Not I: A German Childhood - Softcover

Joachim Fest

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1843549328 ISBN 13: 9781843549321

Publisher: Atlantic Books, 2013

Synopsis

Few other historians have shaped our understanding of the Third Reich as Joachim Fest. Fierce and intransigent, German-born Fest was a relentless interrogator of his nation's modern history. His analysis, The Face of the Third Reich, his biographies of Adolf Hitler and Albert Speer and his descriptions of the last days in the Fuhrer's bunker have all reached a worldwide audience of millions. But how did the young Fest, born in 1926, personally experience National Socialism, the Second World War and a catastrophically defeated Germany? In Not I, the memoir of his childhood and youth, Joachim Fest chronicles his own extraordinary early life, providing an intimate portrait of those dark years of conflict. Whether describing his Catholic home in a Berlin suburb, his father's resistance of the regime and subsequent teaching ban, his own expulsion from school, or Aunt Dolly's introductions to the operatic world, these are the long-awaited personal reflections of a born observer the exactitude of whose prose is as sharp as the memories he describes.

About this title

About the Author:

Born in Berlin in 1926, Joachim Fest was a historian, journalist, critic and Publisher of the renowned newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. Best known for his writings and public commentary on Nazi Germany, he authored renowned biographys on both Hitler and Albert Speer. A leading figure in the debate among German historians about the Nazi period, Fest died in 2006.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.:

In early 1936, from our place by the wall, Wolfgang and I eavesdropped on a rare argument between our parents. There had been a strangely irritable atmosphere all day. My mother evidently started it, reminding my father in a few short sentences what she had put up with, politically and personally, in the last three years. She said she wasn’t complaining, but she had never dreamt of such a future. From morning to night she was standing in front of pots, pans, and washboards, and when the day was over she had to attend to the torn clothes of the children, patched five times over. And then, after what seemed like a hesitant pause, she asked whether my father did not, after all, want to reconsider joining the Party. The gentlemen from the education authority had called twice in the course of the year to persuade him to give way; at the last visit they had even held out the prospect of rapid promotion. In any case, she couldn’t cope anymore...And to indicate the end of her plea, after a long pause she added a simple “Please!”

My father replied a little too wordily (as I sometimes thought in the years to come), but at the same time revealed how uneasy he had been about the question for a long time. He said something about the readjustments that she, like many others, had been forced to make. He spoke about habit, which after often difficult beginnings provides a certain degree of stability. He spoke about conscience and trust in God. Also that he himself, as well as my brothers and I, could gradually relieve her of some of the work in the household, and so on. But my mother insisted on an answer, suggesting that joining the Party would not change anything: “After all, we remain who we are!” It did not take long for my father to retort: “Precisely not! It would change everything!”

About this edition

• Publisher: Atlantic Books
• Publication date: 2013
• ISBN 10: 1843549328
• ISBN 13: 9781843549321
• Binding: Paperback