“The Fall of Berlin”, by Anthony Read and David Fisher

540 pages, W. W. Norton & Company, ISBN-13: 978-0393332414

The Fall of Berlin by Anthony Read and David Fisher is a magnificent account of the last days of the Second World War and the German surrender to the Soviet Union (let’s be real; it was the Soviets who smashed Berlin flat and took control of it, even if technically they surrendered to all of the Allies). I actually read this book years ago, way before Faust’s Metropolis: A History of Berlin by Alexandra Richie (reviewed par moi December 5^th, 2017…but then you knew that), and found that this much more concise history of the city was able to focus on a relatively brief era and thus bring more depth and knowledge to the same. Starting with the Olympic Games of 1936, authors Read and Fisher chronicle the history of Berlin during the years prior to World War II and ending with the Battle of Berlin. Focusing not only on the known historical players such as Hitler and Goebbels, but including excerpts from diaries of every day Berliners, the book reads almost like a novel with a cast of thousands. At first, Berliners are stunned that Hitler is able to conquer most of continental Europe through sheer bravado alone, the general consensus being that eventually the world would see Hitler and the Nazis for what they really were and sanity would once again prevail. But of course, we can now look back in hindsight and realize that the complacency of the general population and the other world leaders is precisely what led to Hitler wreaking havoc on the world.

Most of the chapters are very short – no more than 3 to 4 pages – which helps to keep the pace of the book from bogging down into too much detail. Much information is given on the daily life of Berliners – how ration cards worked, what they did during air raids, etc. – especially different groups of Berliners: Jews (yes, Jews, at least for a time), immigrants, forced laborers, Hitler Youth, and so on, and how they reacted to the changing world as, eventually, Berlin spiraled into chaos. The innumerable bombings, which nightly rocked the city, are described in detail and how the city reacted, as first stunned and then eventually immune to the terror. The first 200 pages of the book cover the years from 1936 until March 1945, while the remaining 250 pages detail the Battle of Berlin. Through complicated political considerations, the Soviets are allowed to conquer the city while the British and American troops held back. Because the Soviet Union suffered so much during the war, especially the siege of Stalingrad, it was deemed only fitting that they make the first attempt on the city. The first wave of soldiers were professionals while the second wave of soldiers-former prisoners of the Germans, took out their hatred in raping, looting and pillaging. In the first 8 weeks after the fall of Berlin, over 90,000 German women had seen doctors due being raped by the Soviet soldiers. How many never reported this crime cannot even be estimated.

The Fall of Berlin is not a comprehensive tale of the Russian 1945 spring campaign, but it certainly provides readers with a dense, richly textured portrait of one of the world’s most famous cities and its obliteration from bombing and invasion. What I think what I appreciate most about this book was that it didn’t focus only on the battles of World War II or the major personalities, but on the lives of everyday Berliners and those who lived through the city’s triumphs and tragedies, who experienced it first hand, but whose voices have been muted in the presence of the big names in history. This certainly isn’t an earth shattering revelation, but the book is a nice addition to anyone’s historical knowledge of the 20^th Century’s most important city.

“Paris: The Secret History”, by Andrew Hussey

512 pages, Bloomsbury USA, ISBN-13: 978-1596913233

Paris: The Secret History by Andrew Hussey is not the first history of Paris that I have read: there was Seven Ages of Paris by Alistair Horne (reviewed on January 27, 2014); Paris: The Biography of a City by Colin Jones (reviewed on February 19, 2015); and even Eiffel’s Tower: And the World’s Fair Where Buffalo Bill Beguiled Paris, the Artists Quarreled, and Thomas Edison Became a Count by Jill Jonnes (reviewed on April 23, 2014). Without question Hussey’s work is inferior to above three…oh, it isn’t a bad book, I guess; rather engaging at times, really, as Hussey seeks to bring the seedier – that is, “secret” – side of Paris into the light, a blood drenched, often gripping tale of the glittering world capital that offsets the glamorous and polished image the very name evokes, the image the above-mentioned works emphasize (although they by no means ignore the dark as they write about the light). But Hussey’s book is a rather stilted affair, rushing through hundreds of years and dozens of events as he seeks to cover as much as he can in 500 pages-or-so. But once he reaches the Second Empire period, the book goes decidedly downhill, with Hussey throwing in too many of his personal hobgoblins and opinions. Far from revealing any “secrets”, too often this book reads like a minimally organized pastiche of historical snippets commonly accessible to any grade-school student researching Paris. Too much of the text is of superficial paragraphs, as if Hussey couldn’t even stay interested enough to sustain any intellectual progression of thought; if there is anything positive to be said about this deceptively-titled book, it is that its inadequacies can serve to encourage interested readers to pursue further information in other books or resources – like, say, the three reviewed par moi above.

