Born in Greifswald in NE Germany, Rudolf Ditzen (1893–1947) was the son of a lawyer and a very educated mother. In 1909 the family relocated south to Leipzig, following dad's appointment to the Imperial Supreme Court. A road accident and typhoid led to a life of pain-killing medications. At 18 the lad killed his boyfriend in a mutual-suicide duel, and spent years in psychiatric hospitals and drug clinics, or in prison for robberies. In between, the re-named Hans Fallada worked on the land, wrote a few novels and did jobs on newspapers.
It was a chaotic life. At the same time as his youngest brother was killed in WW1, Hans was struggling with morphine addiction. His alcohol-fuelled crimes and subsequent gaol sentences only ended when Fallada married in 1929
His 1932 novel, Kleiner Mann, did well at home and overseas, and was made into a film. Under Nazi censorship, Fallada wrote and published a series of tough novels that Germans called neue Sachlichkeit i.e New Objectivity.
Fallada planned to leave Germany. His British publisher had arranged to send a private boat to get the family out of Germany in late 1938. But Fallada stayed, fearing he could never write in another language, nor live elsewhere.
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Fallada remained deeply depressed by the impossible task of eradicating Fascism that was so deeply ingrained in German society. He resumed his old morphine habit with his second wife, and both ended up in hospital.
Yet at the end of the war, Fallada was welcomed by the new East German literary authorities. In 1947 he published Alone in Berlin with Aufbau-Verlag, the first novel by a German author to consider local resistance to the National Socialists. How amazing that Hans wrote his best novel during Sept-Nov 1946, just months before dying from a morphine overdose in Feb 1947. No wonder he became one of the best-known German writers of the early-mid C20th.
The 1946 book: Alone in Berlin
The characters Otto and Anna Quangel were based on the real working family of Otto and Elise Hampel. It was 1940, France had surrendered, Nazism seemed unassailable and citizens was endangered. Dissent brought arrest and prison. Belin was filled with fear.
The novel’s main characters lived in 55 Jablonski Strasse, a house divided into grimy flats. Residents tried to live under Nazi rule in their different ways: the Persickes were nasty Hitler loyalists; the very decent retired Judge Fromm was preparing a shelter to protect elderly Jewish Frau Rosenthal; Eva Kluge, the kind postwoman, resigned from work and The Party, and left her thuggish husband.
In the same block of flats the Quangel couple was plodding, tight with money, unsociable and not hostile to National Socialist propaganda. So how did this unlikely family decide to defy tyrannical Nazi rule? In 1940 their beloved only son Ottochen was killed while fighting in France. Horrified out of their normally compliant existence, the couple began a silent campaign of defiance.
Otto, a nearly illiterate foreman making furniture, changed. He wrote anonymous and dissident postcards against the regime, dropping them in building stairwells around their suburb, Berlin-Wedding. His first card said: "Mothers, Hitler Will Kill Your Son Too". Then “Work as slowly as you can!” And “Put sand in the machines!” 276 postcards and 8 letters were deposited by the Quangels in 1.5 years.
Despite Otto’s fears, his quiet wife Anna insisted in joining Otto’s anti-Nazi campaign. For years the couple's marriage had become lonely. But being unable to console each other for their son’s death, it was suggested that their shared risky project brought them back closer, perhaps in love again.
A scary game developed between the Quangels and the police. Gestapo Inspector Escherich was the policeman responsible for sourcing the postcards, out of professional duty rather than Nazi ideology. During his meticulous search for clues about the mysterious postcard writer, Escherich developed a sneaky respect for his criminal.
The postcards irritated the authorities. Failure to solve the case compromised Escherich’s career, the Inspector who was beaten up by his impatient SS bosses. Clearly the Quangels could never ultimately escape the relentless savagery of the regime; a betrayal would eventually ensnare them.
Otto Quangel was caught when postcards falling out of his pocket, betrayed by a workmate. The two of them were arrested in Oct 1942, but Otto remained calm about his inevitable execution. And he did everything to save Anna. But they were both sentenced to death by the People's Court. Did Otto and Anna at least had some moment of moral triumph during the court case?
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They were executed in Plötzensee prison. After the executions, Gestapo Inspector Escherich was alone in his office. He gathered up all of the hundreds of subversive postcards, scattered them out of the police headquarters windows and shot himself dead.
The tension that the author maintained, despite the foregone conclusion, was unnerving. And like daily life in Berlin, the language was harsh and full of misery. Some readers found Alone in Berlin to be morally powerful, while others were just plain exhausted. I liked the reviewer who said that resistance to evil was rarely straightforward, mostly futile and generally doomed.
It was a chaotic life. At the same time as his youngest brother was killed in WW1, Hans was struggling with morphine addiction. His alcohol-fuelled crimes and subsequent gaol sentences only ended when Fallada married in 1929
His 1932 novel, Kleiner Mann, did well at home and overseas, and was made into a film. Under Nazi censorship, Fallada wrote and published a series of tough novels that Germans called neue Sachlichkeit i.e New Objectivity.
