My purpose in opening this blog is to explore the responses, both in the US and in Germany, to a planned book on the role of the non-Jewish member of what the Nazis called "Privileged Mixed Marriages", meaning marriages between a Jew and a non-Jew with non-Jewish children. The "Arian" partners were the only "guardian angels" of many families under the Nazis, but they were under constant threat of losing that role, either by Party edict or by death.
This will be a historical novel rather than a biography; it will freely mix personal memories with fictional (but historically correct) events. To be written by a still surviving "Mischling" (mixed-race offspring) of such a “privileged” mixed marriage who sees a need to describe a so-far widely neglected aspect of the history of the Third Reich and the Holocaust. Much has been written about the horrendous actions by the Nazis against the majority of European Jewry. This book should increase our collective understanding of that time by describing what the Nazis meant by "privileged" -- the constant and hardly noticeable tightening of the screws on a minority of the racially Jewish population and their families who were largely protected from deportation, but not much else.
The literature on this subject is sparse indeed, and there is not much I have found, in German or in English, that concentrates on the agony of the one person whose very life constituted the protection for the entire family. In my own family and in the book the father was racially a Jew, although he had converted to Christianity. The mother was a non-Jewish German who bore the burdens suffered by any woman in a war-ravaged country, but in addition had to deal with the likelihood that her protective role for husband and children may be further limited or even taken away, particularly since she was suffering from a mysterious and possibly fatal disease.
This book will be written in English for the American market where the understanding of the Holocaust is spotty and often limited to black-and-white stereotypes. A well-educated American lawyer, a Jew himself, said to me once "if your father was not killed in a concentration camp he must have been a Nazi". Such an opinion reveals as much misunderstanding as the question I once got: "You were a half-Jew in school; didn't the other kids call you a "Saujude" to your face?"
The book will span the time from 1919 to 1945, one chapter for usually one year at a time. Each chapter will have a single-paragraph preamble to put the action into historical context. It will not be necessary to read that historical preambles to follow the emotional, mental, and physical events of the characters. It will be written in first-person from the point in time when I begin to have personal memories of events which, by and large, completely escaped my understanding at the time.
Back to the purpose of this blog: I’m asking for your input. My questions are these:
1. Do you think there is still enough interest in the subject matter in the USA or in Germany?
2. Do you know of relevant publications on the limited theme, i.e. not the Holocaust in general?
3. What do you think of the general approach to the book and its organization?
4. What other comments can you offer?
I would be most grateful for your feedback or any comments you may have, either in German or in English, whatever is easier for you.
Thank you -
Mischling.
10 comments:
Great idea!!
My cousin was in the same situation as you. She grew up in Germany during that terrible time; her Mother was Jewish, her Father (my Mother’s Brother) was non-Jewish. I have any account of her experiences that was published in a German newspaper. Let me know if you are interested in reading that.
I was born in Germany in 1945, so have no personal recollections of that time, and came to the States in 1961.
renatenelson@msn.com
Hi, Yes, this sounds like a wonderful book (got the link from your daughters blog). It would be well received in the US I think, though I don't know in Germany. I am living in Germany as an ex-pat and they are very quick to say that this isn't Nazi-Germany and I don't think it's discussed at all here. Maybe a German blogger can offer an opinion. I for one would be interested in reading the book. It's a sensitive subject, but one that I don't think has been addressed much from this perspective.
I think this is an excellent idea for a novel and one that could be popular in both the US and Germany. Despite the idea that Germans want to express to the world that they are no longer like the Nazis, they generally don't ignore the Holocaust or the Nazi regime either. Guido Knopp produces excellent documentaries on the topics of Nazis and the Holocaust that are shown on TV very often, there have been popular TV and theater films in recent years on these topics and books such as Ich ging durchs Feuer und brannte nicht. Eine außergewöhnliche Lebens- und Liebesgeschichte (The Nazi Officer's Wife in English) by Edith Hahn Beer which have been well received.
