At the Edge of the Night

Banned by the Nazis, the haunting novel At the Edge of the Night (Am Rande der Nacht), by the German writer Friedo Lampe, is a work of magic realism. This poignant book, beautifully translated by Simon Beattie, was, in Lampe’s own words, ‘born into a regime where it could not breathe’; he hoped that one day it might rise again. It evokes the sensations and impressions of a sultry September evening on the waterfront of Bremen, with its charm and tenderness, squalor and lust. The plot contains a stream of images with many characters: children, old and young people, men and women, townsfolk, performers, students and sailors. Its depiction of raw reality was unacceptable to the Nazis: the book was seized by them in December 1933 and withdrawn from sale. At the Edge of the Night is a powerful and thought-provoking novel that offers a unique perspective on the experience of the Second World War. Lampe’s prose is lyrical and evocative, and his characters are complex and multi-dimensional. The