Movies and Films
This is the forum for Movie and Film discussions. Again, our topic is naval warfare in WWII for the most part.
Re: Das Boot: book or movie ?
Posted by:
cate
()
Date: November 18, 2003 05:03PM
<HTML>Hi all
It rather baffles me just what Buchheim's unique crime is, that leads people to boycott buying his books on some kind of moral basis.
I think Io's summary is extremely fair - love or loathe Lothar, (and he does seem to provoke intense reactions one way or the other, very little in between) you cannot read Das Boot and not be struck by his respect for the crews, and his anger at the way their lives were squandered.
As she points out, Buchheim never claimed to have been part of an organised (or even disorganised) resistance. Very few Germans were, and you can speculate as to why this was, but it's hardly fair to pillory one man above millions of others for that failure. The best book I've come across on this subject so far is Engelmann's, who did actively oppose nazism, running escape lines to smuggle out and hide Jews. He is very enlightening about what life under the NZ regime was like, and how and why ordinary, moderately decent people, managed to accomodate themselves to it.
It may be impossible for us not to let hindsight influence our moral judgements, but you don't need to look very far today to see that :
- the natural reaction of a populace is to unite and support its leaders in time of war, irrespective of the justice of that war - you perceive yourself to be fighting for your own, your family's, your people's survival. This is why the July 44 conspiracists were widely despised as traitors.
- call it spin or propaganda, if a nation hears enough of the same message, reinforced day in day out even for a few weeks with no significant dissent (and the German people heard the same message for over a decade), many of the assumptions underlying it will take root
- the way events turn out inevitably colours the way we judge our own actions, and those of others. If Germany had won the war, the whole European mindset would be different today, about who behaved well and badly during those years. Would Buchheim have been saying then that Nazism was a bad idea and the u-boat war badly directed? No, but then nor would any ex-servicemen writing their memoirs/ novels either, allied ones included.
Buchheim himself clearly sees a distinction between his role, and the type of PKK he contemptuously describes in the Bar Royal Chapter, trying to put words in Thomsens mouth which they'll turn into stock heroic drivel anyway. Like it or not he finds himself tarred with exactly the same brush as the rest of the PKK, since history has so far declined to morally rehabilitate any aspect of the German propaganda machine. But that does not necessarily make it a more shameful outfit to have enlisted in at the time than most of the other options open to young men of fighting age.
Incidentally, Io, I can see no definition that I understand whereby DB isn't a novel - the portraits and events may be closely observed and taken from life, but they are arranged, shaped, evoked and given significance with great story telling skill, that goes beyond reporting. As for the magenta sunsets et al, they've always seemed to me a very painterley view of the elemental world, as though he's offering up his palette and canvas to a subject, making notes in his head for how to render it, and I'd be fascinated to know what part of them were not Buchheim's.
rgds
cate</HTML>
It rather baffles me just what Buchheim's unique crime is, that leads people to boycott buying his books on some kind of moral basis.
I think Io's summary is extremely fair - love or loathe Lothar, (and he does seem to provoke intense reactions one way or the other, very little in between) you cannot read Das Boot and not be struck by his respect for the crews, and his anger at the way their lives were squandered.
As she points out, Buchheim never claimed to have been part of an organised (or even disorganised) resistance. Very few Germans were, and you can speculate as to why this was, but it's hardly fair to pillory one man above millions of others for that failure. The best book I've come across on this subject so far is Engelmann's, who did actively oppose nazism, running escape lines to smuggle out and hide Jews. He is very enlightening about what life under the NZ regime was like, and how and why ordinary, moderately decent people, managed to accomodate themselves to it.
It may be impossible for us not to let hindsight influence our moral judgements, but you don't need to look very far today to see that :
- the natural reaction of a populace is to unite and support its leaders in time of war, irrespective of the justice of that war - you perceive yourself to be fighting for your own, your family's, your people's survival. This is why the July 44 conspiracists were widely despised as traitors.
- call it spin or propaganda, if a nation hears enough of the same message, reinforced day in day out even for a few weeks with no significant dissent (and the German people heard the same message for over a decade), many of the assumptions underlying it will take root
- the way events turn out inevitably colours the way we judge our own actions, and those of others. If Germany had won the war, the whole European mindset would be different today, about who behaved well and badly during those years. Would Buchheim have been saying then that Nazism was a bad idea and the u-boat war badly directed? No, but then nor would any ex-servicemen writing their memoirs/ novels either, allied ones included.
Buchheim himself clearly sees a distinction between his role, and the type of PKK he contemptuously describes in the Bar Royal Chapter, trying to put words in Thomsens mouth which they'll turn into stock heroic drivel anyway. Like it or not he finds himself tarred with exactly the same brush as the rest of the PKK, since history has so far declined to morally rehabilitate any aspect of the German propaganda machine. But that does not necessarily make it a more shameful outfit to have enlisted in at the time than most of the other options open to young men of fighting age.
Incidentally, Io, I can see no definition that I understand whereby DB isn't a novel - the portraits and events may be closely observed and taken from life, but they are arranged, shaped, evoked and given significance with great story telling skill, that goes beyond reporting. As for the magenta sunsets et al, they've always seemed to me a very painterley view of the elemental world, as though he's offering up his palette and canvas to a subject, making notes in his head for how to render it, and I'd be fascinated to know what part of them were not Buchheim's.
rgds
cate</HTML>
