Friedrich Reck-Malleczewen (1884–1945)

Apparently, there is some disagreement about how 'authentic' Reck's diary is. For instance, he talks like a south-German gentleman, but was actually Prussian. Researchers who care about these things say that he lies a lot. This might dampen your reading experience, but not mine: I don't care if Reck's Diary is false, or a persona, or a character, because the speaker in these diaries is one of the most entertaining, enlightening characters I've ever come across in fiction. Whatever else Reck did or was, he certainly lived through Nazi Germany, very nearly to the end, only to end up in Dachau, where he died.

He acts like an old nobleman... but one who is generally kind to the proletariat and the peasantry, and reserves his scorn and hatred for the bourgeoisie and other nobles (at a time when these words still meant something). He's a reader of Spengler, and acts at times like a genuine pessimist... but a pessimist who has great hopes for the future, in which the vulgarity, cruelty, barbarity and injustice of the present may be overcome. Most of all, he depicts himself as an extraordinarily kind man, willing to use his (I assume) gravity and bearing in defense of the victims of petty arrogance, but at the same time harbors an incredible hatred.

DMD is one of the best books I've read recently thanks to these two things: the qualities of its probably half fictional narrator, and the openness with which he hates everything that deserves hatred--Nazis, of course, but everything they stand for. Vulgarity, pettiness, barbarity, stupidity, irrationality, self-interest, gullibility (whether conscious or not). Reck's narrator scorns everything that deserves scorn, and any book that reminds us of that is worth reading. That you get the scorn, and the narrator. And above all you get the incredible sensation--like seeing a Greek tragedy--of reading about Nazi Germany while knowing what's going to happen (i.e., Reck's hopes for the defeat of the Nazis will be fulfilled, but he won't live to see the future).

A clearer head could probably criticize this book heartily; Reck obviously lives in a fantasy world that is part medieval and part modern. But I forgot that while I was reading. Recommended for all.

"A storm is coming up over the heads of a people blindly drunk with victory, and the man who sees it is alone today in Germany... of all the things that have ever been asked of life, just on remains: that in the hour of martyrdom, which our epoch requires of any man not part of the mass, a man be able to bring forth out f himself the strength that comes from having kept faith with the truth.
Surely, all human wishes, provided only that they are big enough, must come to fulfillment?" [129].… (més)

I'm not capable of writing a review that would do this justice, so I'll just say this: I highlighted like mad and can't stop thinking about what I've read. Reck's words are prophetic, insightful, engaging, disturbing, unforgettable and timely. His diary ought to be required reading in universities across the globe to serve as a warning against the blind hero-worship of political leaders that makes it possible for immoral aberrations like Hitler to become men of power. Yes, they can eventually be stopped, but only after so much blood and bone become grist to the mill. Some wrongs can never be made right. Better to be a martyr than a cog in the wheel of evil.… (més)

Den skarpeste, mest ubønhørlig skånselsløse skildring af Nazi-Tysklands usselhed, jeg har set nogen steder:

[Oswald Spebgler] war wirklich der humorloseste Mensch, der mir je begegnet ist.; er könnte in dieser Hinsicht nur überboten werden durch Herrn Hitler und den Nazismus, der ja alle Aussicht hat, an beidem zu sterben: an seiner penetranten Humorlosigkeit sowohl wie an der Langeweile des öffentlichen Lebens... men Spengler afskyede nazismen og var en betydende humanist.

Han træffer Hitler igen, hvor han sidder alene i en restaurant, ... Ja, dort saß er, ein rohkostessender Dschingis-Khan, ein abstinenter Alexander, ein Napoleon ohne Weiber ...

Dieses Volk ist geisteskrank. Es wird teuer bezahlen. ...… (més)