGS:

Unter Müttern: Eine Schmähschrift, Rowohlt (Berlin, Germany), 1993.

Wie Engel erscheinen (title means "How Angels Appear"), Rotbuch (Hamburg, Germany), 1994.

Kinder greifen zur Gewalt, Rotbuch (Hamburg, Germany), 1994.

Die schwere und die leichte Liebe (novella; title means "Heavy Love, Light Love"), Berlin Verlag (Berlin, Germany), 1996.

Belice im Männerland: Eine wahre Geschichte (novel; title means "Belice in Male Chauviedom: A True History"), Berlin Verlag (Berlin, Germany), 1997.

Damen & Herren (novel; title means "Ladies & Gentlemen"), Klett-Cotta (Stuttgart, Germany), 2002.

Sprachversagen (essays), Droschl (Graz, Austria), 2002.

Guantánamo (novel), Klett-Cotta (Stuttgart, Germany), 2004, translated by Tim Mohr, Soft Skull Press (Brooklyn, NY), 2007.

SIDELIGHTS:

German author, essayist, and literary critic Dorothea Dieckmann writes novels, short stories, and nonfiction in her native tongue. She was awarded the Hamburg Prize for Literature for her short stories, while her novella Die schwere und die leichte Liebe won the Marburg Prize. Despite her early success in Germany, her sixth book, Guantánamo, was the first of her works to be translated into English. The novel is particularly relevant to American readers because it is about the controversial prison camp at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba. Here, people considered to be terrorists or associates of terrorists have been imprisoned by the American government, sometimes for years without trial, and it has been revealed that many detainees have been tortured. A relatively brief work of 150 pages, Guantánamo is a fictionalized depiction of one such prisoner's ordeal.

Although Emily Weinstein pointed out in her Village Voice review that this book "is about imprisonment, not a specific prisoner," Dieckmann focuses on a character named Rashid. Rashid is a German citizen who is the son of German and Indian parents. One year he decides to travel to Delhi, India, to visit relatives. There he meets an Afghani man and the two become friends. They decide to take a trip to Pakistan, where both men participate in a political demonstration. Suspected of being a terrorist, Rashid is arrested and shipped to the American prison at Guantánamo.

Dieckmann proceeds to describe in detail everything that happens to Rashid. His days alternate between abject boredom in his cell and periods of absolute terror when he is interrogated and tortured. Physically and mentally worn down, he changes his story about what he was doing in Pakistan several times in an effort to appease his torturers and prevent them from inflicting further pain. Although Dieckmann has never personally been to the prison facility and based her novel on journalistic accounts, critics of the novel have asserted that she nevertheless provides convincing descriptive details. Weinstein called the book's scenes "vivid, while descriptions of [Rashid's] physical state are dense with visceral detail." "Dieckmann's imagination—and her attention to detail—are stunning," reported a reviewer for the Progressive on the Prairie blog, while a Publishers Weekly contributor concluded that "she simply seals the reader, like Rashid, in the camp's claustrophobic horror."