Interview: Hans B Grueber talks about His Story

Hans B Grueber has just released an extraordinary memoir of life lived in Germany, France, the USA and New Zealand, encompassing war, protests, and a determination to stand up against injustice. Hans talks to NZ Booklovers.

What inspired you to write this book?

It started off as a lockdown project in September 2021 to write my life story for the benefit of my children and grandchildren, to let them know where they literally came from. The inspiration was my very interesting life. When you turn eighty, you wonder if your experience, knowledge and, hopefully, wisdom will soon be lost forever.

During the time of writing it became increasingly clear to me that the story went far beyond the personal and family to become a wider history of the times I lived through. I always had the good fortune to live in interesting places at interesting times.

How did you select what to include from your life?

The events and topics selected themselves through my memory. I worked on the assumption that I remember what was important to me. Therefore, His Story is not a general history as you find it in textbooks, but a very personal history. My advantage over textbooks is that I was there.

What was your routine or process when writing this book?

On the one hand, I was totally naïve. I literally started with what is now, of course, edited and re-edited, titled the preface and dated June 2026. In other words, it should be the last thing. It shows that I already had some idea of the great picture in my mind. On the other hand, the outlay of an autobiography is easy. You start at the beginning and finish at the end, which is today and hopefully not the end. I never planned on a spreadsheet or anything on paper, but followed the flow on the days of writing. Interestingly, even in my early eighties, I didn’t seem to be in a hurry but sat down whenever the next part had formed in my head and wanted to be recorded. Therefor it took such a long time of gestation.

If a soundtrack were made to accompany this book, name a song or two you would include.

There is no one theme song or soundtrack for a life story of eighty-plus years. In the beginning, there was a lot of classical music and jazz. Then I bought every Beatles album the week it came out. Lately, I discovered Dire Straits and cannot skip Mark Knopfler’s guitar solo at the end of Sultans of Swing whenever it is fed to me on YouTube, the algorithm of which knows me well. A recent book I read has reminded me of the famous line of Bob Dylan in one of his songs. It goes around in my head, and I can’t lose it “You don’t need a weatherman to know where the wind blows”. And he got the Nobel Prize in Literature, which goes to show that the members of the Nobel Committee must all be around my age.  

If your book were made into a movie, who would you like to see playing yourself and the other key people at the different ages?

My New Zealand wife and I met through the same lawyer handling our divorces. When he asked her permission to give me her phone number, she asked only one question: “What does he look like?” His answer was: “A mixture between Robert Redford and Paul Newman”.  So, it has to be Robert Redford, and for my best lawyer friend, Paul Newman will do. As supporting cast, I wouldn’t mind Catherine Deneuve and Salma Hayek.  

What did you enjoy the most about His Story?

Time travel. Even if parts were painful to write, most of my memories are positive and pleasant. Sometimes it feels like plunging into a warm bath. I also enjoy the combination of remembering as a child, a young man and a grown man, with the meta-level view and the experience of an eighty-year-old. I can only recommend it to everyone. 

What did you do to celebrate finishing this book? 

I deliberately put myself under pressure to actually do it and finish the job by telling everyone I was writing my autobiography for publication. So, it is a wonderful feeling to hold a printed copy in my hands and show it to other people. It is especially pleasing as it is all mine from cover to cover, literally, even if I wisely decided to get professional help from my editor, proofreader, indexer and publicist. The celebration will start after the official book launch.

What do you hope readers will take away from reading your book?

First of all, that they enjoy it enough to recommend it to others. Next, that one person can not just live an interesting life but make a difference, at least in New Zealand, even if it might be only minuscule. And that we should all wake up to the fact that our political elites not only ignore the existential threat of global warming but seem hell-bent on bringing about nuclear Armageddon to shorten our demise.  But this should give us hope, as man-made problems can be solved by us.

What is the favourite book you have read so far this year and why?

I read the latest book by one of my favourite authors, Ken Follett, “Circle of Days” (2025), a Christmas present to my wife, so I can read it. Now I enjoy a book I picked from the bookshelf of my wife’s part of our library by an author I had not heard of before Douglas Kennedy “State of the Nation” (2005). A man writing as the first-person female central figure and narrator, and he pulls it off. Why, because I enjoy reading good literature word by word, as I am a relatively slow reader.

What’s next on the agenda for you?

Campaigning for my beloved adopted country, New Zealand, especially in the present geo-political situation, to become neutral. Being able to be friends with everyone and enemy of no one.  

Otherwise, depending on the success of my autobiography, I may publish the best posts of my blog “ZealandiaBlog”, which seems to have aged well.

Writes Hill Press