Fallada planned to leave Germany. His British publisher had arranged to send a private boat to get the family out of Germany in late 1938. But Fallada stayed, fearing he could never write in another language, nor live elsewhere.
Fallada's book cover
In late 1943, the author lost his long-term German publisher who escaped overseas. So Hans again turned to alcohol and random sex, to deal with his collapsing marriage. In 1944 he shot at his (first) wife in anger and was again certified.
this edition was published in French
In late 1943, the author lost his long-term German publisher who escaped overseas. So Hans again turned to alcohol and random sex, to deal with his collapsing marriage. In 1944 he shot at his (first) wife in anger and was again certified.
Fallada remained deeply depressed by the impossible task of eradicating Fascism that was so deeply ingrained in German society. He resumed his old morphine habit with his second wife, and both ended up in hospital.
Yet at the end of the war, Fallada was welcomed by the new East German literary authorities. In 1947 he published Alone in Berlin with Aufbau-Verlag, the first novel by a German author to consider local resistance to the National Socialists. How amazing that Hans wrote his best novel during Sept-Nov 1946, just months before dying from a morphine overdose in Feb 1947. No wonder he became one of the best-known German writers of the early-mid C20th.
The 1946 book: Alone in Berlin
The characters Otto and Anna Quangel were based on the real working family of Otto and Elise Hampel. It was 1940, France had surrendered, Nazism seemed unassailable and citizens was endangered. Dissent brought arrest and prison. Belin was filled with fear.
The novel’s main characters lived in 55 Jablonski Strasse, a house divided into grimy flats. Residents tried to live under Nazi rule in their different ways: the Persickes were nasty Hitler loyalists; the very decent retired Judge Fromm was preparing a shelter to protect elderly Jewish Frau Rosenthal; Eva Kluge, the kind postwoman, resigned from work and The Party, and left her thuggish husband.
In the same block of flats the Quangel couple was plodding, tight with money, unsociable and not hostile to National Socialist propaganda. So how did this unlikely family decide to defy tyrannical Nazi rule? In 1940 their beloved only son Ottochen was killed while fighting in France. Horrified out of their normally compliant existence, the couple began a silent campaign of defiance.
Otto, a nearly illiterate foreman making furniture, changed. He wrote anonymous and dissident postcards against the regime, dropping them in building stairwells around their suburb, Berlin-Wedding. His first card said: "Mothers, Hitler Will Kill Your Son Too". Then “Work as slowly as you can!” And “Put sand in the machines!” 276 postcards and 8 letters were deposited by the Quangels in 1.5 years.
Despite Otto’s fears, his quiet wife Anna insisted in joining Otto’s anti-Nazi campaign. For years the couple's marriage had become lonely. But being unable to console each other for their son’s death, it was suggested that their shared risky project brought them back closer, perhaps in love again.
A scary game developed between the Quangels and the police. Gestapo Inspector Escherich was the policeman responsible for sourcing the postcards, out of professional duty rather than Nazi ideology. During his meticulous search for clues about the mysterious postcard writer, Escherich developed a sneaky respect for his criminal.
The postcards irritated the authorities. Failure to solve the case compromised Escherich’s career, the Inspector who was beaten up by his impatient SS bosses. Clearly the Quangels could never ultimately escape the relentless savagery of the regime; a betrayal would eventually ensnare them.
Otto Quangel was caught when postcards falling out of his pocket, betrayed by a workmate. The two of them were arrested in Oct 1942, but Otto remained calm about his inevitable execution. And he did everything to save Anna. But they were both sentenced to death by the People's Court. Did Otto and Anna at least had some moment of moral triumph during the court case?
The film version of Alone in Berlin, 2016
The tension that the author maintained, despite the foregone conclusion, was unnerving. And like daily life in Berlin, the language was harsh and full of misery. Some readers found Alone in Berlin to be morally powerful, while others were just plain exhausted. I liked the reviewer who said that resistance to evil was rarely straightforward, mostly futile and generally doomed.
The book did very well and was filmed for television in both East and West Germany, and then again for the cinema in the west in 1975 with Hildegard Knef and Carl Raddatz.
The 2016 film: Alone in Berlin The 2016 war drama film, based on Hans Fallada’s 1947 book, was directed by Vincent Pérez and starred Emma Thompson, Brendan Gleeson and Daniel Brühl. It was made in Berlin and shown at Berlin’s International Film Festival. The film ended with the image of the postcards swirling in the wind, falling down on the Berlin streets and picked up by passers by. It gave the film's characters an understated posthumous moral victory.
The 2016 film: Alone in Berlin The 2016 war drama film, based on Hans Fallada’s 1947 book, was directed by Vincent Pérez and starred Emma Thompson, Brendan Gleeson and Daniel Brühl. It was made in Berlin and shown at Berlin’s International Film Festival. The film ended with the image of the postcards swirling in the wind, falling down on the Berlin streets and picked up by passers by. It gave the film's characters an understated posthumous moral victory.