Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture, most associated with Napoleon’s invasion and subsequent retreat in the disastrous invasion of Russia, is from the RussianTchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture, most associated with Napoleon’s invasion and subsequent retreat in the disastrous invasion of Russia, is from the Russian perspective. But while reading this tale of Martin Millbacher, an East Prussian entranced by Napoleon’s appearance who joined the French army about to invade, I couldn’t help but hear the first two movements of Beethoven’s Third Symphony, written in 1805, in my head as I read. The first recalls the grandeur embodied by myths that brought Napoleon to power. The second expresses the tragedy of false arrogance it often creates.
Martin was one of many thousands of “French…, Spanish, Italian, Croatians, Austrians, Prussians, Polish, Saxons, Hamburgers, Bavarians, Württembergers, Swiss, Hessians, Westphalians, Belgians, Dutch, [and] Lithuanians” caught up in the “Eroica” of glory and riches the military seemed to promise, who heard a different music.
They harnessed their horses to a trumpet call. A military band started to play; the emperor decided the march into the Czar’s empire would begin with music. The horses raised their heads, the soldiers laughed. How better everything was with music. (1)
So it went as Martin marched toward Moscow in the pleasant late fall weather, befriended and guided by Albrecht, a Westphalian veteran earlier battles. At the beginning, it all seemed almost idyllic, except for having to march and not having a horse.
As long as music played, Napoleon triumphed. (2)
Until Borodino. There, Martin first experiences the chaos of war, the random and persistent carnage which also claims the life of Albrecht. He finds a horse, perhaps once belonging to a Russian, and connects with another battle-hardened veteran, Henry, who is from Basel, Switzerland. Together they make their way to Moscow, which seemed to be too easily set ablaze and conquered, with no defenders within sight or sound. While Henry encourages Martin to visit the ever-present prostitutes, he remains true to the girl at home he will marry. His naïvety and idealism somehow persist even through the Russian counterattack leading to the well-known retreat in the Russian winter, one that be reprised more than a century later by Martin’s descendants. They are forced to endure repeated horrors, numbing the fleeing soldiers to horrors like coming across a church filled with dying comrades as
Some threw straw over the Russians and used their corpses as pillows. (3)
Predictably, the few dreamed-of baubles of they managed to keep are spoiled or lost, and Martin’s loss of his beloved horse from Borodino becomes his greatest personal tragedy, despite the countless others he and Henry have had to endure. Music is also lost.
Martin recalled how Napoleon entered his city Smolensk to the sounds of fanfares that were dedicated to him three months earlier as birthday presents. It must be music. Music inspires courage in soldiers, strengthens belief in a campaign’s successful conclusion. Yet the fanfares remained silent, the ruins were silent, cats strolled quietly around the walls, a dog barked in the distance, white flakes crumbled on the rubble. (4)
Martin’s final loss of innocence comes with an avoidable misadventure that haunts him long after he and Henry make their way back to his home, when music seems inappropriate.
They hear the lonely drumroll in the distance, soon it would be completely silent. We marched into Russia with military music, we return with a single drum, said Henry. Most of the musiciens lay in the Russian snow. (5)
War is over for him. For Henry, however, war continues as he leaves to make his way back to Basel and the Rhein. To his father’s shame, Martin does not join the Prussian army in their alliance to hound Napoleon’s army back to Paris, mostly because he knows what war is, somewhat because he couldn’t imagine possibly having to bear arms against Henry. His family, as it turns out, cannot escape the tragedy of losing his older brother—who joins the army at his father’s patriotic request—at the Battle of Leipzig. When they learn of the Russian entry to Paris, his father reconsiders his wish.
No matter who marches in, the foolish people will always cheer… (6)
If they hear any music at all, it will be closer to the final two movements of Beethoven’s Third. Or any other popular jingoistic song that distracts them from the truth of war.
(1) Auf ein Trompetensignal hin spannten sie die Pferde an. Eine Militärskapelle begann zu spielen, der Kaiser hatte entschieden mit Musik ins Reich des Zaren einzumarschieren. Die Pferde hoben die Köpfe, die Soldaten lachten. Wie doch alles besser ging mit Musik. (2) Solange die Musik spielte, siegte Napoleon. (3) Einige warfen Lagerstroh über die Russen und gebrauchten die Leichen als Kopfkissen. (4) Martin stellte sich vor, wie Napoleon mit Fanfarenklängen in seine Stadt Smolensk einzieht, die ihm vor drei Monaten als Geburtstagsgeschenk überreicht worden war. Musik musste es sein. Musik machte den Soldaten Mut, bestärkt den Glauben an einen guten Ausgang des Feldzuges. Doch die Fanfaren blieben stumm, die Ruinen schwiegen, lautlos streunten Katzen durchs Gemäuer, in der Ferne bellte ein Hund, nach Mitternacht krümelten weiße Flocken auf die Trümmer. (5) Den einsamen Trommelschlag hören sie aus der Ferne, bald verstummte er ganz. Mit Militärmusik marschierten wir in Russland ein, mit einer einzigen Trommel kehren wir wieder, sagte Henry. Die meisten Musiciens liegen im russischen Schnee. (6) Egal wer einzieht, das dumme Volk jubelt immer…...more
A sweet, tender collection that demonstrates a great premise can sometimes only go so far. Two elderly men, born and raised in East Prussia before WorA sweet, tender collection that demonstrates a great premise can sometimes only go so far. Two elderly men, born and raised in East Prussia before World War II, live out their years in a home in Hamburg. They like sitting and reminiscing on a bus stop bench. Their memories take them on short fantasies, revisiting the places of their youth, recalling idyllic times, sharing their speculations with the people at the home when they get back. It's not profound literature. But the short, "rides" would have an appealing charm for many readers....more
Gerhard Polt is the funniest comic and one of the most insightful people of whom I'm aware. His Bavarian dialect, insights into Bavarian culture, and Gerhard Polt is the funniest comic and one of the most insightful people of whom I'm aware. His Bavarian dialect, insights into Bavarian culture, and ironic monologues as various German right wingers are masterpieces. And so very difficult to translate. The cultural nuances don't always come through in English. This small edition is only for devoted fans of Polt. It's a compilation of various parts of Polt's humor arranged in a Devil's Dictionary style. I keep a copy in my travel backpack (along with my copy of the U.S. constitution) to have some good reading material handy if I finish what I brought. A sample followed by a desperate attempt to translate it:
Toleranz 1. Toleranz ist kein deutsches Wort, das ist ein Fremdwort. "Etwas tolerieren", das bedeutet etwas aushalten. Wenn früher einer Folterungen überlebt hat, dann war der tolerant. 2. Toleranz ist sehr individuell, das geht bis zu den innern Organen. Der eine frisst eine Schweinshaxe mit zwei Knödeln und noch einen Apfelstrudel dazu, weil sein Magen es toleriert. Der andere sauft eine Kamillentee und es wird ihm schlecht. 3. Tolerant ist jemand, der einen anderen grüßt, obwohl dieser sein Nachbar ist. 4. Nur ein Depp ist immer tolerant.