“The First Man in Rome”, by Colleen McCullough

896 pages, William Morrow & Company, ISBN-13: 978-0688093686

The First Man in Rome by Colleen McCullough is the first book in her “Masters of Rome” series and spans the years 110 to 100 BC. The series has a thesis (first introduced in 1939 by Sir Ronald Syme in his epic historical treatise “The Roman Revolution”): as Rome became more powerful within the Mediterranean world, the old ways of doing things – through the deliberation of various interests, mainly aristocratic and mercantile – became impossibly cumbersome. It became more and more difficult to govern an empire with institutions originally designed to administer a city-state. Certain powerful leaders (especially Marius, Sulla, and Caesar) tried to create a state in which they had autocratic power but also preserved the externals of the old ways. They were opposed by the conservatives (called the optimates by classical historians, though they themselves preferred the title boni or “good men”). The obtuse or simply ignorant resistance of these reactionaries, who are all (except for Cato) presented as degenerate or self-serving, made the creation of an autocracy necessary. The result was the birth of an imperial monarchy, and a radically different organization of power. Each book in the series features a detailed glossary, hand-drawn illustrations of the major characters, and notes by McCullough detailing her reasoning for portraying certain events in certain ways.

The main plot of the novel is generally concerned with the rise of Marius, his marriage to Julia, his success in replacing Metellus as general in charge of the Numidian theatre of war, his defeat of King Jugurtha of Numidia, his re-organization of the Roman Army system, his unprecedented consecutive consulships, his defeat of a massive invasion of German tribes, and the details of his relationship with his subordinate and close friend Sulla. Although Marius can be considered the protagonist, Sulla occasionally becomes the central figure of the narrative. A third storyline is focused on the figures of Marcus Livius Drusus and his sister Livia Drusa who both feature more prominently in The Grass Crown: and their own growing friendship with the Servilius Caepio family resulting in a double marriage. The novel closes with Marius's sixth consulship, in which he proves not to be as adept politically as he is militarily: and the tribune whose help he needs, Lucius Appuleius Saturninus, has an agenda of his own, leading to an armed insurrection which Marius himself has to put down. To cap it all, he also suffers a minor stroke during the summer, although he makes a full recovery. Tarred by association, his political career seems over: but after fighting many battles together, there is some reason for Marius and Sulla to hope that Rome will have peace for a few years.

McCullough’s novel is not only a thrilling narrative, but it brings to life in rich detail the characters and political intrigues at the heart of the Late Republic; indeed, I am not overstating the fact that you can learn more about – and gain a deeper appreciation of – the Late Republic from this novel than you can from many a standard Western Civilization textbook or from non-fiction books covering the period. While some of the characters and plot lines are more interesting than others, overall The First Man in Rome is quite consistent throughout. Sulla’s narrative has been the most interesting and well developed, whereas some of the more idealized characters (such as Julia) feel as though they are held at arm’s length. Much of the letter writing is used to give context and describe events more quickly but may have been the weakest in terms of humanizing the characters. The book is sprinkled with side narratives which are often the most exciting points of the story. Some of the characters that only appear for a short time are surprisingly well developed. The tone of the book does not attempt to tell you who to root for. There are not many obvious villains and many of the small tragedies throughout are more profound because the narration style does not attempt to put a gloss on anything. The work is not without its flaws, but I had a hard time putting it down. At the end of this book I was satisfied that I had a great time reading it and I knew much more about this period than I did at the beginning, and, really now, what else can you ask for from a historical novel?