The Lesser Evil: The Diaries of Victor Klemperer 1945-1959

I started with the first volume, proceeded to the second and had to finish the third. Although he is selfish, and at times unlikeable, one has to admire his tenacity during a murderous period . His will to survive overcame my reservations about his pettiness and ultimately I saw all of us in his character. Even if one is familiar with 1930 to 1950 German history this is necessary reading for a personal perspective.

I had to read this book having immersed myself in Klemperer's life through the earlier books. You need to read the first two volumes first. If you do you will almost certainly read this one too, although it is not as engrossing as the others.

Excellent book. It helps if you have read the other volumes. Uniquely good translation by Martin Chalmers - this is not common.Evocative atmosphere of post war Germany and East Germany conveyed - for those who are interested in that period. It would help if the reference notes were at the bottom of the page rather than at the rear of the book.There are so many "characters" that it is difficult to keep tract of them all - like reading Tolstoy. Would also therefore benefit from a list - say inside back cover - explaining briefly who the characters are and the organisations.Ben Costelloe - Dublin

last of three very fine and entertaining books human with warts and all so often unbelievable next creased up with laughter read these fifteen yrs ago read them again now ang just as good and compelling

The greatest of all Second World War diaries

Klemperer, a Jewish academic managed to survive the war period and starts to piece his life back together back in his old house against the background of the ruins of Dresden and the birth pangs of the Cold War which divided Germany. It is interesting how the euphoria of surviving the Nazi regime is soon over taken by constant worries about food, fuel, the difficulties of traveling around and worries about the future. Klemperer describes the often petty politics of those involved in trying to re-establish educational institutions and the queasy feeling induced by the those trying to use his status as victim of fascism to support their various claims and to distance themselves from involvement in the previous regime. The detail about the influence of the Russians and the groundwork for the creation of the GDR is also very enlightening.However the text is necessarily abridged and therefore can be difficult to follow for readers unfamiliar with the background. There are many names and initials to deal with. Possibly the translation is a little literal at times which makes the prose clunky, but always a problem to differentiate between strict accuracy to the original and a more English style.Overall not an easy read but very interesting for those interested in the war period particularly the difficulties of dealing with the impact of the Nazi regime.

