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Loading... The Himmler Brothers: A German Family History (2005)by Katrin Himmler
All Things Germany (57) Loading...
Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. What must it have been like to find out you were related to Himmler. Katrin Himmler provides a very readable biography of the Himmler brothers. ( ) Interesting biography of the infamous Himmler family. Katrin Himmler is the great niece of one of WWII most notorious men: Heinrich Himmler, head of the SS and chief perpetrator of the Holocaust. This well researched family history looks at what happened to the three Himmler brothers in the events surrounding WWII. It is not only an interesting look at the social and political climate affecting the middle classes but also a fascinating portrayal of how people cope with their own or their ancestors dark past. Katrin does not simply deal with the factual past she also documents what her families versions of events were and how she feels whilst learning the truth. This extra dimension, for me made a subject I am not too interested in fascinating. no reviews | add a review
Once upon a time the Himmlers were just a normal German family--middle-class, hard-working, well-educated. There were three brothers, Gebhart, Heinrich, and Ernst. Heinrich grew up to become the head of Hitler's SS, mastermind of the concentration camp system, and chief perpetrator of the Holocaust. When Katrin Himmler, Heinrich's great-niece, was 15, one of her classmates asked during a history lesson if she was related to the Himmler. "Yes," she stammered, at which there was a deathly hush in the classroom and the teacher, embarrassed and unsure, quickly moved the lesson on. As she grew older, Katrin gave her family history a wide berth, but married to an Israeli whose family was confined to the Warsaw Ghetto and with a young, half-Jewish son, she realized that she could not evade the past so easily. Katrin Himmler's cool but meticulous examination of the Himmler story reveals--in all its dark complexity--the gulf between the "normality" of bourgeois family life and the horrors perpetrated by one member. A more nuanced portrait of Heinrich himself emerges--not a lone evil executioner, but a middle-class family man, loved and fully supported by his respectable German family. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)943.0860922History and Geography Europe Germany and central Europe Historical periods of Germany Germany 1866- Third Reich 1933-1945 History, geographic treatment, biography Biographies, Diaries And Journals Collected biographyLC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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