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Siegfried Lenz. Die Auflehnung. Hamburg. Hoffmann & Campe. 1994. 432 pages. DM 42. ISBN 3-455-04256-X.
The title of Siegfried Lenz's latest novel, Die Auflehnung, applies to several characters in the story who practice "rebellion," mostly in the form of small but determined actions. There are, to begin with, the brothers Frank and Willy Wittmann. Frank has a fish farm, and he is led to "rebel" when a cormorant shows up. Environmental legislation has made the cormorant a protected species, but he knows that once this first one tells its fellows about his rich ponds, all will be over with his business. So he goes on watch with a World War II rifle he had illegally salvaged, and ultimately he kills one of the birds.
Willy, meanwhile, has been a tea taster whose singularly discriminating palate has helped propel one of Hamburg's tea firms into the premier ranks of this international enterprise. However, the fabled "Mr. Tongue" finds himself forced to take early retirement when he suddenly discovers that he has lost...