Many years ago, before I began reviewing for Amazon, I read the first two volumes of Klemperer’s diaries: “I Shall Bear Witness, 1933 to 1941”, and “To the Bitter End” (1941 to 1945). He was of Jewish origin, though a convert to Protestantism. He was Professor Romance Languages at the Technical University of Dresden, and these volumes described the harrowing story of his life in Nazi Germany, complete with his initial bewilderment: he felt himself to be so thoroughly German that he refused to emigrate and, despite being the son of a rabbi, so weakly attached to Judaism. He records the increasing restrictions that were placed on him as a Jew; his dismissal from the University; and how in 1940 he and his Protestant-born wife Eva lost their home In Dölzschen (a suburb of Dresden)and were rehoused in a “Jews’ House” together with other such “mixed couples”. On 13 February 1945 he was served with a notice of deportation; but that was the day before the massive bombardment of Dresden, and in the chaos that followed he removed the Jewish badge from his clothes, and escaped together with his wife from Dresden into American-controlled territory. When the war was over, at the age of 63 he returned to Dresden, and in this volume describes his life in Communist East Germany for the rest of his life.The volume has a superb introduction written by Martin Chalmers, who also translated it into English. He summarizes the main characteristics of what follows: Klemperer’s scepticism about many of the people who now welcome him back; his thrill about his changed circumstances; the requests he receives to certify acquaintances as having been of good anti-Nazi character; reinstatement to his professorship (after an agonizing six months of uncertainty); the success he has a lecturer; the awards that are heaped upon him, but also his unquenchable ambition and bitter disappointments that certain further honours are given to other people instead of to him; his opportunistic decision to join the Communist Party “as the lesser evil” and even urging several other people to do the same, despite his awareness of how illiberal and repressive that regime was; but he also felt West Germany, with so many ex-Nazis in prominent positions, was worse; his growing apart from his first wife and his marriage, within a year of her death in 1951, to a 25-year old student of his; his continued reluctance to define himself as a Jew; his hostility to Zionism (in one place he records that he had said that the way the Jews treated the Arabs was “worse than the Nazis” – but then he also compares De Gaulle’s presidency to Hitler’ dictatorship!), and of course his uneasiness at the antisemitism he felt had never disappeared even before it was promoted by Stalin in his last years, and the influence that had in the satellite countries.He was always in a difficult position, politically, morally, practically (especially in the early years after the war when conditions in East Germany were chaotic and primitive: the Russians had moved industrial equipment and livestock to the Soviet Union and there was near-famine) and physically (he was in poor health – he had a heart condition which gave him pain whenever he walked for a short distance). It is astonishing, given his poor health, how many meetings of how many bodies all over East Germany he managed to attend, and how many political speeches and academic lectures he nevertheless managed to give. He was obviously in great demand as a speaker. He records one occasion when he lectured on Communism at a primary school! In addition he is always writing academic pieces for various journals, and he becomes quite wealthy. And, despite his poor health, he was also able to travel abroad: the Soviet Union, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, Austria, West Germany, Italy, France, Portugal – even, at the age of 77, China (though the diary entries for the China trip have largely been cut, though one records that “I have finally become an ant-Communist”.)He is a self-proclaimed workaholic and doesn’t like university holidays. In term-time, at the age of 70 he was lecturing four hours a week in Leipzig University, six hours in Berlin University, and five hours in Halle University. No wonder he constantly complained about feeling terribly tired. It also meant being away from home for many days, and he repeatedly expresses his guilt for leaving his ailing wife Eva alone so often. After her death and his speedy remarriage, at the age of 71, to 25-year-old Hadwig, he noted over and over again his guilt feelings for having “betrayed” Eva. (Hadwig was an observant believing Catholic while Viktor had no faith at all; and she is also more sharply critical of the communist government than Viktor, who still supporting a regime of whose oppressive nature and Nazi-like sloganising he had been silently critical for years. Occasionally these differences cause frictions between them; but they love each other. Klemperer was even willing to go through a secret Catholic wedding – five years after their civil wedding - so that Hadwig would not be excluded from taking Holy Communion. Perhaps it is under her influence and that of her parents, and perhaps