The Tin Drum - Gunter Grass

I've just finished reading it. I read it in English, not in German, however it sounds stupendous, I can only wonder how it sounds in German.

It's one of the greatest books I've ever read, I didn't expect it. It's fantastically poetic and grotesque(my imagination was thrilled with all the metaphors), and realistic (with a sick sense of humor). Also I think it's the most sincere book I've read. Even if realistic and sincere, it's so care free. It's post-modern however written with a "classical" seriousness and complexity.

As I was told that I have the unfortunate habit of comparing things, I can tell you that I only can compare Grass with Faulkner. Faulkner is mythical, dark, pulsating with instinctive and ancestry throbs. Grass is less that and more artistic. You feel blood and death, however you feel all along the sublimating and purifying drumming of Oskar in every page. Without that, without its therapeutic art, Grass as Oskar could not have survived all the horrors. We don't live Faulknerian times anymore, we've been bound by the events (WWII and all the XX-th century's sadnesses) to become more care free, artistic and complex. It's not bad or good, we're just different and less innocent. Some took only the care free part of it, the epidermal and superficial attitude. We can not live Greek tragedies anymore, I contend that, but many of us decided to live a perpetual musical.

Everybody asked me what it's about, like it mattered. As all great books it's about life and death. I invite you to read it if you have not done that already.