A More Complete View of History: The other side of WWII - A guest blog post by Aubrey Taylor

**Author Aubrey Taylor writes WWI and WWII historical fiction from the German perspective.**

“What’s something everyone else likes that you don’t?”

This is a question my husband recently asked me on a “date night in,” where we share a special dessert and ask each other questions we never would otherwise. I insisted that he answer the question first, so that I could have time to find an answer other than the one that instantly popped into my head.

After a forced conversation about the pros and cons of Eggnog (he doesn’t really like it), I accepted the fact that I have a one-track mind and gave the answer I originally wanted to: “I have a very hard time watching World War II movies that are made by Hollywood.”

I told him that, because I’ve been researching the Second World War from the German perspective for the last three years, it has become difficult for me to digest the tropes we find in film and literature that have been written from the perspective of those who won the war.

Let me be clear: that doesn’t mean I’m in denial about anything that happened during or before the war. It also doesn’t mean that I’m not proud of America’s Greatest Generation. My grandfather himself served as a United States Marine in World War II.

What it does mean is that I’ve surrounded myself with the voices of those who lost the war. I still come across scathing anti-German statements online, and children are horrified when I get excited that they have German soldiers represented amongst their Lego minifigures. “Why do you like them? Weren’t they the bad guys?”

It is lost on a six-year-old when you try to explain that many German soldiers were fighting for the same things the American soldiers were fighting for: the protection of their loved ones and homeland. While the West tends to focus on the Third Reich’s desire for Lebensraum, the truth is, there was also a strong line coming from the German government that it was their people’s duty to root out the threat posed by Russia. Communism was truly seen as a danger and something that weighed heavily on the minds of many Germans since the end of the First World War, perhaps more so than gaining “living space.”

It is also true that, like our soldiers, many German men were drafted whether they wanted to fight or not. Furthermore, they were living under a totalitarian regime: the punishment for not reporting when called up would’ve been more severe than here in the States. This is a simple thing, but I am surprised at the number of people who still have to pause before they can say, “Yes, I suppose that’s true.”

It is easy to critique the past the same way we critique Sunday’s NFL game on Monday morning. I think that many of us, myself included, operate under the assumption that if we had been living in the Third Reich, we would have resisted the Nazis. Writing historical fiction from the German perspective means asking myself what I really would have done if I had lived under Hitler’s regime. Rather than coming up with a definitive answer, I explore many different potential answers—not just mine, but other people’s, as varied as people themselves, with their own individual set of circumstances, histories, and temperaments.

“Writing historical fiction from the German perspective means asking myself what I really would have done if I had lived under Hitler’s regime.”

— Author Aubrey Taylor

Eighty years later, Germany still carries a heavy burden of war guilt. This too is something that different people experience in different ways. Some simply don’t want to know about their grandparents’ (or great grandparents’) past. Some do know, and it brings them chills. Others have the attitude, “What does that have to do with me?” Still others joke about it: “We didn’t lose, we came in second.”

Then there are those who have a hunger to know and to set the record straight. I have one German friend who is researching her grandfather’s story in order to write it into novel form, to show the world the kind of man he truly was. I don’t have connections that are that personal. What I do have is an overactive imagination, a strong passion for history, and a desire to set the record straight in some small way. I can’t deny the things that went on, but what I can do is strive to tell the whole story, or at least a greater part of it.

I have always loved history but never liked research until I began to write my debut novel, Sani: The German Medic. Suddenly, I became passionate about learning everything I could. I’ve read more books in the last three years than I read in the first 40 years of my life. Many of them have been historical non-fiction written by historians on both sides that are expected to present history from a neutral perspective. Whether or not that happens, of course, depends largely on the author and book. I have also devoured memoirs written by men who served in the Wehrmacht, SS, and Hitler Youth. These run the gamut from heavy propaganda (Tanks Break Through by Alfred-Ingemar Berndt) to a heartfelt and thought-provoking eulogy (Requiem for a German Past by Jurgen Herbst). In my mind, they all have their place.

I have consumed scholarly articles, pored over photographs and films, and consulted a few people who are old enough to have lived in Germany at the time. In the interest of telling the whole story, I have also done research into the First World War as well as the political and financial turmoil of the Weimar years. Again, I’ve taken a holistic view, reading things written from the a neutral, historic perspective as well as devouring works by Germans whose views diametrically oppose one another. For example, with regard to the First World War, I read and loved both Ernst Jünger’s memoir Storm of Steel and Erich Maria Remarque’s anti-war classic, All Quiet on the Western Front. Both have their place in history, and I learned from each man’s worldview—the one who exalted in the glory of war and the one who eschewed it. Whether we want it to or not, war has been a fact of life throughout thousands of generations.

“Again, I’ve taken a holistic view, reading things written from the a neutral, historic perspective as well as devouring works by Germans whose views diametrically oppose one another.”

— Author Aubrey Taylor

So what are my stories like, then? They are not stories of victorious good guys and brave members of the resistance, nor are they heart-wrenching tales about the innocent victims of the Nazis. They are certainly not thrillers of Nazi intrigue! Honestly? My books contain a good deal of “day-to-day life in the Third Reich.” Interwoven are friendship, family drama, people dealing with the trauma of their past, and loving, losing, and finding again. Some of my characters face major internal battles over whether or not they support what is taking place around them. There are those who quietly accept it while others quietly disapprove. Naturally, there are also fervent supporters. Few have taken the path of active resistance.

What compels me to continue to write this way? I don’t know. I feel that it is important to portray the whole picture of something that still affects the world we are living in and to make life in Germany under Hitler accessible rather than simply aberrant. As some authors say, “History doesn’t repeat itself, but it does rhyme.” The past, present, and future are indelibly linked.

**The German Revolution of 1918-1919 began with the downfall of the German Empire and eventually resulted in the establishment of the Weimar Republic.**

Currently, I’m back to researching the German Revolution and early Weimar period, which I researched for The Prodigal Sons. I’m really drawn to the Freikorps. Aside from those who are familiar with German or military history, few people know about these groups. They were irregular armies, militia, whose services were initially utilized by the German government to put down communist uprisings throughout Germany in 1918 and 1919. They were even sent as far as the Baltics, where there was still a significant German-speaking population. The unique political and economic environment in postwar Germany gave rise to these groups and allowed them to become almost ubiquitous.

While the Freikorps are sometimes referred to as the Vanguard of Nazism (to borrow the title from a book by Robert G. L. Waite, which I have not yet read), it is fascinating to me that so many men returned from the Great War unable to adjust to day to day life and found satisfaction in these irregular military units. There were others who were very young and had missed the opportunity to fight in the war altogether. Joining these groups fulfilled a need and gave them something to live for in a desolate nation that provided few other prospects. Even after they had been decommissioned by the German government, some remained banded together and continued to seek opportunities to fight in the name of Germany.

When it comes to watching World War II movies made by Hollywood, some of them are very well done, and it’s not as though I refuse to watch them. I simply prefer to watch films made by German filmmakers. They are very forthcoming about their role in the Second World War. For example, in Die Gustloff, a 2008 film based on a book by Tatjana Doenhoff and Rainer Berg, character Erika Galetschky makes this statement: “We are making the whole world bleed; but the war will come home to roost, and we will pay for everything.” Yet they do not rely on the same tropes or stereotypes that we see in Western productions. They portray their characters as whole people, and they can do so accurately, because these are their parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents. It gives the viewer a more complete understanding of a difficult time. Ultimately, this is what I hope to achieve through my writing as well.