Before the fall of the Berlin Wall many East German writers were praised in the Western world as dissident voices of truth, bravely struggling with the draconian constraints of living under the GDR's communist regime. However, since unification, Germany has been rocked by scandals showing the level to which the Stasi, the East German Secret Police, controlled these same writers. This is the first study in English to systematically explore how the writers have responded to the challenge of dealing with the Stasi from the 1950s to the present day.

Highly topical as Stasi scandals continue to punctuate German public life

Acknowledgements Notes on the Contributors List of Abbreviations Introduction; P.Cooke & A.Plowman PART I The East German Ministry of State Security and East German Society During the Honecker Era, 1971-1989; M.Dennis Uwe Johnson's Awkward Legacy: A Sympathetic Secret Policeman of the pre-Stasi Era; D.Tate The Stasi as the Force of Evil: Collin's Faustian Struggle with the Stasi Boss Urack in Stefan Heym's Collin; R.K.Zachau 'Die Tragikomödie Deutschland': Scenes from No Man's Land in Martin Walser's Dorle und Wolf; M.Butler Tallhover or the Eternal Spy: Hans Joachim Schädlich's Stasi-Novel Tallhover; K-H.Schoeps PART II 'Ich, Seherin, gehörte zum Palast': Christa Wolf's Literary Treatment of the Stasi in the Context of her Poetics of Self-Analysis; G.Paul 'Könnte man sagen, du seist ein Spiönchen?': Erich Loest's Fallhöhe; S.J.Evans Telling Tales: Moral Responsibility and the Stasi in Uwe Saeger's Die Nacht danach und der Morgen: O.Evans The Stasi as Panopticon: Wolfgang Hilbig's Ich; P.Cooke The Stasi, the Confession and Performing Difference: Brigitte Burmeister's Unter dem Namen Norma; A.Lewis 'Bekenntnissedes Stasi-Hochstaplers Klaus Uhltzscht': Thomas Brussig's Comical and Controversial Helden wie wir; K.Foell & J.Twark The Stasi as Literary Conceit: Günter Grass's Ein weites Feld; J.Preece Jürgen Fuchs: Documenting Life, Death and the Stasi; C.A.Costabile-Heming Escaping the Autobiographical Trap? Monika Maron, the Stasi and Pawels Briefe; A.Plowman Bibliography Index