The Assault by Harry Mulisch Critique - Essay Example

?Harry Mulisch's "The Assault Introduction The Second World War impacted many lives throughout its and for years to come. Every living soul in Europe was impacted by the war in one form or the other. However the depth and the impact of the war on different people were different. The war became a part of life in all aspects – military, civil, academic, social, political as well as academic. A number of literati have expressed themselves over the war and its impacts but perhaps one of the best works so far in this context has been Harry Mulisch’s “The Assault”. The novel essentially explores the sides of human beings that one would not normally observe in normal circumstances. This applies equally to the protagonist of the story as well as to the other characters that have been woven around his story. The author powerfully depicts how the actions of a few individuals in a short span of time end up impacting lives beyond measure. The characters are shown interwoven together at the beginning of the novel as they all live in proximity of each other but a single event changes the lives of these people by a large degree. The protagonist Anton is shown as being impacted the most by the murder of the police chief Ploeg as his family is executed by the Nazis in retaliation. The protagonist can be seen struggling with the newly emerging realities after the death of his family not just for a few years but for the entire span of his life. There is also a certain morality to the novel where morality and ethics have been tainted with a clear dose of relativism. (Complete Review) Given the circumstances of the day, the novel clearly depicts that morality was more of a paradox than a clear and blatant reality. The characters present in the novel are worth looking into because the author has used interplay amongst them to fully define the entire story. 2. Background The novel has been set out in the last days of the Third Reich as German control was collapsing on Europe. The story reflects the state of affairs throughout most of Europe and the common dilemma of whose side one should be on. On the one hand the Germans are still strongly in control of certain areas such as Netherlands (where the story has been created) and on the other hand the influence of the Allies and the communists in defeating the Nazis is undeniable. It is clear that it would only be a matter of time before the Nazis are taken down in Europe but for the moment the locals are caught between both groups. The resistance present in various countries around mainland Europe is depicted as rather irresponsible because their actions are not well thought out in terms of the impacts on the lives of ordinary people. Hence there is a clear line between Nazi supporters and opposition but the local populace is caught in the middle with nowhere to go. Moreover as the grip of the Nazis is loosening, they spare no effort to subjugate and brutalize the population in order to retain a dominating influence. Within these circumstances, the murder of the local police chief, Fake Ploeg (who is a strong Nazi collaborator) by members of the Dutch resistance trigger the deaths of Anton’s family. (Mars Hill Audio) The same dilemma talked about earlier is brought into play by the author and the rest of the story is built upon these foundations. The major characters of the novel are the protagonist Anton, his brother Peter and his parents the Steenwijk’s, the Beumers who are family friends, the Aarts’ who live close by and are hiding a Jewish family, Fake Ploeg the police chief who is murdered, Fake Ploeg Jr. the son of Fake Ploeg, the assassin of Fake Ploeg and Mr. Korteweg and his daughter Karin who tries to save his lizards by dumping the body of Fake Ploeg in front of the Steenwijk household. A discussion of the characters is presented below in order to appreciate the agency and responsibility of the characters and their overall contribution to the story. 3. Characters 3.1. The Protagonist – Anton “The Assault” is essentially a part detective, part narrative novel that centers on the life and past of Anton Steenwijk who is left alone after the brutal execution of his family by the Nazis as reaction to the murder of the chief of police, Fake Ploeg. The protagonist is depicted as trying to suppress all though of this event in order to forego his past. Given that this occurred when the protagonist was merely twelve years old, it would be unnatural to expect the protagonist to come to terms with such a large loss immediately. The approach used by the author is far more subtle and it depicts that protagonist coming to terms with his past through a mix of coincidence and through personal strength and maturity gained over the years. The role of coincidence and chance is developed clearly throughout the novel. In fact it would not be wrong to say that chance is a constant theme throughout the novel. The protagonist is shown as playing a game of chance as the novel begins and is then depicted as having dice in his pocket as his family is brutalized. The dice have been treated as a symbol for chance that the protagonist’s family is executed but he is not. Similarly the author constantly reminds the audience of random truths and also the irony involved in the life of the protagonist with repetition of the statement: “what are the chances that …” The author constantly meets up with characters from his past, such as the assassin who murdered the chief of police Fake Ploeg, at the funeral of his father in law’s friend. Similarly the author meets up with the son of Fake Ploeg at a rally organized by the communists. (Yorkshire Len) These constant coincidences are pervasive throughout the novel and the author depicts the protagonist as discovering new truths about his past from these chance meetings. The protagonist’s struggle with coming to terms with his past is both reinforced and helped out by his coincidental meetings with these characters. Moreover the development of the protagonist’s life can be seen as resulting from chance too. The police do not know what to do with a child this small and so move him to Amsterdam where one of his uncles claims the boy and then raises him. Consequently Anton becomes