Reimann’s own literary style is an attempt to find space for subjectivity. Lucy Jones’s translation excellently captures the dry wit, expressionistic boldness and seductively odd rhythms that make the original German so charismatic. Elisabeth is spiky and appealingly flawed ... There is something intoxicating about Reimann’s dense, jagged prose.
Reimann was interested in the “I” of the self at a time when the collective “we” dominated — and the tension runs through Siblings, which repeatedly slips between first person singular and plural. It makes her work feel modern, especially in an age of social media-fuelled self-revelation ... Reimann’s novel has the tense mood of a play ... She is a flash of colour in a grey landscape.
In a disarmingly direct style, alive with dialogue and detail, Reimann connects the contradictions of the G.D.R. with the legacy of the Third Reich...rather than whitewashing what it was like to forge a new society out of war-damaged shards ... Socialist realism has long been considered kitschy, compromised both politically and aesthetically. Art made under these conditions invites mockery: can good novels be written under the scrutiny of a Suslov? But Reimann’s work shows that they can ... Reimann brings the past so close that it barely feels past ... Among so many losses—a brother, a future, an ideology—Reimann’s Siblings has somehow survived, an unlikely patch of political, personal, and aesthetic freedom.
What is most intriguing about this autobiographical work is its three-dimensionality, offering a portrait of complicated characters trying to make sense of their life in a society they idealise and resist, as they feel it begin to work against their dream of an egalitarian utopia ... Although Reimann is not always above placing political talking points in her characters’ mouths, the book largely steers clear of black and white conclusions, reminding us, as art should, that life, no matter where it is lived, will always operate through shades of grey.
Jones’s translation ably captures the frankness of Elisabeth’s voice: the fast transitions, sensual visual imagery and careful ironic distance. At its best the prose evokes a kind of flickering street photography ... Only in the novel’s latter half, which moves from a delineation of the Arendt family’s history to a focus on Elisabeth’s struggle to reconcile her artistic vision with party ideology, does Reimann slip into the clichés of socialist realism ... Siblings is too good a novel to be read merely for the way in which it reflects on the limited political horizons of our era; but if you are looking to imagine your way beyond them, it gestures to a picture of a future that never was.
Siblings is like a book from a lost civilisation. It comes with four pages of endnotes, which these days is unheard of in fiction ... Siblings is a generational book. Like Gen X-ers or Gen Z-ers, Reimann looked about her to see that the markers of life and society had been put in place by people alien to her ... They don’t seem to offer a ready place in a contemporary society for Elisabeth or Uli. There is a social-industrial complex being run up, but they’re not sure they fit ... On the one hand, the array of possible relationships is so great and potentially so variegated, from the neutral pool of comrade, colleague, workmate; on the other, all the men in Siblings seem to be the same man, and the woman seems to be equally drawn to all of them.
What is most intriguing about this autobiographical work is its three-dimensionality, offering a portrait of complicated characters trying to make sense of their life in a society they idealise and resist, as they feel it begin to work against their dream of an egalitarian utopia ... The narrative, for the most part, is an intense and painfully intimate affair ... Although Reimann is not always above placing political talking points in her characters’ mouths, the book largely steers clear of black and white conclusions, reminding us, as art should, that life, no matter where it is lived, will always operate through shades of grey.
There are plenty of engaging discussions about industry and politics, which Reimann enlivens with Elisabeth’s volatility and enthusiasm. It stands as a solid work of socialist realism.
