BOOKS FROM BELARUSMemoirs of a Wartime Interpreter: From the Battle for Moscow to Hitler's Bunker
Tags:
Set in Russia
Female author
Description:
"By the will of fate I came to play a part in not letting Hitler achieve his final goal of disappearing and turning into a myth I managed to prevent Stalins dark and murky ambition from taking root his desire to hide from the world that we had found Hitlers corpse" - Elena Rzhevskaya"A telling reminder of the jealousy and rivalries that split the Allies even in their hour of victory, and foreshadowed the Cold War"- Tom Parfitt, The GuardianOn May 2,1945, Red Army soldiers broke into Hitlers bunker. Rzhevskaya, a young military interpreter, was with them. Almost accidentally the Soviet military found the charred remains of Hitler and Eva Braun. They also found key documents: Bormann's notes, the diaries of Goebbels and letters of Magda Goebbels.Rzhevskaya was entrusted with the proof of the Hitlers death: his teeth wrenched from his corpse by a pathologist hours earlier. The teeth were given to Rzhevskaya because they believed male agents were more likely to get drunk on Victory Day, blurt out the secret and lose the evidence. She interrogated Hitler's dentist's assistant who confirmed the teeth were his.Elenas role as an interpreter allowed her to forge a link between the Soviet troops and the Germans. She also witnessed the civilian tragedy perpetrated by the Soviets. The book includes her diary material and later additions, including conversations with Zhukov, letters of pathologist Shkaravsky, who led the autopsy, and a new Preface written by Rzhevskaya for the English language edition.Rzhevskaya writes about the key historical events and everyday life in her own inimitable style. She talks in depth of human suffering, of bittersweet victory, of an author's responsibility, of strange laws of memory and unresolved feeling of guilt.
Reviews:
(1 year ago) |
21 Mar, 2024
Rzhevskaya writes about establishing the truth of Hitler's death through his teeth, taken from his charred remains. She talks in depth about human suffering, bittersweet victory, an author's responsibility, strange laws of memory and unresolved feelings of guilt.
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(2 weeks ago) |
29 Sep, 2025
Memoirs of a Wartime Interpreter: From the Battle of Moscow to Hitler's Bunker by Elena Rzhevskaya is a fascinating memoir. I didn't know about her going into the book, but I'm glad we have her account about the bunker. Wow! The only reason I'm rating this only three stars is because copy I borrowed from the library had some printing errors. It was randomly missing a page or two here and there throughout and that the entire index (which is listed in the table of contents) just wasn't there either.
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