"The Lives of Others" and Contemporary German Film

The series offers lively, comprehensive accounts of contemporary German culture written by experts and designed for advanced student readers and scholars alike. Both in monographs and closely-defined edited collections, it aims to introduce major authors, thinkers, filmmakers, literary topics, genres and landmark individual works, focusing on the period since 1989 but reaching back, where appropriate, to the vital hinterland of the 1970s.

This volume offers the first book-length academic investigation of Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck's Oscar-winning film The Lives of Others (2006). The aim of this edited collection is twofold. On the one hand, it offers new insight into one of the most successful German films of the past two decades, placing The Lives of Others within its wider historical, political, aesthetic and industrial context. On the other, it offers this group of scholars, which includes many of the leading international figures in the field, opportunity to make a series of interventions on the state of contemporary German film and German film studies.

Auteur

Paul Cooke, University of Leeds, UK.

Résumé

"With this volume, the master text that is The Lives of Others has a companion that does a great service in shedding light on the complex and interrelated issues that surround the film. It is accompanied by a very useful bibliography. One can expect this volume to be a touchstone for many future discussions of the film."

(James M. Skidmore, Seminar 51, 1-2015)