“For much of his life, he’s hoped in a tiny back corner of his soul that people from Africa mourn their dead less. Death there has been a mass phenomenon for so long now. Now, this back corner of his soul is occupied instead by shame: shame that for most of his lifetime he’s taken the easy way out.”

In 2012 a group of more than 400 asylum seekers from different African countries settled, as a form of protest to the new European asylum regulations-, in a square of a central district of Berlin. They lived there for more than a year until the Berlin government drafted a temporary solution that consisted of  giving them housing, German lessons and a monthly stipend while they reviewed each individual application.  This is the background of Go, Went, Gone.

Since his retirement, Richard, a professor from what used to be East Berlin, is having a hard time finding new meaning for his life. Out of boredom he decides to go talk to the asylum seekers he’s read about in the news. Soon what starts as a weird relationship becomes an unusual friendship. They start telling Richard their stories, their dreams and hopes. Karon, Rashid, Yussuf, Awad, Ithemba, Osaboro… each have different backgrounds and stories that lead them, sometimes involuntarily, through a dangerous journey from Africa to Europe where many lost what they valued most.

Erpenbeck writes a beautiful book that while depicting the hardships to find meaning to one’s life at an old age, makes us question the world we live in.  The book is ambitious, and Erpenbeck does a masterful job at it. She explores old age, race and privilege, the relationship between East and West Germany, the subtle ways in which we create trust. There’s a lot of research behind this book – for example, the complex immigration and asylum regulations, and the local conflicts in the African countries that force people to leave- and she easily translates it into a work of fiction that makes us understand the frustration of navigating within a system that drives people in circles and leaves them standing in the same square with the same legal status. After finishing the book I kept thinking about it for a while. Erpenbeck shows us how Germany is doing its best to treat asylum seekers with dignity, but at the same time she makes us wonder: Is treating people with dignity enough?

About Jenny Erpenbeck

Erpenbeck was born in East Berlin in 1967. She studied theater and directed several plays before she started writing, nonetheless she still directs Operas. She writes both fiction a plays. For her book, The End of Days she won the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize. Gone, Went, Gone won the English PEN Award.

Other books written by German women:

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German initiatives and projects that support and empower girls and women

Flamingo

Flamingo e.V. is a non-profit association operating in Berlin to support refugee women – single, pregnant and/or with children – and unaccompanied minors, irrespective of their origin and residence status. They offer training and counseling free of charge. They organize volunteers companions to support the women in situations such as visits to the authorities or to a doctor.

Besides counseling they have two programs for pregnant women: Safe Star – Living space, which consists in four apartments were already four babies were born and the residence status of the young mothers could be secured; and, Safe Star – Godmother where refugee women are partnered with volunteers  that accompany them during and after birth.