Danúbio, de Claudio Magris, ou de como um rio narra a Europa

Magris – traveller and narrator – gives us an account of his travels which take him across all Central Europe, covering almost 3000 kms from Danubio’s source in Germany to the river’s mouth in the Black Sea. He pauses at places he considers emblematic, describing their peoples and their curiosities, their languages, their cultures and their recent and ancient history. His aim is to capture the spirit that portrays the known Mittleurope, its ways of life, its feeling towards life, its miseries, its grandeur, its ethnic diversity, its survival strategies. All throughout, one senses an underlying feeling of nostalgia regarding the exodus of the German culture, a culture which, alongside the Jewish culture, cemented the unity and civilization in Central Europe. Its disappearance, in his view, is a great tragedy which cannot be erased by the National Socialism perversion. Through today’s eyes I have attempted to present and comment the authors’ views in the light of the time the book was written.