Nebraska Bookworms
The Plattsmouth Book Club loves books, and we invite you to join us in savoring them.
We meet the first Saturday of each month, 10 a.m. at the Plattsmouth Public Library, Plattsmouth, Nebraska. Everyone is welcome to attend, whether you've read the current selection or not.
Come join us!
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Member Information
January 7 Meeting
In January we got to rave about book selections we gave or received for Christmas. It's always fun to learn about books we might not hear about otherwise.
Also in January we try to flesh out our reading list for the rest of the calendar year. Please send your suggestions to Susanne or Carol. We'll add all book titles to our list on the Upcoming Selections page.
February 4 Meeting
Choices for February: A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving or The Long Exile by Melanie McGrath.
Irving's fiction book narrates the tale of a remarkable boy who believes himself to be God's instrument and journeys on a truly extraordinary path.
McGrath details the true account of the involuntary 1953 relocation of three families of Canadian Inuit even farther into the barren Arctic. The book is an indignant indictment of the government while the story is the basis for the 1999 creation of Nunavut, the province with 83% native peoples.
Please check our revised listing of upcoming selections for future reads. Don't forget to send your suggestions to add to our list.
Our Next Book
From the Bookshelf
A Government of Beasts
-C. Goller
In the Garden of Beasts
Erik Larson, © 2011
Crown Publishers
ISBN # 978-0-307-40884-6
449 pp
3 ½ stars
Tiergarten
“Wildlife Park” (Garden of Animals, Garden of Beasts) is the literal translation from the German “Tiergarten,” the renowned park in Berlin that figures in the setting of the book.
In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler’s Berlin traces two members of the family of America’s ambassador to Germany from 1933-1937.
Larson bases his non-fiction work on multiple diaries and myriad letters, and early on the author cautions us: “There are no heroes here, at least not of the Schindler’s List variety….”
Nor of any other variety. Larson puts his readers in the uncomfortable position of scorning the protagonists yet sympathizing with the mission, and he accomplishes this dichotomy surprisingly well.
The Characters
A secondary dichotomy Larson introduces is the political difference that develops between Ambassador William E. Dodd and that of his self-absorbed daughter Martha.
Both begin as American liberals, but the professor remains so throughout his life. Dodd considers Hitler’s regime demented, whereas Martha finds Nazis and Nazism so entrancing she rejects liberalism for them.
Ambassador Dodd sneers privately that Hitler and his cadre are contemptible, yet only once in Germany does he ever speak out against Nazism — and then, only with foreign journalists and in a non-official capacity.
Indeed, Dodd clearly doesn’t object to the disenfranchisement of German Jews, only the mistreatment Americans, and only when someone is looking.
Meanwhile Martha, the quintessential coddled airhead, has just filed for divorce from her loving husband. Passing herself off in Europe as a sweet ingénue, she proceeds to sleep with every man she finds.
So appalling is her sluttish behavior that even the amoral butler describes the family’s home as a “house of ill repute.” Indeed, Larson says everyone but Dodd knew what Martha was doing. The reader suspects Dodd knew but given that he shrank from confrontation, he simply ignored the obvious and feigned ignorance. Also he either didn’t recognize the potential for intrigue or didn’t care.
Probity aside, Martha’s behavior presented the perfect opportunity for foreign spies to use her and her father’s knowledge against America. It’s no surprise that that is precisely what happened.
Larson documents that at least France, Germany, and Russia all engaged, though it was the Russian agent who succeeded best. Martha and Boris Winogradov’s alleged romance resulted in her eventually rejecting Nazism for communism. Eventually she so blatantly betrayed her country that she had to live out her discreditable life in Czechoslovakia, a country whose language she never bothered to learn.
The Plot
From the start, Dodd failed to understand the requirements of his job and refused to adjust. Instead, he seems to have considered his role to be a shining beacon of rectitude that his German hosts (and others) should emulate.
For that simplistic role, Dodd would have been ideal. As a history professor, his whole career had been built on condescending to the less knowledgeable, telling students how and what to think, positing himself the discerner and arbiter of correct ideas.
In that simplistic role, Dodd shipped his dilapidated Chevy to Berlin because he wanted to make a statement about frugality. He couldn’t afford to host the lavish parties expected of his office, yet claimed as his reason for not doing so a huffy aversion to a lifestyle he had no direct experience with. He railed at the big money he had never been able to achieve himself and resented those who had.
Dodd never seemed to realize what a buffoon he seemed to Germans and to his own embassy staff. He was outmatched at every turn, yet failed to notice his inadequacy.
Dodd by temperament, training, and social status was singularly unfit for the role of Ambassador. That he failed so miserably is not only an indictment of him but of President Roosevelt, who sent the timid, whiny schoolteacher off to engage forceful men, a task Dodd could not possibly hope to achieve.
Readers understand immediately why at home Ambassador Dodd was known as Ambassador Dud. Yet sadly the man never seemed to realize that in the capacity for which he was qualified — Professor Dodd — he was clearly successful.
Then, just as readers begin to appreciate what little Dodd did have to offer, Larson relates that back home in Virginia the professor hit a four-year-old girl with his car and did not stop to help. Instead, he petulantly claimed he didn’t stop because the accident wasn’t his fault (it wasn’t). One gets the uncomfortable impression, however, that Dodd would have stopped had the child been white.
Larson clearly wants readers to disrespect Dodd.
Yet the author is inexplicably clement with Martha. Her fatuous narcissism, inconstancy, unexamined political whims, and total disregard for her father’s political position — to say nothing of her treason — mark her indelibly as less than contemptible. But Larson simply parrots her claims, seeming to accept them at face value. If this is the author’s attempt at subtle literary irony, it fails. Larson’s forte is blatancy; he should stick with his proven success.
The Writing
The greatest achievement of the book is its myriad well-documented sources. Larson’s extensive research shows itself on every page, and readers have little doubt of the accuracy of the author’s portrayal of the Dodds.
In most cases, the writing is good enough that the author doesn’t intrude on the characters. Only when portraying Gestapo chief Rudolf Diels does Larson get so enamored of his own semi-clever turn of phrase (Diels naturally “oozes into a room like a malevolent fog”) that he disputes himself (a few pages later Diels characteristically sweeps in with overt melodrama).
Like his other books, Larson’s In the Garden of Beasts is an easy, quick read. Readers don’t need a dictionary, maps, or a history book for complete understanding.
Also like his other books, this one can be depressing even though readers already know the outcome from the outset.
Larson hits his target: readers understand why William Dodd failed at his job and now see the situation in Berlin from the perspective of an outsider…in every sense of the word. Recommended.