Contents - Hoffmann und Campe Verlag

Dispatch: September 2009
240 pages
Jürgen Leinemann
Das Leben ist der
Ernstfall
Life Is Itself an
Emergency
Non-Fiction
‘For decades he has been looking into the souls of the mighty – now he is looking into his
own.’ Die Zeit
The verdict is cancer of the root of the tongue. For one of the most prominent political
journalists, a committed listener and questioner, it means the end of his professional life. ‘I
saw myself as one of those people who become what they are through words. Not just writing;
talking was also my profession. And now I have been struck dumb.’
‘The unchanging sensation of being threatened with death from cancer, my physical weakness
and my mental depression are the reality through which I have to fight my way. I must not try
to evade the truth of my illness but neither must I let it get me down. Two phrases have
become crucial guidelines for me. The first is: reality is everything one has to get through.
The second is a line from a poem by Peter Rühmkorf: ‘Remain shockable and resist’. Both are
of vital importance for me, now that my illness has removed journalism as my school in life. I
have to live with the broad grey zone of unpredictability if I want to stay alive. And I do want
just that; I am now clear about it.’
© Jörg Klaus
Jürgen Leinemann, born in Celle (Niedersachsen) in 1937,
studied German, history and philosophy. He began his
journalistic career with the German Press Agency in Berlin,
Hamburg und Washington. Since 1970 he worked for Der
Spiegel; he was a reporter und head of bureau in Washington und
Bonn. In 1990, after the Wall came down, he went to Berlin,
where from 1999 to 2001 he was head of the Department of
German Political Affairs; from 2002 he was writing for Spiegel
in their Berlin office. In 2004 his bestseller Höhenrausch. Die
wirklichkeitsleere Welt der Politiker (High-altitude euphoria.
Absence of reality in the world of politicians) appeared. He has
won the Egon Erwin Kisch Prize, the Siebenpfeiffer Prize and
the Henri Nannen Prize for lifelong achievement.
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