Diary of a Man in Despair: A Non-Fiction Masterpiece about the Comprehension of Evil [Paperback]

Friedrich Reck-Malleczewen (Author), Paul Rubens (Translator)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 1, 2000

One of the most important documents of the Hitler period--the diary of a martyred anti-Nazi Russian aristocrat who describes the horrors of the era with insight.

This is the true ans compelling diary of an anti-Nazi Prussian aristocrat who lived through mankind's darkest era, only to die in a concentration camp on the eve of the Armistice. The diary is considered one of the most important documents of the period, describing in unforgettable terms how a psychosis enveloped an entire society, enabling Hitler's rise to power, and the Nazi regime. This accurate account of the forebodings of an unsung visionary exposes in chilling fashion the relationship between sentimentality and violence.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Astonishing, compelling, and unnerving." -- The New Yorker

"It is not often that invective reaches the level of art, and rarer still that hatred assumes a tragic grandeur." -- New York Times

"One of the most important documents of the period." -- Hannah Arendt

About the Author

Freidrich Percyval Reck-Malleczewen began this secret diary in May 1936 and continued until his arrest by the Gestapo. He was executed by genickshuss (neck-shot) in Dachau in February 1945.

Product Details

• Paperback: 240 pages
• Publisher: Duckworth Publishing (February 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0715630008
• ISBN-13: 978-0715630006
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.8 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #831,026 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Diary of a man among apes, August 24, 2002

By 

Philip Challinor - See all my reviews

This review is from: Diary of a Man in Despair: A Non-Fiction Masterpiece about the Comprehension of Evil (Paperback)

The title is a calumny. As his translator, Paul Rubens, points out, Friedrich Reck-Malleczewen was a prophet - not in the vulgar sense of one who predicts future events, but a prophet after the fashion of Jeremiah, William Blake and Dostoyevsky: one who comments on the present from the perspective of the Most High. As such, even when his own death is imminent, Reck most certainly does not despair. Like the three individuals mentioned above, he is angered, disgusted, saddened and horrified by what he sees around him; his journal is filled with images of Calvary, the plague, and the Apocalypse; yet he continually strives to see his own and his country's ordeal as a time of suffering and repentance which must be endured to make way for a new and better world. None of which is to say that his thinking is "mystical" in the sense of being vague or escapist; indeed, the immense value of Reck's diary, both as literature and as a historical document, lies in its brilliant combination of sharp observation and lucid analysis. Although he makes the all-too-common error of lumping in the plotters of 20 July 1944 with the many opportunists who tried to dissociate themselves from the regime as defeat began to loom, Reck's analytical passages offer as clear and concrete a picture of the corruption underlying Hitler's Germany as any historian I have encountered. Telling details of life in the Third Reich - the omnipresent thuggery and tale-bearing, the forced barracks-gymnasium atmosphere, the all-pervasive lies and propaganda - spring out of every page through tartly written anecdotes and vignettes. The peculiar detestability of the Nazi functionaries - frustrated schoolteachers and jumped-up mailmen posing as masters of the world - is described and analysed with perception and admirable loathing. This elderly, conservative, royalist aristocrat - a member of a class who, because they did not support the Weimar Republic, are too often labelled supporters of the Nazis - displays a courage, intelligence, breadth of culture and (I cannot emphasise it enough) a faith which makes his journal as moving a human document as the more famous diary of Anne Frank.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An Honest Reflection, November 4, 2004

By 

adidactic "A" (Somewhat west of where you are) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Diary of a Man in Despair: A Non-Fiction Masterpiece about the Comprehension of Evil (Paperback)

I have read this book twice, once in the original edition and then this edition. It is a fabulous book.
As to the Reck's aristocratic prejudice, this is something he is quite clear about, but he is a democrat as well -- hence he praises the opposition for being just that. Also, the individuals who really bear the brunt of his wrath are the Generals, the Junkers and the Kaiser before him who forsook their aristocratic upbringing, and sold out Germany long before Hitler took power, and then flirted with him as a novelty.

It is hard to understand Reck's viewpoint without at least visiting or living in Germany and especially Bavaria -- which is a bit seperatist. Also, note his praise of the Munich uprising -- a communist uprising -- where people were still treated with diginity.

His anger is with the sort of lowering of standards, the rise of the masses spurred on by hate, and constantly bombarded with propaganda. It is truly a remarkable book and one that has tremendous relevance for these times.

2 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the greatest books ever, January 29, 2003

By 

Henry W. Kastler (Chicago, IL USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Diary of a Man in Despair: A Non-Fiction Masterpiece about the Comprehension of Evil (Paperback)

It's hard to believe this isn't a work of fiction. This guy is filled with hate and rage and loathing as he watches the German-speaking people descend into madness. Incredible writing, powerful ideas. Get it.