Requiem for a German Past: A Boyhood Among the Nazis

I cannot recommend this book highly enough. It gives the reader a true feeling of the conflict experienced by the author, and probably many other young people living in Germany during the Third Reich. As an author I'd like to share it with my own readers, because Jurgen Herbst's memoir is the reality of the experience many historical fiction authors endeavor to portray.

Primarily a memoir for his first twenty years of life, Jurgen Herbst goes into great detail about his coming-of-age experiences in the Third Reich. He was raised in the Prussian military tradition emphasizing a strong sense of family, country, and church, and thus spends his adolescence trying to reconcile these notions with the propaganda and events of Hitler's Reich. He joins the Jungvolk (as all youths in Germany were required) and sees it primarily as a means to advance into the military career he has always dreamed of. Along the way, through his experiences, he sees that the Third Reich is not all it claims to be. Herbst's book, which reads very much like a novel, is one-of-a-kind; not many books describe the life and experiences of boys in the Jungvolk or the Hitler Jugend. Even if you only have a cursory interest in Nazi Germany, I highly recommend reading this book.

I took courses in the History of Education under Dr. Herbst (1967-69)and found him to be a very engaging teacher--one of the best I had in graduate school. I knew nothing about his past, except that he was German-born, until I heard of this book. This man has a way with words! In this brief but very compact and vivid memoir, he deals with some of the great dilemmas of life--in any period--,although of course he focuses on the period 1928-1948, his first twenty years. Herbst's memoir reminds me of another memoir of a childhood that can teach us all many valuable lessons (Irving Louis Horowitz, DAYDREAMS AND NIGHTMARES). REQUIEM is profoundly gripping. A must-read (and probably re-read) to help us understand our own times . . .and our own selves.