(read in Dutch translation: Mijn broer bijvoorbeeld), thoughtful, sensitive memoir of the writer’s older brother who died fighting for the Waffen SS at the Eastern Front in September 1943.

In the process of ordering the scarce tangible and intangible memories and memorabilia that his brother left behind in pictures, short steno style diary notes and stories by family members, Uwe, who was a toddler of three at the time of his brother’s death, also discusses the devastating bombing of Hamburg, where they lost their family home, the controversial nature of atrocities committed by the Nazi regime and the capacity to forget of many, his father’s desperate attempt to rebuild his live as a fur coat artisan, his mother’s resilience and demise, and his sister’s sad spinster life without paternal love that was somehow mitigated by a final 2.5 years lasting love affair completely at the end of it. Uwe Timm waited until all witnesses had passed way, before he could muster the courage to write this sensitive book.

As one of the few German post war writers he ponders the kind of Questions that Primo Levi, Jorge Semprun, Jean Amery and Imre Kretesz raise. The tendency of the ‘father’ generation (Uwe refers to the generation of his parents, the perpetrators) to deny any knowledge or awareness of the Nazi’s atrocities (holocaust, killing of innocent victims in the East) is closely linked to a studious strategy of ‘looking away’ and ‘non-engagement’ that was adopted by many in response to a desire to be one of the crowd, stay anonymous, duck one’s head. The latter was a response to the climate of fear and punishment instilled by Nazi authorities and their many henchmen. But how does such an attitude relate to the cultivated attitude and self-perception of many Germans that they defended to the last man, stayed strong, were courageous? Can it be courageous to look away from one’s own atrocities and afterwards confront the enemy with prying questions about how they failed to bomb the railway lines and crematoria of Auschwitz, how they failed to adopt more Jewish refugees before the war? Uwe ran into an intensifying conflict with his father during his post-war youth about such questions. He lamented the fact that all those courageous Bearers of Iron crosses and what not, did not want to carry their responsibility for the committed or witnessed atrocities, but rather referred to the famous ‘befehl ist befehl’ (orders are orders) notion to abscond individual responsibility. With Kierkegaard’s notion of individual responsibility in mind, Uwe wonders to what extent the ‘Ich habe es nicht gewusst’ (I didn’t know) of so many post-war apologists was sincere or rather the result of a deliberate act of ‘looking away’, reneging individual responsibility (even as a witness). Reading Browning’s book on the activities of the Einsatzcommandos killing Jews and Soviet commissars in the wake of the advancing German forces in the East, Uwe suffers eye problems (a crack in his cornea). Browning writes of witnesses who refused to participate in the killings for conscious reasons, escaping without corporal repercussions (they were demoted to perform other jobs in the Einsatzcommando). This literally makes Uwe’s cornea crack (violently open his eyes). Browning through these consciously objecting members of the Einsatz commandos (a mere 2 % of all perpetrators) opens the door for reneging the famous ‘Befehl isst befehl’ excuse.

Looking for further explanations why Germans would regard the violent treatment or killing of Untermenschen as ‘normal’, Uwe wonders whether it matters that the prevailing German attitude (or societal norm) to the use of violence was one that saw violence as a legitimate (normal) expression of aggression and pedagogical edification. The application of violence was ubiquitous in Nazi society, whether at school, at home, or sanctioned by the State at a time of war. Violence was regarded as a positive force, a normal exhortation. Uwe wonders to what extent his father would have been able to reflect critically on notions like patriotic duty and personal sacrifice, seen in the context of post-war literature that extolls that those very values are key in understanding what kept the crematoria in concentration camps going.

In the end Uwe desperately looks for clues in the short annotations of his brother’s war diary for a sign of compassion and exculpation on his brother’s part. He cannot find any, except perhaps the final statement in the diary where his brother observes that ‘the listing of cruel acts does not make sense’. Without further context, it is difficult to interpret the meaning of these words. Did his brother participate in the atrocities perpetrated on the Eastern front? Is this an expression of disgust? Or were such war acts so common, so normal, that they did not warrant noting? ( )

I would recommend this book to anyone of Germanic heritage, The author's only memory of his older brother was of a game of hide and seek before his brother was deployed to the Russian front during W.W. II as a member of the SS and died in the Ukraine. Uwe Timm's family was always haunted by his dead brother and "In My Brother's Shadow" is his attempt to discover who his brother was, and how his brother, his family ad the German people fit into the post W.W. II world conscience. ( )

If you have a brother, you will probably know what kind of person he is. You know his character, his personality, and often you won't be very surprised by the decisions he makes in life. Simply because you grew up together. Uwe Timm didn't know his brother, because there was a 15 year age difference. And because his brother died in the war at the age of 18. And, more than anything, because his brother, Karl-Heinz, grew up in Nazi-Germany, whereas Uwe is part of the post-war generation, growing up to despise nazism, and horrified by the Holocaust.

So, who was this brother? Why did he join the SS-Totenkopf-division? What did he do at the eastern front, in Ukraine and Russia, an area where the most horrible atrocities were committed by the German army?

Uwe's problem seems to be that his reconstruction has to rely on some letters that Karl-Heinz sent home from the front to his family, and a diary that he kept, with nothing more than some very short notes of his day to day activities. These documents don't give much information, especially no personal information. So, to make a long story short, Uwe can't answer any of the questions that he has posed about his brother.

That is a bit of a disappointment. To himself in the first place. But also to his readers. What is left is a family history with a lot of black holes. The good thing is that Uwe Timm is a very capable writer. He is able to write about the members of his family in loving detail. The way his mother moved her hands. The way his older sister finally found love at the age of 72. His writing makes this story worthwhile. ( )

A rare glimpse at the war and the post war period from the German side. ( )