Günter Wilhelm Grass (German: [ˈɡʏntɐ ˈɡʁas]; 16 October 1927 – 13 April 2015) was a German novelist, poet, playwright, illustrator, graphic artist, sculptor, and recipient of the 1999 Nobel Prize in Literature.
He was born in the Free City of Danzig (now Gdańsk, Poland). As a teenager, he served as a drafted soldier from late 1944 in the Waffen-SS and was taken prisoner of war by US forces at the end of the war in May 1945. He was released in April 1946. Trained as a stonemason and sculptor, Grass began writing in the 1950s. In his fiction, he frequently returned to the Danzig of his childhood.
Grass is best known for his first novel, The Tin Drum (1959), a key text in European magic realism. It was the first book of his Danzig Trilogy, the other two being Cat and Mouse and Dog Years. His works are frequently considered to have a left-wing political dimension, and Grass was an active supporter of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD). The Tin Drum was adapted as a film of the same name, which won both the 1979 Palme d'Or and the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. In 1999, the Swedish Academy awarded him the Nobel Prize in Literature, praising him as a writer "whose frolicsome black fables portray the forgotten face of history".
»Calcutta er et spejl af hele verdens tilstand, ikke bare af Indiens,« siger Günter Grass. Derfor er hans beretning om et ophold i Calcutta fra sensommeren 1986 til foråret 1987 heller ikke kun en bog om Indien, men også en bog om Günter Grass selv. Med sin kone Ute tager han af sted for at søge nye erfaringer, men også for at komme væk fra gamle ærgrelser. Han oplever ikke kun det fremmede, men også sin egen fremmedhed over for det. I forgrunden står de intense indtryk, som ikke er til at ryste af: varmen, lugtene, sveden, Calcutta næsten mere som et naturfænomen end som et samfund. Det er især alt dette, Grass har holdt fast i sine tegninger, der ikke kommenterer, men skitserer. I næste række følger forfatterens analyse og kommentar, hans forsøg på at begribe denne helt anderledes verden. I bagagen ligger så alt det, der er med hjemmefra (f.eks. Theodor Fontanes romaner fra slutningen af forrige århundrede), og midt i Calcutta overværer Grass en opførelse af et af sine egne skuespil: Plebejernes prøver på opstanden.
Række tunge er gudinden Kalis udtryk for præsentation og for skam. Günter Grass oplever i Calcutta vesterlændingens skamfølelse over for en kultur, der folder sig ud i rigdom og armod, pragt og elendighed, og som samtidig forkrøbles af de love, netop vesten giver verden. Skam er ikke bare dårlig samvittighed, den er erkendelse af egne grænser, af egen afmagt. Grass skriver og tegner om Indien – og om sig selv som gæst. Hans spejl slår revner, og i dem vokser bogens billeder og ord.
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