evolving political analyses since 1930,”²⁷the new treatment of theRuhr Uprising
emphasizes itsmythical status in the history of socialism and fundamentallyal-
ters thegendereddynamics in the process.Beyond the ideological revisions that
establish clear connections between KPD and SED,most of the changes concern
the figure of Theres/Therese, which were made in response to criticisms about
FranzKreusat’slack ofaprivatelife. The petty-bourgeois fiancée and the red
nurse are combined into one character and the roles of women in therevolution-
ary struggle greatlyexpanded–obviously withaview towardEast German read-
ers and their more egalitarian views ongenderand politics. NowFranz meets a
more socially conscious ThereseTauten atadance and is immediatelysmitten–
as is his mother.Their budding romancesurviveshis heated arguments with her
Social Democratic father and her initial annoyance about his manypolitical
meetings. Personaland political problems reach their culminating point when
Therese informsFranz thattheymust getmarried–she is pregnant.Yet these
problems are magicallyresolvedonce the uprising begins and she breaks with
her father and his politics of accommodation. During the decisive battle, Therese
evenventures to the frontlines to provide the armed workers with food andmed-
icine:“Therese had overcome her initial fear and sensitivity and carried out her
heavyduties with patience and prudence. [...]No, she no longerwasthe Therese
of yesterday; her thinkinghad completelychanged, and her father would prob-
ablynot have recognizedher if he had met her.”²⁸Franz still hasto dieasacri-
ficial death–for theglorious history of communism and the workingclass. Hope
and confidence for the future arrivesinthe form ofababy boy who, born in 1921,
might in fact be readingthis revised novel in East Germanyas“the first socialist
state on German soil.”As the next chapter argues, such revisionism was not the
onlystrategyavailable to communist writers forkeeping the proletarian dream
alive.Anotherrevolutionary situation, the 1921 MarchAction, inspired the writer
FranzJung to experiment with alternativestothe genderednarrativesofthe pro-
letarian novel and reconfigurethe constellations of aesthetic and political emo-
tion in the largercontext of what this book calls proletarian modernism.
Afterword of the publisher,Marchwitza,Sturm auf Essen(Berlin: Neues Leben, 1952),361.A
two-part 1958 editionappeared in theyoung-adultNeueAbenteuer series.
Marchwitza,Sturm auf Essen(Berlin:Tribüne, 1978), 151–152 (177 in the 1952edition).
192 Chapter 9