--- title: Gunter Grass' Controversial Past: How He Acknowledged It in 1970 description: The author has died at 87 canonical: https://time.com/3819364/gunter-grass-1970/ author: Lily Rothman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-04-13T15:40:41.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T06:21:06.109Z article:section: History og:title: Gunter Grass' Controversial Past: How He Acknowledged It in 1970 og:description: The author has died at 87 og:url: https://time.com/3819364/gunter-grass-1970/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt37df30e1028b5207/6987eacca988cadd636b0278/1101700413_400.jpg?branch=production&width=828&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: April 13, 1970, cover of TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Gunter Grass' Controversial Past: How He Acknowledged It in 1970 twitter:description: The author has died at 87 twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt37df30e1028b5207/6987eacca988cadd636b0278/1101700413_400.jpg?branch=production&width=828&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # How Günter Grass Acknowledged His Controversial Past  by [Lily Rothman](https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/)  ## Lily Rothman Rothman is managing editor at TIME. Apr 13, 2015 3:40 PM UTC  Gunter Grass on the April 13, 1970, cover of TIME Gunter Grass on the April 13, 1970, cover of TIMECover Credit: ISADORE SELTZER  by [Lily Rothman](https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/)  ## Lily Rothman Rothman is managing editor at TIME. Apr 13, 2015 3:40 PM UTC Günter Grass—the German writer who [died on Monday at 87](http://time.com/3819115/german-guenter-grass-nobel-laureate/)—was known for much of his life for the success of his books, for his Nobel Prize, for his defining place in the conflicted cultural world of the divided post-war Germany. In later years,his admission that he had served in the Waffen-SS and his publication of a poem critical of Israel changed his reputation. As an April 13, 1970, TIME cover story about the author—dated precisely 45 years before his death—pointed out, Grass had made his name partially for his willingness to blur the line between art and politics, a line that had been strictly observed by traditional German literature. In the West Germany of the time, he was an outspoken supporter of Willy Brandt; his work was often seen as an admonition to those who would sweep the country’s past under the rug in the name of moving forward. “He too has done his demonic best to break up all the going German rhythms, from the marching-to-destiny beat of Deutschland über Alles to the amnesiac waltz of postwar prosperity,” the piece said, comparing him to the protagonist of his most famous work, _The Tin Drum._ “In three war novels he has drummed: Remember! Remember! REMEMBER!” Even then, Grass did not deny that he was involved with the Nazi party during the war. And as the article laid out, he was a true believer, not merely going along to get along: --- > “” --- At the time, despite that past, his intellectual evolution earned him a comparison to a saint; his political stance allowed the world to see him as an example of how the nation could properly acknowledge and progress from its Nazi past. But his “succinct” version of his time during the war years glossed over the extent of his involvement, which he eventually revealed in his 2006 memoir. Considering he had made his name urging his country to remember—for example, that cover story pointed out, in his 1963 _Dog Years_ he had written of “magic spectacles that allowed postwar German children to see exactly what their innocent parents were actually doing between 1939 and 1945″—the fact that he had did not completely described his own history earlier was devastating to his reputation. Amid the outrage, Grass [said that he was still coming to terms with the past ](http://time.com/3819115/german-guenter-grass-nobel-laureate/)during those intervening years. When TIME lauded his “slow maturing,” that process had still been unfinished. **_Read the full story, here in the TIME Vault:_** [The Dentist’s Chair as an Allegory of Life](http://time.com/vault/issue/1970-04-13/page/70/) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3819364/gunter-grass-1970/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3819364/gunter-grass-1970/"},"headline":"How Günter Grass Acknowledged His Controversial Past","datePublished":"2015-04-13T15:40:41.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T06:21:06.109Z","description":"The author has died at 87","url":"https://time.com/3819364/gunter-grass-1970/","keywords":["remembrance","Books"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt37df30e1028b5207/6987eacca988cadd636b0278/1101700413_400.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Lily Rothman","jobTitle":"Rothman is managing editor at TIME.","url":"https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/"}],"articleSection":"History","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt37df30e1028b5207/6987eacca988cadd636b0278/1101700413_400.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"April 13, 1970, cover of TIME","caption":"April 13, 1970, cover of TIME","creditText":"Cover Credit: ISADORE SELTZER","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/history/","name":"History"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/remembrance/","name":"remembrance"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3819364/gunter-grass-1970/","name":"How Günter Grass Acknowledged His Controversial Past"}}]}] ```