Vergessen und erinnern: Die verankerung der vergangenheit in Uwe Timms werken

The aim of this study is examining the past in the novels of Uwe Timm, a Modern German Author, named "Morenga", "In My Brother's Shadow" and "Hot Summer", in terms of social, cultural and personal memory. In the introduction chapter of the dissertation, the studies made in relation with the social, cultural and personal memory and the questions and problems pertaining to the aim of the dissertation have been touched upon. The first chapter of the dissertation is comprised of the theories concerning the forgetting, the past, and the social memory. In this context, the theories of Maurice Halbwachs, Pierre Nora, Aleida Assmann and Jan Assmann, the most important figures of the memory researches have been explained and the theories which might have importance for the dissertation have been chosen. The second chapter of the dissertation, it is discussed how literature has become a means for the collective memory and the remembering, and has been emphasized on the functions and influences of literature in terms of remembering. Nevertheless in the same chapter, it is tried to be shown how the past has emerged and used in the modern literature. The third chapter of the dissertation is comprised of the chosen novels of Uwe Timm, namely "Morenga", "In My Brother's Shadow" and "Hot Summer". In the "Hot Summer" novel printed in 1974, the author handles how the uprising was experienced in Hamburg and Munich in 68s, how Ullrich has become an activist in 68 movements, and casts a light upon the challenging process suffered by Ullrich and accordingly by German youth, the claim of liberation, street fights and their manner towards Vietnam war. Uwe Timm has written up the entire past, namely the 68 generation, right after the movements and provided the actual and the fictional stories of the past together. "Morenga", printed in 1978, provides a novel foresight in the nature bearing witness to the history. The Author who wrote up about the war experienced between the occupying Germans and the native Hereros and Hottentots in Namibia, which was a South African colony of Germany in 1904, tells the story of Namibia that gained its freedom today and the guerrilla warfare that are still ongoing in other places; and lets us to handle all these events from a different angle. Considering his bond with the past in this novel of him, it is observed that the author casts a light upon 1904, from the perspective of 1978. In the semi-autobiographical work of Timm named "In the Shadow of my Brother" that was published in 2003, the author questions being a pro-Nazi through the letters his brother Karl-Heinz who died in Russian front, left behind and through the lines of the diary. The work is more likely as a book of settlement with the crime, conscience, personal and national history as well as the social memory of Germans. The author who illuminates 1943 Germany with the light of 2003 significantly contributed to the memorial literature with this work of him. The theories, which cast a light on the novels mentioned above and examined in the dissertation the best, have been chosen and scrutinized. The novels have been examined in terms of the theories emphasized and it has been examined how all these terms have emerged in the novels within the culture-scientific and literature-scientific context. In the fourth chapter of the dissertation, the relation between the literature and theory has been emphasized and it has been concluded that the theories are not any means explaining the literature. The theories and the literature bi-directionally illuminate each other. However, the literary work always precedes these theories since it is dynamic and vivid. In the last, conclusion chapter, a short summary has been provided and it is evaluated what kind of subjects have been touched upon and what kinds of conclusions have been reached.