Mexico as literary experience: In times of fading light (2011) By Eugen Ruge

Abstract

This paper “Mexico as a literary experience: In times of fading light (2011) of Eugen Ruge” written by Olivia C. Díaz Pérez and Jesús Omar Serrano Muñoz analyzes a novel that signifies a watershed moment in the German-speaking literary scene by addressing the history of the German Democratic Republic (GDR) in the manner of Thomas Mann and his novel Buddenbrooks. The researchers emphasize how the author describes the decline of East Germany through the fall of a socialist establishment family whose background goes back to the exile of German speakers
to Mexico. Through their contribution Díaz Pérez and Serrano Muñoz highlight how the novel returns to a still little known theme concerning the relations between Mexico and the GDR, that is to say, the difficult role that the German-speaking people in exile had to play upon their reincorporation into the political and cultural life of East Germany. They draw special attention to how Mexico’s image in the novel plays a very specific role in serving as literary experience and form part of a literary tradition of foreign travelers in Mexico.