The Blind Side of the Heart
ABOUT
THE BOOK
Amid the chaos of civilians fleeing West in a provincial German railway station in 1945, Helene has brought her seven-year-old son. Having survived with him through the horrors of the war years, she abandons him on the station platform and never returns.
Many years earlier, Helene and her sister Martha’s childhood in rural Germany is abruptly ended by the outbreak of the First World War. Her father comes home only to die. Their Jewish mother withdraws from the hostility of her surroundings into a state of mental confusion. Helene calls the condition blindness of the heart, and fears the growing coldness of her mother, who hardly seems to notice her daughters any more.
ABOUT
THE TRANSLATOR Anthea
Bell
Anthea Bell OBE was an English translator of literary works, including children’s literature, from French, German and Danish. These include The Castle by Franz Kafka, Austerlitz by W. G. Sebald, the Inkworld trilogy by Cornelia Funke and the French Asterix comics with co-translator Derek Hockridge.
Anthea Bell OBE was an English translator of literary works, including children’s literature, from French, German and Danish. These include The Castle by Franz Kafka, Austerlitz by W. G. Sebald, the Inkworld trilogy by Cornelia Funke and the French Asterix comics with co-translator Derek Hockridge.