because, after the 1956 Hungarian uprising in Hungary, the East German control on cultural life was in fact tightening all the time, that Klemperer’s diary criticisms of the Soviet Union and of East Germany become ever stronger. He claims to be totally disgusted by politics, but does not, as Hadwig would like him to do, withdraw from it altogether.Despite his private opposition to its narrow-minded Marxism, he was a leading member of the Kulturbund (the organization for the East German intelligentsia) and was elected as its representative to the Volkskammer (the East German parliament), where, as he wryly reports, he voted as he was told and took part in the standing ovations to Stalin. Among those heaping praise on him on his 70th birthday in 1951 were Grotewohl, Pieck and Ulbricht. The same for his 75th birthday. He notes the names of all the people and organizations who congratulated him – and makes a mental note of those who did not.The original German edition was heavily cut, but still was a two-volume work, here further reduced to one of 656 pages, no less! In my opinion it should have been drastically cut even further! The minutiae of every day’s events quite swamp his observations and reflections. Over and over again he refers to his inner unease and conflicts, his depressions, his self-accusations – and his “Vanitas” of which he is painfully aware. Although he is thirsty for praise and recognition, he quite often thinks of himself as really a shallow thinker (and as less intelligent than either Eva or Hadwig), feels useless and that he no longer has anything original to contribute, and that others regard him as passé. His repeated complaints and worries – often over the same things - make for some very tiring reading: his heart condition; severe food and fuel shortages in the early post-war years; electricity cuts in the evening; suspicion of continuing antisemitism; thwarted ambitions for a Chair in Dresden, Leipzig or Greifswald; complaints about Greifswald when in 1947 he at last got a chair at that small university. He left Greifswald within a year to take up a professorship at Halle, but he was soon complaining about Halle also. He was never satisfied, and was always plagued by yet further political and academic ambitions. (His second wife observed that when eventually he did in 1953 get the recognition he had so longed for – membership of the Academy and the National Prize – these successes were not met with elation but with depression.)His political ambitions and his pro-Soviet speeches are particularly hard to justify, since he was fully aware of the repressive and regimented nature of the communist regime, and especially of its slogans which he compared with those of the Nazis and about which in 1947 he had published one of his best-known books, LTI (Lingua Tertii Imperii – The Language of the Third Reich. His diaries now refer to LQI – The Language of the Fourth Reich, which was just the same.) Occasionally he writes that he is really a liberal at heart; but then also, “I am attached to our cause and hate the Nazis of Bonn even more than our stupid and unimaginative dictatorship”; and his diary shows genuine relief when Soviet troops put down the East German workers’ revolts in 1953. Of course he was taking a risk with many of the thoughts he committed to his diary, and occasionally he even publicly takes a critical line on the cultural situation in East Germany and on an exclusively Marxist line on literature. It does surprise me that he not only got away with it, but was still publicly honoured. He records other academics who were not so lucky and who were arrested.The diary is awash with names, as he records everyone he meets socially and everyone who is present at committee meetings, and, although all these names are footnoted on their first appearance, it is very difficult to keep up with who is who, even if one wanted to. The excerpts in the earlier part of the book are much fuller than in the later part, though the ones in the later part are slightly more interesting. In the earlier parts, whenever he travels by street car or by train, he describes the route, the stops, the number of the tram and whether the journey was comfortable or – more often – not. He records meal after meal, especially in the years of shortages: Spartan ones at home unless friends brought him some extra food, poor ones in restaurants and rather more copious ones at some of the official meetings. The moaning tone is all-pervasive, relieved only every now and again when he records basking in any applause he received at one of his lectures. Undoubtedly he had much to moan about, but was it worth publishing it so extensively? He is an obsessional and prolix diarist – sometimes he makes two or three separate long entries a day. The massive material will have been of interest to him – there is a good deal about academic rivalries, some of them personal, some political, others about the low standards in East German universities; but most of it I found monumentally boring and Klemperer a thoroughly unlikeable character. I am reluctant to give up on any book; so I read it in small instalments over seven weeks. But it really wasn’t worth it.

