Goodbye to Berlin
by Christopher Isherwood
Several of us had read the book many years ago and found it quite a different experience to read it later in life, without our once youthful enthusiasm.
Nonetheless it is certainly well written and provides us with a valuable snapshot of pre-Nazi Germany with its decadence and prejudice.
It is largely autobiographical.
The six chapters or fragments of a larger work which was planned but not completed seem to start out in quite a light-hearted manner with some amusingly perceptive character sketches and vignettes
but become increasingly chilling as the work progresses ably illustrating the banality of fascism and its attraction to those who have fallen upon hard times and are looking for someone to blame.
Sadly the “communists” of the book seemed little better.
Whilst some of the dialogue and language now seem somewhat dated the lessons of the book are timeless.
NS December 2008
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