I do like the idea of writing the true story as a novel because it makes it more accessable to the reader but there may be something to be said about writing it as a true store but in a narrative style. It keeps it more engaging to read but people also like the impact that non-fiction has. It may also be easier to publish as non-fiction. I'd suggest though that if you do write it as non-fiction that you research things very, very well.
I think it's an important story and one that should be told before it's lost forever.
Thanks for your excellent comments, Dixie!
I was glad to hear about the Guido Knopp TV programs which keep the subject alive (as it should be). I wish I could see them here. I have posted a request to hear from some Germans about how active that discussion is in Germany these days. I'm also interested in hearing from Germans about any book dealing specifically with my main subject. I have to know the potential level of interest and my competition before I get too deeply into writing. The book by Edith Beer you mentioned sounds interesting -- I looked at the Amazon description -- but deals with quite a different set of circumstances. Thanks for the hint!
You are so right about the fiction/nonfiction aspect with which I've been struggling. Regardless of what it ends up being, the historical facts have to be right-on. I hope to solve the stylistic conflict by a preamble to each chapter which gives the historical facts to put the action and the emotions in context. I must write it as a novel that will involve the reader as witness to the uncertainties and anguish brought about by actions of the regime. But since a regime by itself doesn't make a good literary antagonist I have to give it/him a face that's invented. So it'll be a novel based on historical facts and laws and actions, but with real human emotions, tensions, and suspense. Do you call that fiction or non-fiction? To make it more challenging, I'll have to make the early part third-person narrative until I am born (in 1928) and gradually morph into the first-person narrator with all the ambiguities in trying to understand what's happening. The adult narrator with today's point of view will have to come to the aid of the poor kid! I have no idea whether I can pull all this off! it would be a challenge for an experienced writer!
Your last statement is a weighty and crucial one: I belong to a generation of eye witnesses that's dying out! I'd better hurry!
I enjoyed hearing from you and writing back! I always find that writing about something clears the mind.
Herzliche Grüße,
"Mischling"
I am German born (1942) living in France and the privileged mixed marriages in the Third Reich have puzzled me since the sixties. For some time now I feel a book ought to be written (I am aiming more at a psychological aspect) and for this purpose I shall fly to Berlin in December and "dive" into archives to see what stories/descendants I could find.
I am open to contributions of people personally concerned.
Karin
'Divided Lives - The Untold Stories of Jewish-Christian Women in Nazi Germany' by Cynthia Crane (ISBN: 1-4039-6155-7; barcode: 9781403961556) is a good book on the subject; several accounts of women who were children of mixed marriages (predominantly privileged ones).
And no, there's nowhere near enough written on the subject!!!
Thank you for the hint, Sara, I will try to get the book.
Leaving for Berlin on December 8, back on December 20.
Kind regards,
Karin
Hi Sara,
sorry I did not respond earlier. The research in Berlin archives was touching and fascinating, I continued a little in Hamburg in March, but since then had little time to exploit documents due to multiple obligations at home. Going to Israel end of October 2009and hope to dedicate the winter season contacting descendants of mixed marriages. I am really looking for children whose parents divorced under the pressure of Nazi administration.
Kind regards,
Karin
Karin, it's been over 4 years since your comment but I wonder what you found in your further research.
I am "Mischling's daughter and am planning to write my father's story with a focus on his non-Jewish mother and her important role in keeping her husband and children alive until the end of the war, due simply and exclusively to her "non-Jewish status." As it turns out, my grandmother died of brain cancer in January, 1944, at which time all hell broke loose for my father, his siblings, and especially for his (Jewish)father... who died in an air raid in March, 1945.
My plan is to research this subject well and to tell an historically accurate story in the form of a novel. I will focus on my grandmother and try to tell the story, at least to some extent, from her perspective. I also hope to capture my father's and aunt's perspectives, as children of a mixed marriage, with whom little was shared outright, but who knew that something very significant was happening.
Fortunately, my father has done much research of his own, but at 85 (today!), he is tired and not up for more research or writing. I will visit him next week and plan to have many conversations!
Carol
Post a Comment