A Woman In Berlin

Author Anonymous
Narrator Diana Bishop
Publisher Little, Brown Book Group
Run Time 9 hours and 52 minutes
Format Audio
Genre Autobiography: general, Biography: general, Diaries, letters and journals, European history, Second World War, True stories: general.

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What to expect

Between April 20th and June 22nd of 1945 the anonymous author of A Woman in Berlin wrote about life within the falling city as it was sacked by the Russian Army. Fending off the boredom and deprivation of hiding, the author records her experiences, observations and meditations in this stark and vivid diary. Accounts of the bombing, the rapes, the rationing of food and the overwhelming terror of death are rendered in the dispassionate, though determinedly optimistic prose of a woman fighting for survival amidst the horror and inhumanity of war.

Critics Review

This is a devastating book. It is matter-of-fact, makes no attempt to score political points, does not attempt to solicit sympathy for its protagonist and yet is among the most chilling indictments of war I have ever read. Everybody, in particular every woman ought to read it

Arundhati Roy

One of the most important personal accounts ever written about the effects of war and defeat

Antony Beevor

This is not an hysterical woman … you simply cannot dismiss it … profoundly, acutely embarrassing … an insight into the resilience of people in an unknowable situation

Robert Sandhill

Complex, closely observed diary by a woman living in conquered Berlin at the end of WWII

Kirkus Reviews

Let Anonymous stand witness as she wished to: as an undistorted voice for all women in war and its aftermath, whatever their names or nation or ethnicity. Anywhere

Los Angeles Times

An astonishing record of survival . . . the voice of Anonymous emerges as both shrewd and funny . . . a fresh contribution to the literature of war

Entertainment Weekly

A stunning account of a German woman’s battle to survive repeated rape at the hands of the victors among the ruins of Berlin . . . While leaders plot their dreams of glory and victory, the lives of ordinary people–on all sides–are trampled and destroyed. A most salutary work

Guardian

The author has a fierce, uncompromising voice, and her book should become a classic of war literature

Publishers Weekly

Marvelous . . . As it is a human instinct to survive, this book, which could have been horrifying, is instead exhilarating: a rare tribute to the human spirit

Daily Mail

Coolly written, tearingly honest . . . This is a classic not only of war literature but also of writing at the very extreme of human suffering

Daily Telegraph

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