Can you ever paint a complete picture of a person on the page?
The often-overlooked German writer Christa Wolf figured she’d give it a damn good go.
The result?
A strange, sad, and in some ways challenging book that was “half banned” by the German Democratic Republic.
Why was it deemed so provocative? Did Wolf manage to capture the whole of someone in her book? And why did my GCSE German teacher so roundly mock me for saying castle?
These are all questions the wonderful Catherine Taylor helps me to answer in this latest episode.
Indeed, welcome to The Library of Lazy Thinking Podcast, with me, your host, Glenn Fisher.
As you may well know by now, in each episode, I'm joined by a guest from the world of books to talk about a specific book they'd like to put in the library.
There's no plan and no agenda, just two people lazily thinking about literature.
If you enjoy the show and would like to help us (and get your hands on a coveted Library of Lazy Thinking bookmark, sticker, and pin badge), you can become a supporter of the library by upgrading your subscription.
But either way, please do like and share the show—it all helps.
In this episode, as I say, my very special guest is author of The Stirrings, Catherine Taylor. We discuss her pick for the library, the 1968 novel The Quest for Christa T. by Christa Wolf.
About Catherine
Catherine Taylor was born in Waikato, New Zealand, and grew up in Sheffield, South Yorkshire from the age of three. She studied English and Philosophy at Cardiff University and has worked in the book industry since 1992, for, variously, the British Library, Microsoft Encarta, Amazon, The Folio Society, and most recently as the deputy director of English PEN. She is a book critic and features writer for Guardian Review, New Statesman, FT Life & Arts, The Economist, Times Literary Supplement, Irish Times, Prospect, and the i. She is co-founder of the Brixton Review of Books, a non-profit literary quarterly, and editor of The Book of Sheffield: A City in Short Fiction (Comma Press, 2019), which was chosen as the Big City Read 2020 by Sheffield Libraries. Catherine's first book, The Stirrings: A Memoir in Northern Time was published by Weidenfeld & Nicolson in 2023 and won the 2024 TLS Ackerley prize for memoir and life writing.
About Christa
Christa Wolf was a German novelist and essayist. She is considered one of the most important writers to emerge from the former East Germany. Her books include Cassandra, Model Childhood, and The Quest for Christa T.
Links to obscure (and not so obscure) things mentioned in this episode
* Order The Quest for Christa T. by Christa Wolf and Catherine’s fascinating book The Stirrings from my local independent bookshop in Sheffield here.
* Learn more about Christa Wolf here.
* Find Catherine on Instagram here.
* Find Glenn on Instagram here.
About the Library
The Library of Lazy Thinking is a place to hang out and learn more about books. The library is free—like all libraries should be. But if you’d like to support the library, you can make a small monthly donation by becoming a paid member (and get an exclusive The Library of Lazy Thinking bookmark, sticker, and pin badge). All donations go back into the library, helping to organize live events, exclusive merchandise, and more podcasts.
About Glenn
Glenn Fisher is a writer—wait, Glenn Fisher is me. I’m the one writing this. Let’s drop the third-person act. My writing has been published in online literary journals Lunate, The Paris Bitter Hearts Pit, 3am Magazine, Dogmatika, and Litro Magazine. I am currently working on my first novel. I write about books and interview other writers and creatives here in The Library of Lazy Thinking. I live in Sheffield and work as a freelance copywriter. I have had a best-selling non-fiction book published on the subject called The Art of the Click. It was published by Harriman House and shortlisted for Business Book of the Year. It has been translated into Simplified Chinese and Korean. I also have a dog called Pablo. He is harder to translate. Indeed, most of my life revolves around trying to understand his often unreasonable demands.
