Barriers

Set in a city renowned for a famous wall that had once separated its citizens, it is no wonder that Jenny Erpenbeck’s Go, Went, Gone has a lot to say about walls and barriers, both physical and abstract. Perhaps the greatest barrier in the novel is set by the German population, its legal practitioners and private citizens. Refugees arriving in Germany face a wall of resistance. If they manage to master the language and cultural barriers, they are still faced with a wall of ambiguous and unsympathetic legal processes, and are legally prohibited from working until their refugee application is finalised. This leaves them with little means to exist while awaiting the decision, which can take years. The law fluctuates and can be interpreted in various ways but never, it seems, to the advantage of refugees. Further, there is a general resistance to the refugees in the form of racism and prejudice.

Peter tells Richard that for the Incas, the centre of the universe wasn’t a point but a line where two halves of the universe met. This prompts Richard to view the two groups of people as facing off, something like the two halves of a universe that actually belong together, but whose separation is nonetheless unalterable. He sees the barriers between resident and refugee, rich and poor, man and woman, barriers that are mystical but very real.

Erpenbeck also explores the dissolving of barriers between time and place. The money transfer from Karon to Ghana, where money falls into the floor in Germany and land is purchased in Ghana, is a prime example. The barrier between the underworld and the above is also penetrable. Excavations reveal ancient treasures, Richard imagines a drowned man sinking and rising in the lake, and ghosts of drowned refugees, who had been restricted from coming ashore in Italy, are said to inhabit the Mediterranean. The other metaphysical barrier is the idea of visibility. Although the men are real, they are rarely seen by passers-by, even Richard fails to notice them as he crosses the plaza. This blurring of life and death, of real and unseen, of past and present, adds to the instability of the world, and while instability is common to the human experience, refugees face the added challenge of real barriers that exclude them from a normal life.

Barriers Quotes

Just stop putting up resistance – or is that how dying begins? Chapter 1

They speak English, French Italian as well as other languages that no one here understands. Chapter 2

Why didn’t he see the men? We become visible. Chapter 4

Is the only freedom the fall of the Berlin wall brought him the freedom to go to places he is afraid of?’ Chapter 6

The colonised are smothered in bureaucracy, which is a pretty clever way to keep them from taking political action. Chapter 13

The foreigner … is trapped between the now invisible fronts in an intra-European discussion that has nothing at all to do with him or the actual war he’s trying to escape from. Chapter 15

… if this prosperity couldn’t be attributed to their own personal merit, then by the same token the refugees were not to blame for their reduced circumstances. Things might have turned out the other way around. For a moment, this thought opens its jaws wide, displaying its frightening teeth. Chapter 19

What span of time should you consider if you want to know what counts as progress. Chapter 29

At first … my mother was scared of him because he’s black… (Anne) Chapter 37

You mustn’t forget she belongs to a completely different generation. (about Anne’s mum) Chapter 37

Round up all the boys and girls and send them back to where they came from. Chapter 39

… they’ve got plenty anyhow, they’re all drug dealers or African mafia. Chapter 39

So a border, Richard thinks, can suddenly become visible. Chapter 44

And is it a rift between Black and white? Rich and poor? Stranger and friend? Chapter 44

The practical thing about a law is that no one person made it so no one is personally responsible for it. Chapter 46

The line dividing ghosts and people have always seemed thin to him … (Richard) Chapter 47

What if the drowned man tried calling out to them from beneath the ice, and they saw him beneath their feet … but in the time it would take to fetch an axe … he would have sunk back down. Chapter 49

The ghosts, Karon says, only come as far as the Italian coast. Chapter 53

Accommodation

Accommodation can be seen in two versions of the same word: as a house or place to stay and in reference to accommodating or making way for something, being willing to fit in with one’s wishes or needs. In the world of Jenny Erpenbeck’s Go, Went, Gone, accommodation is fleeting. Richard’s house and possessions are seen as temporary, and the stories of the refugees reveal that the roof over your head today may be tin but tomorrow it may be the stars. Accommodation is a balancing act, perched over a bottomless pit. The refugees have houses burnt or are driven from their communities overnight. In Germany, their accommodation is transitory; a tent in the plaza is torn down, a room in the nursing home is closed and, eventually, rooms at Spandau are deemed illegal to occupy. Meanwhile, Richard’s house, like many others in Germany, passes steadily from generation to generation. Descriptions of Richard’s home with its many rooms sharply contrast the accommodation of the refugees.