Viktor .Klemperer’s diaries are among the best books I have very read. They revealed the frightening every day life under the rule of Hitler and the Nazis. We often think that most .Germans admired Hitler and welcomed the Third Reich This didn’t last long. Many helped Klemperer survive the war in small ways that are reassuring and revealing. I am grateful for a third diary describing life under the Soviets. I’m also grateful to the bookseller.

This massive book took me far too long to read. Yet, it still was brilliant. Victor Klemperer is one of the great heroes, in my view. He truly is a survivor if ever there was one, with personal resilience that was was absolutely astounding. He is rightfully best known for his classic diaries, I Shall Bear Witness, two volumes which rank (in my mind) as the greatest firsthand accounts of 1933 to 1945 in Nazi Germany living as a persecuted non-practicing Jew married to an Aryan wife. This dairy, The Lesser Evil recounts his final years in post-war East Germany (German Democratic Republic). In Nazi Germany he was stripped of everything except the clothes on his back by war’s end, in the GDR he slowly gained fame and honor. This includes his involvement in politics. While he wasn’t a communist in heart, he saw communism as “the lesser evil” when compared to fascism. He joined the communist party because he knew he needed to if he wanted to work as a college professor (which he needed in order restore his finances and academic reputation). He was always the pragmatist. He also was involved in parliamentary politics as well. Yet despite his clear success in post-war Germany, he was plagued by self-doubts and depression. He also grew inwardly more critical and bitter about the failure of the German communist state. In 1951, his wife, Eva, died. Yet the survivor in him finds love again in Hadwig, a much younger student of his, whom he marries. Yet even there, complete happiness eludes him as he felt guilty toward both Eva and Hadwig, as if loving one made him unfaithful to the other.Klemperer’s true fame was as a diarist. Yet he was an intellectual — pondering his academic writing and lectures up to the very end of his long life. I am certain that is what he would want to be most remembered for. Interestingly Klemperer the great diarist, read another great wartime diarist as well, the teenage Anne Frank. He was ambivalent by her book. Later he saw the play based on her diary and was much more moved. One couldn’t help but wonder what Anne Frank’s diaries would have been like if she had survived into full adulthood. Of course when he read her book, he was unknown as a diarist, something that only came posthumously to him — and her — a trait they both shared. He however fully realized toward the end of the war that his diaries would be a great testament to the times so he (and friends) guarded them with great care.This last diary, The Lesser Evil, wasn’t easily read. Unfortunately, there was no e-book version available (hello publishers ... get busy with an ebook of The Lesser Evil). The print volume had small print which was difficult to read. There are numerous footnotes with all Klemperer’s diaries and to not read them will severely limit one’s understanding of what he’s writing about. With his seminal work, I Shall Bear Witness, in e-books, one could easily traverse between text and notes, yet with the print volume it was cumbersome. This diary’s editing was rather severe too. While Klemperer was a prolific diarist, sometimes the editor cut out too many of Klemperer’s words to be replaced by a bland summary. It was almost like he (translator Martin Chalmers) wanted to hurriedly get to the end of the translation to complete the book.Still these technical issues do not detract from the value of Victor Klemperer’s final work, or from the stunning impact of his total output as a diarist. His brilliance is that his lifetime of diaries gives testament to German history straddling the first half of the 20th century. His bravery (though he never saw it), his resilience (though he never recognized it), and his zest for his intellectual life, make him one of the greatest figures of his time. While he may never have the fame of Anne Frank, who was more understandable and endearing, yet getting to know Victor Klemperer over the years has deeply enriched my understanding this time period immeasurably. I do believe my slowness in completing this book was because I knew it represented the death of someone who I view as a dear inspiration.

The lesser evil in the title is not the lesser evil consistently repeated by Viktor Klemperer in his diary at the end of his life. He is referring to East Germany, a lesser evil than the West. Most readers and the publishers as well would think of comparisons to the Holocaust. Klemperer forgets the past in a hurry and focuses on the political tie to his professional career, including some sparse use of the word “comrade”. I have finished reading a classic and an epic. Klemperer is as unhappy after World War II and with his first wife or second wife as he was living in the Jews’ house and losing his career. He is tired, and so there is no surprise on page 177 with “I would it were bed-time, Hal, and all well” from Henry IV, Act V. The politics are specifically confusing, but the overall impression is clear, that out of the ruins there would be a divergence of economic theories and historical interpretations preying upon a defeated people, some of whom throughout 1946 and 1947 pose a most interesting storyline, which is the character reference needed by Germans from Jews in the eyes of the Russian occupying force. A price to pay to the occupiers: “Very great tension between KPD and SPD … very many nasty goings-on,” which evidently was affected by the same anti-Semitism of the past. But almost none of this book is about Jewish persecution; it is as much about the philo-Semitism Klemperer claims to hate. For their part, the Russians are mostly to become thieves, having for example “removed crateloads of treasures” and also food from the starving. This came from a particular trip on page 213 to Leipzig, where 30% of infants dying was too few for a Russian military leader. But “there was no gassing,” says Klemperer. Klemperer’s academic heroes would be Rousseau and Voltaire. His career returns to him, basically in the same proportion as returned access to transportation. Eva is always a footnote; while alive and sometimes productive even, she is only a mute portrait somewhere on the wall. She is senile on June 8, 1948, and therefore Klemperer is free to repeat how guilty he is. But I don’t believe they fought or drifted so much from each other, since when Klemperer says she sacrificed a prolific career for his, she was stuck with him, he is only expressing the pessimism that follows him at every turn. “Vanitas” becomes a fixture for years in his entries. America is all but omitted, just as much as reflection about persecution as a Jew. At the end of 1950, he states views that will fade before death, “I want to be a Communist, I want to go with the SED … what they do in the cultural area is often so fundamentally wrong. Only: what is done in the West is 1000 X more odious still.” In 500 pages of reading, I cannot understand what he meant. Perhaps one moment of humor is on page 403: “The broad Danube impresses me. But it is not blue here either.” Always go back to page 454 for the ghost. And about Anne Frank, circa 1956, she is unimpressive and “vain and silly” in her writing, but Klemperer later says that the staged version “shook him” very much.

