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You can be assured that I have read many works of world literature, and yet, when asked to name the most important book for me personally, I return to a children's book -- the book Momo by Michael Ende.
The subtitle of this enormously successful work of the 1980s is 'The Strange Story of the Time-Thieves and of the Child Who Brought Stolen Time Back to the People.' And that is actually already the content of the book. It concerns a little girl named Momo, who is a master at using her time meaningfully -- and specifically not in the sense of self-optimisation. And this girl suddenly perceives that the world of adults is threatened by their perverted relationship with time: the culprits are the grey gentlemen with their grey briefcases and their elegant grey cars. They whisper to their victims that time is money. Therefore one must deposit it in the time savings bank. What matters is not doing a piece of work with love but getting it done quickly. The grey agents of the time savings bank are very successful. More and more adults become time-savers. What falls by the wayside is the joy of togetherness (which takes time), of being there for one another (which costs time) -- in short, inner contentment.
Of course Momo saves the world, and the story ends happily.
Children need fairy tales, after all. But even as an adult I am impressed by the images Michael Ende works with. For example when the grey gentlemen calculate for their potential client why time must be saved: this idea of making life in the here and now a joyless work hell in order to fill a time account that will be available to one someday. Don't I know this myself, when I give in to the hope that I only need to work hard enough to have eventually mastered all the work?
Or when Momo goes to where time comes from and observes that each hour of her life is a beautiful flower that blooms for exactly one hour, unique and irretrievable. Momo is therefore an important book because it shows us that today's socially accepted relationship with time is not without alternatives. Michael Ende presents his message in words so simple that no one can claim not to have understood it.
Although Momo is a children's book, it should be required reading for all stress-suffering adults.
