“A Woman in Berlin” is a memoir of Marta Hillers, which she begins to write in the bomb shelter in Berlin on April 20, 1945, on Hitler’s birthday, ten days before his suicide. She tells that in the first few days after the capture of Berlin she was repeatedly raped by Soviet soldiers. The published book also informs that many other German women met the same fate. The military scoured all bombed cities, yelling “Komm Frau!”
This is a very sad book. It is terrible, because it makes the reader think about the difference between what a person thinks about himself and who he really is. Only in a twist of fate people, who were born at another time, fall into “the meat grinder” and life puts everything in its place. Ideology, moral principles and education – everything goes wrong. Only the soul remains. And if there are mercy behind the soul, compassion, self-esteem and true love to motherland (Russia or Germany), then a person might have a bright future. All the characters in this book need to pass this trial.
So what is this book about? The first thing that stands out is insanity of the war, which is dirty and sticky, lousy and venal, needs blood and death, pain and loss. The war is insane to madness. There is peace on the street, because the war is no longer here, the war has passed here, it took everything what it wanted and went further. The war is no longer, but its madness remains. The world knows thousands of different types of crimes – innocent and vile, casual and exotic, accidental and cold-blooded, but the worst of them are those crimes, which are committed during the war against civilians.
The main goal of the war is to turn people inhuman with the help of madness and force them to create madness. Bullying, looting, murder, rape – everything becomes a special, brutally insane issue. Here cruelty happens massively against the group of people every day. Every hour the whole world seems to be going crazy and trying to be even crazier.
The book is not political and it is not at all determined to “worsen relations between Germany and Russia.” It is just about something else. It is about the resilience of German women against Soviet soldiers, about their iron will and faith in their better life. It is about how Hillers breaks the ice in the heart of the major. And it does not matter that he is arrested. Only humanity helps them to survive and not to give up.
The memoir of Marta Hillers carries not only fear and pain, but also endurance of the human spirit. The war has two sides and two stories. Both of these sides suffer and each side tries to avenge. Revenge is madness. Everyone should understand that revenge is not a way out. The person who begins to yearn for revenge only aggravates the situation. Unfortunately, not everyone understands this. Nevertheless, everybody should always remain a human and look for this humanity in other people.
