The Sunday Times-bestselling author of Dresden returns with a
monumental biography of the city that defined the twentieth century
- Berlin Throughout the twentieth century, Berlin stood at the
centre of a convulsing world. This history is often viewed as
separate acts: the suffering of the First World War, the
cosmopolitan city of science, culture and sexual freedom Berlin
became, steep economic plunges, the rise of the Nazis, the
destruction of the Second World War, the psychosis of genocide, and
a city rent in two by competing ideologies. But people do not live
their lives in fixed eras. An epoch ends, yet the people continue -
or try to continue - much as they did before. Berlin tells the
story of the city as seen through the eyes not of its rulers, but
of those who walked its streets. In this magisterial biography of a
city and its inhabitants, bestselling historian Sinclair McKay
sheds new light on well-known characters - from idealistic
scientist Albert Einstein to Nazi architect Albert Speer - and
draws on never-before-seen first-person accounts to introduce us to
people of all walks of Berlin life. For example, we meet office
worker Mechtild Evers, who in her efforts to escape an oncoming
army runs into even more appalling jeopardy, and Reinhart Cruger, a
12-year-old boy in 1941 who witnesses with horror the Gestapo
coming for each of his Jewish neighbours in turn. Ever a city of
curious contrasts, moments of unbelievable darkness give way to a
wry Berliner humour - from banned perms to the often ridiculous
tit-for-tat between East and West Berlin - and moments of joyous
hope - like forced labourers at a jam factory warmly welcoming
their Soviet liberators. How did those ideologies - fascism and
communism - come to flower so fully here? And how did their
repercussions continue to be felt throughout Europe and the West
right up until that extraordinary night in the autumn of 1989 when
the Wall - that final expression of totalitarian oppression - was
at last breached? You cannot understand the twentieth century
without understanding Berlin; and you cannot understand Berlin
without understanding the experiences of its people. Drawing on a
staggering breadth of culture - from art to film, opera to
literature, science to architecture - McKay's latest masterpiece
shows us this hypnotic city as never before. 'Remarkable . . . A
majestic work of non-fiction' Matthew d'Ancona 'Sinclair McKay was
born to write this book' David Aaronovitch, The Times 'A masterful
account of a city marked by infamy . . . If there is a book that
must be read this year, this is it' Amanda Foreman 'An electrifying
new account of Berlin' Julia Boyd, author of Travellers in the
Third Reich 'One of my favourite historians' Dan Snow
General
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