Refugee: The Journey of an East German Woman

Product Description Beginning with her childhood in the East Germany of the 1940s, we follow the author on her family’s dangerous flight from communism. As refugees, they move from town to town in 1950s West Germany, finally settling north of Frankfurt, where Jutta spends her teenage years. After marrying an American army intelligence officer, she emigrates to Oregon, her husband’s home state. She learns about America and its customs as an outsider. Like her father, she struggles with alcoholism, eventually finding her way to recovery. After remarriage in 1989, she finds refuge at home in Portland. Review A vivid and moving memoir, full of white-knuckle intrigues and ordinary heroics. In times of strife, such as we’re living through today, a story like Donath’s serves to remind us that our troubles are not new, that courage and ingenuity are always possible and necessary. - Charles Goodrich, author of Watering the Rhubarb, A Scripture of Crows, and The Practice of HomeJutta Donath’s compelling memoir―of a family forever changed by the Soviet takeover of their town; of a dangerous escape to the West; of horrendous hardships and personal challenges overcome―kept me up too late, for too many nights, unable to put it down. It’s that good. - Ingrid Wendt, author of EvensongJutta Donath’s memoir, Refugee: The Journey of an East German Woman, is an original, different from the many books and movies about World War II, where adults and military take the stage. It is a true story telling the effect and aftereffects of worldwide conflicts on a child born into eastern Germany during the war. Beginning with infant memories of being carried into a cellar while sirens wail, Jutta describes the family’s journey to find safety and a home during terrible times, and her own journey which eventually leads her to America. Even when she describes hardships: hunger, threats of bombing from all sides, a Fascist military, and later an oppressive Communist government, she is always clear-eyed, curious, a self-sufficient optimist—a survivor. As a teenager looking for meaning she falls in with a heavy-drinking crowd of other youngsters. Still a teenager, she marries an American soldier from Klamath Falls, Oregon, with whom she migrates to America. She takes on adulthood, becomes a mother, becomes a college professor, moves on to a second “meant-to-be” marriage, and confronts and conquers her own alcoholism, all part of her life’s journey. Even while becoming an American through and through, over the years she manages to maintain a loving, transatlantic relationship with her family and the best of her German heritage. It is a difficult but not doleful story. Refugee is an informative and winning memoir told in short chapters that draw us in and move the story in quick, vivid sequences. Highly recommended.- Barbara Drake, author of The Road to Lilac Hill, Peace at Heart, and Morning Light About the Author Jutta Donath, born in the former East Germany, holds a masters degree in German from Portland State University. She taught German and English as a Nonnative Language (ENNL) at Portland Community College for twenty-five years. Jutta co-translated with Daniella Parenteau a book of Ingrid Gottschalk’s German poetry―What Remains / Was Bleibt. She lives with her husband in Portland, Oregon.