Heinrich Böll (1917-1985) was one of (West) Germany’s most important authors and public intellectuals during the period following World War II. From the later forties to the early seventies, he devoted most of his creative energy to depicting the impact of the war and related issues on the individual and the nation, both during the conflict and over the ensuing years. While never completely abandoning these themes, he turned in the late sixties and seventies increasingly to contemporary political problems in his homeland, most notably the rise of left-wing dissidence and terrorism, in both his literary and publicistic writing.
Fürsorgliche Belagerungarose principally from his concern over governmental responses to these developments.
Several early reviewers of the novel criticized the
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Citation: Rowland, Herbert. "Fürsorgliche Belagerung". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 16 January 2018 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=16219, accessed 23 November 2024.]