Tolerance 1. Tolerance is no German word, it is foreign. "To tolerate something" means to endure. If one survived torture, then he tolerated it. 2. Tolerance is very individual, it goes to one's inner guts. One chows down a Schweinshaxe* with two dumplings and then adds on an apple strudel because his stomach tolerates it. The other gulps down chamomile tea and gets sick. 3. He who greets another is tolerant, even though that one is his neighbor. 4. Only a twit is always tolerant.
* - [Bavarian specialty often poorly translated as a pork knuckle. It's a crispy, chicharone-ish encased pork masterpiece when done well or in the company of multiple beers in a beer garden.]
Leni Riefenstahl’s Triumph des Willens (The Triumph of the Will) tried to convince the world that the Nazi Party embodied the Völkisch spirit of GermaLeni Riefenstahl’s Triumph des Willens (The Triumph of the Will) tried to convince the world that the Nazi Party embodied the Völkisch spirit of Germans (the “right” and the “Right” ones) to express the glory of the Third Reich. It was the cinematic essence of what made Germany the “greatest” nation in history. Ralf Zerback, on the other hand, makes a succinct, at times poetic case that it was the Triumph of Violence. There was nothing mystical about it. Violence as a first policy choice and as expressions of political and social discontent as hallmarks of fascism was born then. The Nazi Party, from the political fringes to the pinnacle, freely exercised it with relative impunity by 1930. The threat of it was often more effective than actual acts, but it couldn’t have existed without them. For example, even though Nazis never achieved a voting majority and actually lost votes in the last relatively free German election before consolidating power of the Third Reich, they had enjoyed incredible success by muting opposition.
It demonstrates how quickly the first phase of Gleichschaltung – the alignment and party and governmental politics and policy, selective enforcement and subversion of the rule of law – was. Or how rapidly people fell in line to the new order largely based on fear of state-sponsored terror. The first targeted groups intended for concentration camps were outspoken and elected Communists. Yes, it helped if they were Social Democrats or Jewish, but the primary targets were any who openly opposed Naziism since its founding more than a decade earlier. Although many of those 27,000 were tortured to death, the real goal was to treat them all brutally and then send them back into society as a warning to others of what might happen to them. This was incredibly effective. Workers districts that had been plastered with Communist flags in early March 1933 all had Nazi flags just two months later. When they saw their broken comrades and friends come back, they knew they either had to fall in line publicly and be very careful privately if they wanted to continue to resist.
While volumes exist about the period from the last free German presidential election in 1932 through the early months of 1933 Gleichschlatung, this is the first of which I am aware that looks at overlooked events in 1932. They created the precedents aided the rapidity of implementing Gleichschlatung. Zerback compiles many of the long-forgotten or downplayed events with which Nazis prepared for taking power as they were constantly underestimated until it was too late. By then a constitutional democracy was replaced by an authoritarian dictatorship and acts of violence were as, if not more so, essential as any political machinations.
By 1934, Nazi leadership was trying to sort out how to rein in the SA, which was the organization in charge of the newly formed concentration camps. The SA celebrated their brutality in the open, actually assaulting people with no consequences throughout Germany. This was used as a pretext for the “Night of Long Knives,” when its leadership, beginning with SA leader Ernst Röhm, were arrested and murdered. After the purging of SA ranks, most of its remnants were incorporated into the much more brutally bureaucratic SS, which was then being reorganized by a relatively new member of the party who stood out for his ability to organize brutality to support political power–Reinhard Heinrich. The nature of the camps changed under his leadership to first intensify the ability make people follow new rules and intimidate them up to the point of death if they did not.
So, as counterintuitive as it sounds, yes, there were only 3,000 in the camps by the end of 1934. This happened for two reasons: the overall size of original targets of repression shrank dramatically because the terror of the first year had been so effective, and it was a year of Nazi terror reorganization from a group of public thugs to one of an intricate bureaucracy that created thousands of Schreibtischtäter, literally desk-perpetrators. Eichmann became the poster boy for this concept. One who makes the decisions and orders but is far away from implementation. This is an important book to show how quickly the probable coming of a fascist regime will act soon in the U.S. It happens very fast and it needs violence and the constant threat of it to succeed....more
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