Fighting against forgetting: A memoir of suffering.
Walter Jens suffered from dementia for a whole decade. Once powerfully eloquent and one of Germany’s most influential literature professors, he gradually sank into a world beyond language and thought. He died on June 9, 2013. Inge Jens, his wife with whom he spent half a century, cared for him during his illness and, supported by others around her, accompanied him through his final journey. In a series of intimate letters to friends and acquaintances, Inge Jens described how her husband changed over time, and how difficult it was to live with someone suffering from dementia. “I’m watching him vanish – the man I loved doesn’t exist anymore.”
Consisting of selections from her correspondence and a longer account, this book documents Walter Jens’ story of suffering with immense sensitivity and empathy by Inge Jens.
