As an “exiled” German who’s lived in the UK for 39 years, I can really empathise with Viola Di Grado (Sicilians are brought up to hate our island – but those of us who flee are seen as the enemy, 21 August). Most Germans I meet who have lived in the UK for a while appear to prefer speaking English – even when I address them in German. When I left in 1985 to do an MA, I felt a mixture of relief at not having to fully confront a German history that I was powerless to change – as well as the excitement of landing in a truly multicultural capital that was willing to give me a chance at a different life. I have spent the last 39 years trying to reframe my troubled relationship with the country of my birth and have, it seems, made peace with it while recognising that I’m not English either.
My two passports live happily in the same drawer along with my sense of being neither fish nor fowl, but appreciating the fins and the feathers that come with it. Possibly a chimera – but one at peace with itself.
Martin Klopstock
Letchworth, Hertfordshire