an anesthesiologist and later marries without providing much thought to his troubled past. Only after meeting the member of the resistance does Anton try to explore his past again. The suppression of the past has been depicted beautifully by the author by stating (Lesessais): “The motorboats were different. Pitching, their prows would tear the water into a V shape that spread until it reached both sides of the canal. There the water would suddenly begin to lap up and down, even though the boat was already far away. Then the waves bounced back and formed an inverted V, which interfered with the original V, reached the opposite shore transformed, and bounced back again—until all across the water a complicated braiding of ripples developed which went on changing for several minutes, then finally smoothed out.” The execution can be equated to disturbances in the water by the motorboats and the difficulty in tracing the resulting path of the water can be equated to the suppression of the past by the protagonist. Throughout this novel it must be appreciated that Anton has been depicted as a person with enough compassion and understanding to forgive people whose relative guilt has been exposed. Moreover instead of striving for revenge, Anton is shown as developing an understanding for the dilemmas of guilt and innocence that marked the event that changed his life. 3.2. Peter – the Protagonist’s Brother Anton’s brother Peter does his best to re-dump the body of Fake Ploeg but he is too late as the Nazis arrive just before his attempt. Consequently the family is rounded up. The parents are executed immediately while Peter is reportedly executed sometime around 1945. Although Peter disappears early in the novel but he is brought back by the author in order to introduce another concept of guilt and innocence. If Peter did manage to dump the body of Fake Ploeg in front of someone else’s house instead of the Steenwijk household, it would have lead to the execution of the members of that household. The author asks how this would have been justified that is would this have made Peter guilty or innocent? (Delvago) Such a proposition poses a strange moral dilemma for the protagonist that he finds hard to answer. Peter’s success at dumping the body elsewhere would lead to disastrous consequences for some neighbors who were hiding a Jewish family. This dilemma is one of many dilemmas raised by the characters but is left unanswered. 3.3. The Beumers The Beumers were family friends of the Steenwijks but they failed to show any support throughout the incident of dumping Fake Ploeg’s body although they are shown to have knowledge of the entire incident. This in turn leads the reader to ask another question, how justified is someone in protecting himself or themselves when a dangerous situation arises. Should friends be helped out or should one place priority in saving oneself if a life threatening situation arises. Again the actions of the Beumer household bring about a moral predicament that is hard to answer. The protagonist tries answering this question but with limited success. If the actions of the Beumers are analyzed it becomes apparent that anyone in such a situation would try to defend themselves before offering protection to someone else. However, had the neighbors cooperated with the Steenwijk family, there could have been a chance that the body could have hidden and then dumped later. In this scenario, the Steenwijk’s would have been safe as well as the other neighbors. 3.4. The Kortewegs The investigation of Anton reveals towards the end of the book that the body was dumped by Mr. Korteweg and his daughter Karin in front of the Steenwijk household. Strangely enough the reason assigned by Karin is that her father was merely trying to protect his collection of lizards that the Nazis would have obliterated had the body remained in front of the Korteweg household. The protagonist also learns that the burden of his actions that day were too much for Mr. Korteweg to live with so he ended up committing suicide. This can be seen as the burden of responsibility that Mr. Korteweg could not shoulder in his later years. There is after all little point in trying to save lizards by sacrificing human lives. Even though the Korteweg part of the story is strange, it is made stranger still when the protagonist realizes that the body was not dumped in front of the Aart household who were harboring a Jewish family. If that had been done, there were large chances that the Jewish family and the Aarts would have been executed. Therefore while Mr. Korteweg did something reprehensible, he also did something thoughtful at the same time. Again it is hard to decide if these actions were morally justified or not and hence another open question emerges. 3.5. Fake Ploeg Junior The second largest character in “The Assault” is undoubtedly Fake Ploeg Junior whose life is obliterated much the same as Anton’s life. After his father’s Fake Ploeg Junior is forcefully admitted to a Catholic school while his mother is taken away. This treatment forces Ploeg Junior to renounce school at an early age and eventually become a mechanic. The protagonist and Ploeg Junior can identify similar tragedies in life although the onset of such tragedies was different. Both are forced to see life in a difficult manner at an early age and both end up struggling in order to quell the past and its misery. 4. Conclusion The characters in “The Assault” are interwoven and segregated at the same time due to the circumstances forced upon them. Largely the actions of these characters cannot be labeled as moral or immoral and it must be realized that after all these people were just human. The characters portrayed by Muslich are just as fallible as any ordinary human beings and the book can be seen as a critical appraisal of life towards the end of the Second World War. 5. Bibliography Complete Review. The Assault - Harry Mulisch. 21 December 2008. 18 October 2011 . Delvago, Rincon. The Assault: Harry Muslich. 2011. 18 October 2011 . Lesessais. The Assault by Harry Mulisch. 8 March 2008. 17 October 2011 . Mars Hill Audio. Harry Mulisch. 2011. 18 October 2011 . Yorkshire Len. Harry Mulisch: The Assault. 1 November 2007. 18 October 2011 . Read More