In terms of accommodating the refugees beyond four walls and a roof, the German population does not do a great job. Indeed, the prejudice as shown by Anne’s Mother, Monika and Jorg, and a plethora of contributors to news blogs, reveals that they are far from accommodating. The idea of keeping money for their own country and not sharing with the newly arrived is prominent in their rhetoric. However, despite the law that is increasingly unaccommodating, there are still individuals who are willing to open their homes and offer sanctuary to the refugees.

Accommodation Quotes

If nothing special happens, then I can’t make a story out of it. (Journalist asking police about the men) Chapter 2

… they refuse to believe the world is in idyllic place (sympathisers in square) … The refugees on the other hand are trying to gain admittance to this world that appears to them convincingly idyllic. Chapter 8

We jumped in to lend a hand because nobody else wanted to. (Director nursing home) Chapter 11

The foreigner … is trapped between the now invisible fronts in an intra-European discussion that has nothing at all to do with him or the actual war he’s trying to escape from. Chapter 15

They assail these newcomers with their secret weapon called time, poking out their eyes with days and weeks, crushing them with months. Chapter 17

From one day to the next I had no father, no family, no house, no workshop. (Rashid) Chapter 18

.. if this prosperity couldn’t be attributed to their own personal merit, then by the same token the refugees were not to blame for their reduced circumstances. Things might have turned out the other way around. For a moment, this thought opens its jaws wide, displaying its frightening teeth. Chapter 19

Richard considers what to say as a resident of a country that has seventy thousand apprenticeship positions with no one to fill … but is nonetheless unwilling to accept these dark-skinned refugees. Chapter 25

But maybe they’ll have it better there … a sign they are going to be accepted. (Sylvia) Chapter 33

We’re not giving away anything for free, the law says, unrelenting and hard as iron. Chapter 39

… this country of bookkeepers will be aghast and blame the objects of the transport for the expense, as used to happen in other periods of German history. Chapter 44

A friend, a good friend, is the best thing in the world. Chapter 45

Your own property is in peril when your neighbour’s house burns. Chapter 51

It is accounted a sin to turn any man away from your door. (Tacitus) Chapter 51

Empathy

At the commencement of the book, Richard seems to approach the issue of the refugees as an academic exercise, organising lists and taking notes, but eventually he comes to model the necessary empathy required to fully engage with them. Erpenbeck, in turn, triggers the reader’s empathy towards asylum seekers, amid increasing concern around Germany’s acceptance of refugees and rising xenophobia. Generally, empathy in literature has been, for those in the West, demonstrated towards Western literary figures or historical victims of trauma. Yet, most of the asylum seekers arriving in Germany are from Africa and the Middle East. It is through the similarities in the individual traumatic experiences of the Oranienplatz protesters, before, during and after their flight to Germany, that Richard is prompted towards an empathic view. As Richard hears their stories, learns their names, researches their histories and culture, he abandons his preconceived ideas and can develop empathy.

Richard’s self-perception of being flawed, seen when he recounts the ways in which his treatment of his deceased wife was less than ideal, also seems to propel Richard towards empathy. Additionally, his recognition of the temporal nature of his possessions and the privilege they suggest, and of his relatively unearned freedom to travel since the fall of the wall enables him to place himself in the shoes of those he is trying to help. Monika and Jorg, who see travel as their right, without considering it as a privilege, fail to reach a place of empathy and instead make jokes and prejudiced comments about the refugees.

