Jonathan Littell’s novel The Kindly Ones depicts many scenes of graphic violence
Category: Explore Further
Choices in dictatorships
In Imre Kertész’s novel Fiasco, Köves describes his experience of being called up to do military duty under the Hungarian regime of János Kádár (1956-1988). He was asked to sign a piece of paper committing him to become a prison guard in the central military prison. Despite not wishing to assume this role, he signed.
Conformity and Hypocrisy
Elisabeth Langgässer (1899-1950) was a writer. The story ‘Start of the Season’ was published in 1947 in her collection of short stories, The Torso.
Post-war justifications
Hans Baumgartner, one of the former shooters involved in mass killings in Libau between July and December 1941, was interrogated by the Stasi in the GDR 1969-1970. He was tried, found guilty, and sentenced to death.
Knowledge about atrocities
Daniel Lerner, Chief editor of the Allied Psychological Warfare Division, reported after travelling through occupied Germany in the first two weeks of April 1945
Innocent Bystanders?
US Marine Corps Reserve Captain P. Dickson interrogated German civilians in the Rhineland in March 1945
Facilitating ‘Aryanisation’
Report of an interrogation by Saul Padover and Lewis Gittler, Psychological Warfare Division, 12th Army Group US Army, with Arthur Koenig, 19 November 1944
Bystanders to deportations
Extracts from the Diary of Berlin journalist, Ruth Andreas-Friedrich
‘Justifications’ for killing
Letters sent to his wife by Walter Mattner
Reports for the Social Democratic Party in Exile (Sopade)
Conformity and compromise
A young woman’s experiences of life in 1930s Germany