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A Woman In Berlin
Eight Weeks In The Conquered City--A Diary
by Anonymous


9.9

based on 19 reviews
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based on 13 votes
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Imperial Hubris

Official Publisher Site

A 34-year-old woman provides a firsthand account of the Russian takeover of Berlin in the spring of 1945 in this recently republished diary.

Metropolitan, 288 pages
08/04/2005
$23.00

ISBN: 0805075402

Nonfiction
Biographies & Memoirs
History

NOTES:
Translated from German to English by Boehm Phillip.

All reviews are classified as one of five grades: Outstanding (4 points), Favorable (3), Mixed (2), Unfavorable (1) and Terrible (0). To calculate the Metascore, we divide total points achieved by the total points possible (i.e., 4 x the number of reviews), with the resulting percentage (multiplied by 100) being the Metascore. Learn more...

Salon Jonathan Shainin

In unsparing prose that brooks no pity and assigns no blame, the diarist calmly describes the disintegration of the German capital.

San Francisco Chronicle Edie Meidav

Destined to be a classic.

The New York Times Joseph Kanon

One of the most important documents to emerge from World War II.

Daily Telegraph Cressida Connolly

A gift of the utmost value to historians and students of the period.

The Independent Joanna Bourke

The vision is bleak, but there are times of unbearable poignancy.

Los Angeles Times Kai Maristed

There is no hint of self-pity in her journal, nor any attempt at self-exoneration. [5 Aug 2005, p. E14]

Entertainment Weekly Karen Karbo

An astonishing record of survival.

Kirkus Reviews

Frank and affecting, a remarkable piece of war literature.

Publishers Weekly

The author, who died in 2001, has a fierce, uncompromising voice, and her book should become a classic of war literature.

Daily Telegraph Nigel Jones

Coolly written, tearingly honest, yet calm and dispassionate almost to a fault, this is a classic not only of war literature but also of writing at the very extreme of human suffering.

New York Review Of Books Gabriele Annan

In one entry after another, [the diarist] manages to be brisk and perceptive, vivid, evocative, horrified, disgusted, heart-rending; and there is even an occasional murmur from the undercurrent of laid-back and quite friendly sarcasm that Berliners like to claim as their special brand of humor.

PopMatters Lester Pimentel

A Woman in Berlin will stand as a civilian's devastating chronicle of the barbarism of total war.

Boston Globe Richard Eder

Not heroic, and no doubt insufficient. But, if you like, clean. And above all useful.

Library Journal Frederic Krome

Although her diary does not add much to the larger picture of the last days of the war, it provides an important perspective on the tribulations facing ordinary Berliners during the siege and early occupation of their city by the Red Army. Recommended. [1 Jul 2005, p. 96]

Washington Post Ursula Hegi

This voice is irreverent and insightful, focused and without self-pity and hypocrisy.

The Observer Simon Garfield

There is a determinedly poetic flavour to many descriptions.

The Observer Linda Grant

While A Woman in Berlin lacks the great moral interrogation of Primo Levi's post-war accounts of Auschwitz, what the books share is a voice describing the lived experience of horror that the mind almost always prefers to forget, the examination of painful memories, the questioning of the impact that it has on the self, and on the inner struggle to survive, at all costs.

The Independent Mark Bostridge

This diary of the sacking of a once great city is both an important work of social history and a remarkable human document.

Village Voice Rebecca Tuhus-Dubrow

A Woman in Berlin... should be embraced for the reason it was initially faulted. Its frank documentation of German suffering -- the hunger and uncertainty as well as the widespread rape -- illuminates a subject whose worldwide taboo is just beginning to subside.

The average user rating for this book is 9.9 (out of 10) based on 13 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

jaime r gave it a10:
Extraordinary testimony.

Mike N gave it a10:
This book is incredible. I wish the author had recieved the acclaim she deserved during her life time.

Killian F gave it a10:
brill.

Michael K gave it a9:
This is a wartime diary which describes the mass rape of German women by members of the Red Army after the Battle of Berlin in 1945. The author is a journalist who speaks Russian as well as German, and her eventual survival strategy is to attach herself to Russian officers in order to protect herself from the advances of the ordinary soldiers.This book will not appeal to everyone. I think it is literature, however, whether it qualifies as the seventh highest rated work of nonfiction in the history of this Web site is another matter.

Alice C gave it a10:
A Woman In Berlin is an extraordinary account of the daily life of ordinary citizens -- men and women -- trying to hang on to their dignity as WWII comes to an end and Russian troops sack the city. Highly recommend reading this book.

Wayne H gave it a10:
Outstanding book. Quite a different view of WW2 Germany. "That man" really ruined his people

Sparky gave it a10:
Wow! I have a new hero, and her name is "Anonymous." Ii cannot imagine how the author could have gine through the soul-destroying experiences she describes, yet have had the discipline to record them and the courage to recount them. Talk about keeping your head when all about you are losing theirs! I think the key to her charm is that she never, ever feels sorry for herself. There is no other book you could read that would give you the feeling of being a civilian in the midst of a world war the way this one does. Or, even more important, the feeling of having lived through 12 years of Hitlerite Germany, only to see Berlin come crumbling down.

A Woman In Berlin Eight Weeks In The Conquered City--A Diary by Anonymous

A Woman In Berlin
Eight Weeks In The Conquered City--A Diary
by Anonymous