Empathy Quotes

Or maybe they were afraid the man would pull them down with him, who knows. (Richard’s thoughts about the strong men who row away from a drowning man) Chapter 1

He would have been left behind outright if it hadn’t been for a Russian soldier who handed him to his mother through the window of a train. Chapter 3

Why didn’t he see the men? We become visible. Chapter 4

It’s important to ask the right questions. Chapter 9

There was childhood. There was day to day life. There was adolescence. (Richard on Rashid’s life) Chapter 18

.. if this prosperity couldn’t be attributed to their own personal merit, then by the same token the refugees were not to blame for their reduced circumstances. Things might have turned out the other way around. For a moment, this thought opens its jaws wide, displaying its frightening teeth. Chapter 19

… none stand above the other, rather compliments the other … (Tuareg belief) Chapter 29

… watching and listening as these three musicians use the black and white keys to tell stories that have nothing at all to do with key’s colours. Chapter 32

And is it a rift between Black and white? Rich and poor? Stranger and friend? Chapter 44

A friend, a good friend, is the best thing in the world. Chapter 45

Your own property is in peril when your neighbour’s house burns. Chapter 51

It is accounted a sin to turn any man away from your door. (Tacitus) Chapter 51

Storytelling

In front of Berlin’s town hall, the small group of men staging a protest demand the right to remain in Germany and to work, but refuse to disclose their names. This refusal produces a great silence in their story. Although their placard reads in English ‘We become visible’, they are unknown and unseen by many. It is only through telling their stories that others can understand their past and present lives and their future hopes. It is through telling their stories that the refugees might convince the German lawmakers of the legitimacy of their cases. However, the law proves to be deaf. Jenny Erpenbeck’s novel Go, Went, Gone questions both the importance of telling others’ stories when language is a barrier and how those stories are discovered. Monika, Jorg and a range of others are willing to fill in the stories of the refugees with their own version of the truth. They tell stories of African mafia, of diseased prostitutes and of violent criminals. Richard, on the other hand, sets out to learn the men’s stories. His attempts are clumsy, thwarted by both the language barrier and his ill-conceived list of questions; he finds it is not always as simple as asking for glimpses into the men’s worlds as much of their stories include a depth of experience that makes them inexpressible and private.

Richard believes that the stories he holds of Germany and its past are best not told on top of the weight of the men’s own stories. Osarabo has never heard of the world wars and does not recognise the name Hitler. It makes Richard feel ‘deeply ashamed, as if this thing that everyone here in Europe knows is his own personal secret that would be unreasonable to burden someone else with’.

The gift of storytelling to unite not only works in a larger sense, in that the novel helps readers understand a deep issue, but through Richard’s conveyance of the men’s stories to his friends, it sparks action and understanding from them. Ultimately, it is around a fire at a party that the men share stories about their lives, in particular, their love lives, and bond as a group. This intimate sharing between new friends opens up a new kind of language between old friends, Detlef and Richard about Richard’s wife, Christel. As Richard himself shares his own story about his wife and their struggles, his misadventures of love, he joins Peter, Detlef and the refugees as equals.

Storytelling Quotes

What’s he going to do with the thoughts still thinking away in his head? Chapter 1

All these objects surrounding him form a system and have meaning only as long as he makes his way among them … (about Richard’s ‘stuff’ from the office) Chapter 1

They speak English, French Italian as well as other languages that no one here understands. Chapter 2

If nothing special happens, then I can’t make a story out of it. (Journalist asking police about the men) Chapter 2

We become visible. (sign in front of hunger strike men) Chapter 2

What stories lay behind all the random images placed before us? Chapter 3

‘Negro’ is a word no one would say now but back then people printed it on book jackets. Chapter 5

In other words, so-called ‘asylum fraud’ is nothing more than telling a true story in a country where no one’s legally obliged to listen, much less do anything in response. Chapter 15

Richard wished he knew what questions would lead to the land of beautiful answers. Chapter 20

What other things might be lurking in the dark reaches of his memory that will never again be dragged out of storage, before closing time arrives and the lights go out for good. Chapter 40

And might reasons journey be compare to what these men have been through? Chapter 50