Autobiography and memoir Maybe Esther by Katja Petrowskaja review – a family story of 20th-century Europe Petrowskaya’s relatives, as described in this bestselling Sebaldian memoir, collectively conjure up the Russian revolution, the world wars and the Holocaust Katja Petrowskaja … Maybe Esther calls to mind the itinerant style of WG Sebald. Photograph: Christian Jungeblodt for the GuardianIn 1941 an elderly woman who might have been called Esther, great-grandmother of Katja Petrowskaja, remained in her apartment in Kiev when her family left. As a narrative, Maybe Esther calls to mind the itinerant style of WG Sebald. Her great-grandfather married a woman who couldn’t speak or hear, though the marriage has itself become one of the mute secrets of her family history. • Maybe Esther, translated by Shelley Frisch, is published by 4th Estate.

Source: The Guardian February 01, 2018 12:00 UTC