This diary by Victor Klemperer represents the good Professor's private thoughts of life as he saw it in East Germany during the post war years of 1945 through 1959. Having been lucky enough to survive WWII as a Jew living in Germany, one would think that life in post war Germany would be much easier. At the end of the war Klemperer and his wife Eva found themselves in the American occupation sector. Despite being Jewish and with his hometown of Dresden almost completely destroyed, he insists on returning and living in the Russian East German sector. As described in the diary, we see how Russia deals with the reeducation and punishment of Nazi's and how surviving Jews are upgraded in German society. Klemperer tells us of his re-installment as a full Professor and becomes a published Author and man of letters. During this post war period Klemperer becomes involved in Communist politics and asserts that life in the GDR (East Germany) is the lesser evil of the two Germanys during this "Cold War" period. It is this ongoing inner argument of which German government is right that puts Klemperer in the so called position of "between two stools", which means he can't please all the people he associates with because he seeks one true and benevolent entity but neither one really suffices. Along with Klemperer's inner political torture, he has to deal with the death of his first wife Eva and the marriage to his very young wife Hadwig. Klemperer mentions death all during his 15 years of diary entries much as he did during his war entries. His health as he says was always bad, much as during the Nazi regime. In retrospect bad health or not, Klemperer lived over 78 years. Klemperer shows his struggles and inner doubts along with his desire for fulfillment, vanity and the search for academic excellence. In many instances he is much too hard on himself. His diary marks the time of life in a Germany which no longer exists. In the end politics in Germany aggravated him to no end. In retrospect there really was no "lesser evil". This last diary from Klemperer gives great insight from an educated man living behind the iron curtain. This is a fitting finale of a set of diaries on the order of Samuel Pepys.

I've been engrossed w these 3 volumes for months. I wish there were more public discussions on Klemperer's choice to live in and support East Germany. Why is he so critical of the (American) West? Is it because of the bombing of Dresden? He does mention his belief that there are a lot of ex-nazis employed in the West. Have the Soviets been that successful in their anti-american propaganda? He is so fearful (and disgusted) of even visiting the American sector, although soviet policies are militant and secretive (people suddenly disappearing, etc.) Most of his peers have relocated to the West, as have most family members. Some reviewers cite how he is a "big man" in the east now; he is able to reclaim his home, has money now, etc. He believes the Soviets are keeping the Nazi party from reforming.Klemperer notes the similarities between Nazi and Soviet behavior in their exuberant clapping and stomping feet during useless, repetitive meetings. Also notes suppression of real news and harmless fiction books and movies. Manufacturing is shoddy, and there are food/goods shortages in the East.His life under Nazi rule would suggest a brave man. I'm confused about his dogmatic refusal to even look into life and politics in the West. Comments and further discussion to this post are welcome. Kathy Brandt