A World so Small and Vast
Two midwives, one little girl and an East Frisian village in the whirlpool of time
1959: in a raw and windy, ice-cold village under a huge domed sky, a girl named Greta is born. Not in a hospital, but with the help of the village midwife in her grandparents’ farm labourer’s cottage. Greta grows up on this remote stretch of land, woven into the same existence as her forbears. And yet changes are occurring – slowly but surely, progress comes to the village. Roads are paved, TVs arrive, and some people finally get a car. Women’s lives, in particular, are changing: birth, motherhood, family – nothing escapes the changes. Katrin de Vries gives us a vivid and atmospherically dense glimpse into the small, yet vast, world of the village.
- A journey into the past that makes it clear that change represents both progress and loss.
- For readers of Elena Ferrante and Monika Helfer
Katrin de Vries, born in 1959, lives in East Frisia. She is a writer and gardener.
