You have to consider their childhoods. Pfirsich was loved and cherished and educated.
This kid had to survive like an abandoned baby rat. In alleys full of cats.
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Posts Tagged ‘survival’
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Why would this child know what was in the newspapers, even of his own time? What children do we know that read papers, even in a nice warm living room — and then outside the comics pages?
A German soldier once asked me, “Whatever happened to Rommel?”
Once again, it made me realize that often the very participants in an event don’t know what happened. Nor do they care. The soldier had been through the end of a war, in prison camps, and then went to America to build a fine career as a cartoonist. Why would he know or care what had happened to a commanding officer not even his own?
One of the problems of writing history is the anachronism of awareness. You and I may be able to get whole books about Rommel based on his diaries, histories and memoirs, but these are not available to the people right there at the time.
We can’t use the term “paranoid” in the time of Horatio Hornblower, and we can’t talk about “a million” in the common parlance of the 18th century. It can take a generation for “everybody” to know about the details of an event, real or mythological.
I’ve fallen into the trap of thinking nobody had wristwatches because MEN didn’t wear them until after WWI. We have to be ever alert (and thank all our supergeek readers for keeping us on our toes!).
Yeah, I know: “Why didn’t the Americans recognize this guy for a Holocaust survivor!!?”
If I showed that – before anybody found a camp — it’d be an anachronism. It’s not like this stuff was being broadcast; in fact, in Germany, it was dangerous to talk about it, even if you knew.
Americans didn’t want those films getting out of Guantanamo, either….
A German is a German, especially then; this guy really thinks he’s been done an injustice being thrown in a camp with THOSE PEOPLE. They could at least have put him in with his own people. Geeze.
New story tomorrow — what’s been called the Backstory: “New and Different” – where we find out who’s responsible for the ribbon on the riding crop!
Oh, you didn’t think you were going to get away with pure nobility, did you?
Good ol’ Winzig. He’s really quite consistent in whatever personality he’s developed for the moment. And fearless. He’s always been fearless.
American soldiers were amazed by German soldiers who stayed behind to help a wounded officer.
As one American said, “We’d never do that for one of ours!”
When you’re a prisoner, you’re not supposed to make any noise.
It got a lot of Indians shot. It’s why they have the “stoical” stereotype – they’re under the guns, and they don’t dare move. If you know any Indians, they’re the funniest people on the planet. If they do the severe stereotype thing on you, it’s called “Nativespeak.”
Then again, an Indian told me that, and they like to have white people on (which we deserve)….
(I’m using “Indian” because they do – but I’m thinking “First Nations” when I do. I’m kinda like the clueless but well-meaning German trying to get on the side of the Jews, and realizing it’s never gonna happen. Is that selfish? Probably….)
Dan said Vietnam soldiers of his time called the North Vietnamese (commonly called “Charlie” in most references) “Mr. Charles” as a token of respect and recognition. That’s how Udo’s using it – soldier is soldier, schnapps is schnapps.
Winzig’s fear button has been shut off — but those of you who remember his American tent-mate in North Africa will probably understand why a live file pops open in his head when he hears a possible reference. They were practically married, at least in the way that lets us squabble over dirty socks on our cot.
No, I didn’t write this accurate German — a very helpful Austrian reader did. Thanks to him – another SuperGeek – I look smarter than I am. You cannot keep all the stuff in your head you need to know as an author. Well, I can’t, anyway.
I love German puns. Their language is so very flexible, yet so tight. Martin Luther’s standardization lets them play with it without having it fall apart or wander off on them.
You notice Winzig isn’t a damn’ bit afraid of these people.
Always wanted to show how clueless the Americans were, walking into the middle of the German situation in all its nakedness.
We still make stupid movies about “Indians.”
