Une femme à Berlin
- Author: Marta Hillers (1911 – 2001)
- Title: Une femme à Berlin
- Published: 1954
- Language: French
- #20BooksOfSummer Challenge
Marta Hillers:
- German Journalist Marta Hillers was born on 26th May, 1911 in Krefeld, Germany.
- She died on 16th Jun 2001 Basel, Switzerland aged 90.
- She is most remembered for A Woman in Berlin.
- Marta studied at the Sorbonne.
- She traveled throughout Europe and Russia.
- Hillers was fluent in French and Russian.
- She was in the position of a ‘mediator’ in some situations during the war.
- She is in Berlin during the occupation by the Red Army.
- This book is a summation of her notes 20 April – 22 June 1945.
Conclusion:
- Any recollection of a war experience is impressive.
- Hillers gives a an account of daily life in Berlin
- during the Soviet occupation.
- The most remarkable aspect of the book is Hillers’ point of view.
- She details the mass rape by the occupying forces
- …and how women choose a Soviet officer as protector.
- That was their best option in a bad situation.
- There were so many women who underwent treatment in Berlin
- after the Russians left……the doctors called it ‘rapports forcés’.
- Weak point: The writing feels restrained.
- There were very few descriptions of traumatic emotions.
- Hillers told us just about as much as she felt comfortable with.
- There are many people in this book based on
- friends, neighbors and work/study associates of Hillers.
- She took care to conceal names…
- combine aspects of two people to build a new ‘person’…
- described her attic apartment as having 2 rooms in order to…
- conceal the description of the…
- larger living quarters she really had.
- She did not want the place to be recognized.
- Hillers controlled her emotions.
- “Je n’ai pas besoin de parler en
- peux cacher mes connaissances du russe….” (pg 326)
- On the last pages the author sums up her feelings:
- “From now on…nothing will easily shake or weaken me.” (pg 386)
- Désormais, plus rien ne parvient à m’ebranler aussi facilement.
- The part of the book that
- …impressed me the most was on page 283-284.
- A young Russian officer asks Marta Hiller:
- “Has anyone ever hurt you?
- Est-ce qu’on vous a fait du mal?”
- She responds:
- “Oui, monsieur, enfin vous comprenez.
- C’est la guerre.
- We will no longer speak of it
- N’en parlons plus.”
Last thoughts:
- This is a book about the ‘raw side’ of life during WW II Berlin.
- I think that has played an important part in the many 5 star reviews.
- The book sweeps the reader into a war torn Berlin from a female POV.
- There are better books written about war.
- I would recommend Vasily Grossman’s
- A Writer at War : a Soviet Journalist with the Red Army, 1941-1945
- Grossman does not sugarcoat the Red Army’s actions…
- and adds his poignant and at times critical commentary
- …he had as war correspondent.
Trivia:
- The book was first published in English in 1954 in the United States
- …was published anonymously.
- When it was published in Germany in 1959, the author was
- accused of “besmirching the honor of German women.
- Hillers refused to have another edition published in her lifetime.
- The book was published posthumously in Germany in 2003
- ….again anonymously.
- It met wide critical acclaim and was on the bestseller list for weeks.
- A controversy broke out when a literary editor revealed the author as Hillers.
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