Underground in Berlin: A Young Woman's Extraordinary Tale of Survival in the Heart of Nazi Germany
Written by Marie Jalowicz Simon
Narrated by Ellen Archer
4/5
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About this audiobook
In 1942, Marie Jalowicz, a twenty-year-old Jewish Berliner, made the extraordinary decision to do everything in her power to avoid the concentration camps. She removed her yellow star, took on an assumed identity, and disappeared into the city.
In the years that followed, Marie took shelter wherever it was offered, living with the strangest of bedfellows, from circus performers and committed communists to convinced Nazis. As Marie quickly learned, however, compassion and cruelty are very often two sides of the same coin.
Fifty years later, Marie agreed to tell her story for the first time. Told in her own voice with unflinching honesty, Underground in Berlin is a book like no other, of the surreal, sometimes absurd day-to-day life in wartime Berlin. This might be just one woman's story, but it gives an unparalleled glimpse into what it truly means to be human.
Marie Jalowicz Simon
Marie Jalowicz Simon was born in 1922 and came from a middle-class Jewish family. She escaped the ghettos and concentration camps that claimed the lives of so many other Jews during the Second World War, by living in hiding in Berlin. After the war she taught classics and philosophy at the Berlin Humboldt University, but rarely spoke about her past. Shortly before her death in 1998, her son recorded her telling her story for the first time. This book is based on the tapes he recorded.
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Reviews for Underground in Berlin
40 ratings3 reviews
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Very good book. It really gives a good insight of the life a Jew in hiding and that of many ordinary Germans during WWII. Well written and detailed.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I just finished this book last night and I must say I can HIGHLY recommend it. It had a knack for showing each character’s individuality and their internal contradictions—there were no heroes in this story, and even many of the Nazis were not monsters.Marie Simon, a German Jew from a middle class family, an only child whose parents died before the deportations started, spent (save for an abortive flight to Bulgaria) three years “gone to ground” on Berlin on papers she’d borrowed from a helpful woman and then altered to better fit herself. She stayed with a long series of different hosts and estimates that over 20 people could share credit for having saved her life.At the same time, many of her rescuers, although they were undoubtedly risking their lives for her, were very also unkind to her, and Marie had complicated and often painful relationships with them. She does a good job showing the hypocrisies: the committed Communist who looked down on working class people, the gynecologist who was helping save Jews left and right while cheering the German war successes, the Nazi sympathizer who blackmailed Marie while at the same time treating her lovingly like a daughter, and so on.Marie often had to barter her body to stay safe, something she also speaks about frankly and without self pity, as if she was only describing what she had for breakfast. I’m sure many other Jews in hiding had to go through the same experiences, but few of the other accounts I’ve read have touched on this.This is definitely a win, especially if you’re interested in Jews hiding in plain sight in Germany.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Ein sehr wichtiges Stück Zeitgeschichte, beeindruckend die Sprache, mit welcher der gefährliche Alltag immer wieder beinahe in die Normalität geholt wird. Beeindruckend die trotz allem positive Aussage.