Synopses & Reviews
A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice
For eight weeks in 1945, as Berlin fell to the Russian army, a young woman kept a daily record of life in her apartment building and among its residents. With bald honesty and brutal lyricism (Elle), the anonymous author depicts her fellow Berliners in all their humanity, as well as their cravenness, corrupted first by hunger and then by the Russians. Spare and unpredictable, minutely observed and utterly free of self-pity (The Plain Dealer, Cleveland), A Woman in Berlin tells of the complex relationship between civilians and an occupying army and the shameful indignities to which women in a conquered city are always subject--the mass rape suffered by all, regardless of age or infirmity.
A Woman in Berlin stands as one of the essential books for understanding war and life (A. S. Byatt, author of Possession). Anonymous was a young woman at the time of the fall of Berlin. She was a journalist and editor during and after the war. An American Library Association Notable Book of the Year
A New York Times Book Review Editor's Choice For eight weeks in 1945, as Berlin fell to the Russian army, a young woman, alone in the city, kept a daily record of her and her neighbor's experiences, determined to describe the common lot of millions.
Purged of all self-pity but with laser-sharp observation and bracing humor, the anonymous author conjures up a ravaged apartment building and its little group of residents struggling to get by in the rubble without food, heat, or water. Clear-eyed and unsentimental, she depicts her fellow Berliners in all their humanity as well as their cravenness, corrupted first by hunger and then by the Russians. And with shocking and vivid detail, she tells of the shameful indignities to which women in a conquered city are always subject--the mass rape suffered by all, regardless of age or infirmity. Through this ordeal, she maintains her resilience, decency, and fierce will to come through her city's trial, until normalcy and safety return.
At once an essential record and a work of great literature, A Woman in Berlin (translated by Philip Boehm) reveals not only a true heroine, sure to join other enduring figures of the twentieth century, but also gives voice to the rarely heard victim of war: the woman. This edition includes a foreword by Hans Magnus Enzenberger and an introduction by Anthony Beevor. A Woman in Berlin deserves a place among the famous war diaries by Anne Frank and Victor Klemperer. This book is required reading for anyone who wants to gain an understanding of the trauma experienced by a defeated people at the end of World War II.--Bianka J. Adams, H-Net Book Review One of the most important documents to emerge from World War II . . . Anonymous died in 2001, but she remains officially unnamed, a private woman who has bequeathed us an extraordinary public legacy. Although the diary covers only two months--it ends as Berlin begins limping toward a semblance of normality--it is a richly detailed, clear-eyed account of the effects of war and enemy occupation on a civilian population . . . The most commonly accepted figure for rapes committed in Berlin during the first weeks of the Russian occupation is around 100,000 (calculated by hospitals to which the women turned for medical help). A Woman in Berlin shows us the actual experience behind those abstract numbers--how it felt; how one got through it (or didn't); how it brought its victory together, changing the way they saw men and themselves; the self-loathing ('I don't want to touch myself, can barely look at my body'); the triumph of just surviving. The book is graphic and unflinching, with the immediacy of all great diaries (we are always in the present), but what makes it so remarkable is its determination to see beyond the acts themselves. The rapists are not faceless; they have personalities, names . . . They have the contradictions of real people. They are brutal, naive, even hungry for some kind of connection . . . Though the heart of the book, the rapes are by no means all of it. We are also given the feeling inside a bomb shelter, the breakdown of city life and civil society, the often surreal behavior of the enemy, soldiers' arms lined with looted wristwatches, the forced labor clearing out the rubble piles that marks the beginning of the road back . . . Anonymous] is dispassionate and honest about Germany's responsibility for the war that has destroyed it, appalled at news of Nazi atrocities, thoughtful and open-minded, even about her oppressors . . . But the larger issues of the war are distant, available mostly by rumor. What she records instead is the world actually in front of her eyes, and here no detail escapes her--the stench of buildings where Russians have defecated wherever it suited them, the eerie silence of a whole city hunkering down, the behavior of her neighbors, often petty even in crisis. She has written, in short, a work of literature, rich in character and perception. It is dispiriting that shame or fear of social ostracism caused her to hide behind the label Anonymous (her fiance left her when he heard about the rapes), but even anonymously she has given us something that transcends shame and fear: the ability to see war as its victims see it. One evening, 'for the first time in three weeks I opened a book . . . But I had a hard time getting into it. I'm too full of my own images.' And we, too, will be full of those same images, for a long time to come.--Joseph Kanon, The New York Times Book Review
Let Anonymous stand witness as she wished to: as an undistorted voice for all women in war and its aftermath whatever their names or nation or ethnicity. Anywhere.--Kai Maristed, Los Angeles Times Book Review
