BERLIN LETTER
that so far as both the masses and the intellectuals are concerned little
more is known in Germany today about the structure of fascism and the
general character of a totalitarian regime than was known when Hitler
was alive. Out of the whole show in Nuremberg there emerged only
sloppy publicity releases, duly reprinted in the controlled German press
(and only recently, one good solid book, a study by Eugen Kogon,
Der
SS.Staat).
For the rest, there is only inconsequential journalism and
superficial, confused comment. Works like those of Konrad Heiden,
Franz Neumann, etc., have yet to be reprinted or imported into Ger–
many. I should say-the great gospel of Denazification and Democratiza–
tion notwithstanding-the Allied powers prefer to perpetuate the politi–
cal stupor of the Germans, rather than to shake them into self-conscious–
ness and into a genuine awareness of what is happening in the world.
As a matter of fact, one would be hard-pressed to find anywhere in the
post-war German literature an account of or a comment on the per–
sonality of Adolf Hitler! The subject is simply not touched, as if the
corpse itself had some animistic power of reprisal, as if a deep amnesia
had struck the German mind.
These dark-age shadows over Germany's intellectual life are real
and literal, not metaphorical. The books which are published are re–
leased in pitifully small editions and scarcely available outside the city
of publication. When the philosophical works of Karl Jaspers are reissued
they are simply not to be had unless one makes a pilgrimage to Heidel–
berg or Munich. Book-reviews and literary criticism are almost unknown;
few newspapers take notice of books, and the monthly journals probably
never even receive them in the present chaotic zonal conditions. I have
heard of an interesting new novel published by Werner Krauss in Frank–
furt, a bitter Kafkaesque account of life in a Nazi prison, and with
luck I may be able to comment on it sometime next year. The situation
is impossible, but for now unalterable.
Part of all this is due to physical factors issuing out of the post–
Nazi breakdown-the shortage of paper, the destruction of printing
machines, the transportation crisis. But just as much responsibility can
be laid at the door of the British and American authorities. The large
official policy is deadening enough; combined with the pettiness and
provincialism ef the bureaucrats themselves it exercises a paralyzing
influence on what little native taient and inspiration there is. In the
beginning I remember there were some signs of a renaissance. Men like
Jolas were about, helping to introduce T. S. Eliot to German writers
and poets, to reintroduce Joyce, and bring new (and very ignorant)
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