Günter Grass was born on 16 October 1927 in the then “Free City of Danzig,” now Polish Gdansk. His parents, Willy Grass (1899-1979) and Helene née Knoff (1898-1954) of German and Kashubian-Polish origin respectively, were typical of the mixed ethnic population of pre-war Danzig. They owned a grocery store with an attached apartment in Danzig-Langfuhr. Grass's sister was born in 1930.
Not much biographical information about the first two decades of the author's life is available beyond the fact that he grew up under similar circumstances to his protagonist Oskar in The Tin Drum and other characters from his Danzig Trilogy. He read widely and advanced from elementary school to the Conradinum high school in 1937, was a member of the Hitler youth, and served as an air force auxiliary on
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Citation: Mayer, Sigrid. "Günter Grass". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 24 June 2002 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=4990, accessed 23 November 2024.]