Anonymous's] journal earns a particular place in the archive of recollection. This is because it neither condemns nor forgives: not her countrymen, not their occ
Review
"A devastating book. It is matter-of-fact, makes no attempt to score political points, does not attempt to solicit sympathy for its protagonist, and yet is among the most chilling indictments of war I have ever read. Everybody, in particular every woman, ought to read it."--Arundhati Roy, Booker Prize-winning author of
The God of Small Things
"A tract essential for our often morally fuzzy times . . . It is destined to be a classic."--San Francisco Chronicle
"Let Anonymous stand witness as she wished to: as an undistorted voice for all women in war and its aftermath, whatever their names or nation or ethnicity. Anywhere."--Los Angeles Times
"An astonishing record of survival . . . the voice of Anonymous emerges as both shrewd and funny . . . a fresh contribution to the literature of war."--Entertainment Weekly (grade: A)
"A richly detailed, clear-eyed account of the effects of war and enemy occupation on a civilian population . . . She has written, in short, a work of literature, rich in character and perception."--Joseph Kanon, The New York Times Book Review "Her journal earns a particular place in the archives of recollection. This is because it neither condemns nor forgives: not her countrymen, not her occupiers, and not, remarkably, herself. . . . Stands gritty and obdurate among a swirl of revisionist currents that variously have asserted and disputed the inherent nature of Germans' national guilt . . .To put it briefly, Anonymous writes a merciless account of what individuals can be faced with when all material and social props collapse."--The Boston Globe
"A riveting account of a military atrocity . . . The author doesn't try to explain or moralize the horror. She simply records it as perhaps no one else has, in all of its devastating essence."--The New York Observer
"Unflinchingly honest . . . Its frank documentation of German suffering--the hunger and uncertainty as well as the widespread rape--illuminates a subject whose worldwide taboo is just beginning to subside."--The Village Voice
"A brilliant and powerful work."--Newsday
"What makes the book an essential document is its frank and unself-conscious record of the physical and moral devastation that accompanied the war. . . . The diarist's emotional register remains unfailingly calm. Her dispassionate chronicle of the disasters of war suggests a kind of stoic heroism. . . . Remarkable."--Salon.com
"A stunning account of a German woman's battle to survive repeated rape at the hands of the victors among the ruins of Berlin . . . While leaders plot their dreams of glory and victory, the lives of ordinary people--on all sides--are trampled and destroyed. A most salutary work."--David Hare, The Guardian (U.K.)
"The author has a fierce, uncompromising voice, and her book should become a classic of war literature."--Publishers Weekly
"Books can transform us. So very few do. A Woman in Berlin is one that can."--Dayton Daily News
"A work of great power . . . The author is a keen observer of the ironies, even the absurdities, of a collapsing society. . . . A devastating and rare glimpse at ordinary people who struggle to survive."--Booklist
"With the passage of time, Anonymous's perspective--and the extraordinary way she kept her dignity and moral sense alive in an inferno--have made her diary a war classic."--Maclean's (Toronto)
"Marvelous . . . As it is a human instinct to survive, this book, which could have been horrifying, is instead exhilarating: a rare tribute to the human spirit."--Daily Mail (U.K.)
"Coolly written, tearingly honest . . . This is a classic not only of war literature but also of writing at the very extreme of human suffering."--The Daily Telegraph (London)
Synopsis
A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice
For eight weeks in 1945, as Berlin fell to the Russian army, a young woman kept a daily record of life in her apartment building and among its residents. "With bald honesty and brutal lyricism" (Elle), the anonymous author depicts her fellow Berliners in all their humanity, as well as their cravenness, corrupted first by hunger and then by the Russians. "Spare and unpredictable, minutely observed and utterly free of self-pity" (The Plain Dealer, Cleveland), A Woman in Berlin tells of the complex relationship between civilians and an occupying army and the shameful indignities to which women in a conquered city are always subject--the mass rape suffered by all, regardless of age or infirmity.
A Woman in Berlin stands as "one of the essential books for understanding war and life" (A. S. Byatt, author of Possession).
Synopsis
A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice
For eight weeks in 1945, as Berlin fell to the Russian army, a young woman kept a daily record of life in her apartment building and among its residents. "With bald honesty and brutal lyricism" (Elle), the anonymous author depicts her fellow Berliners in all their humanity, as well as their cravenness, corrupted first by hunger and then by the Russians. "Spare and unpredictable, minutely observed and utterly free of self-pity" (The Plain Dealer, Cleveland), A Woman in Berlin tells of the complex relationship between civilians and an occupying army and the shameful indignities to which women in a conquered city are always subject--the mass rape suffered by all, regardless of age or infirmity.
A Woman in Berlin stands as "one of the essential books for understanding war and life" (A. S. Byatt, author of Possession).
About the Author
The anonymous author was a young woman at the time of the fall of Berlin. She was a journalist and editor during and after the war.