Book Review: The Long Way to Freedom
| DOI | 10.1177/002070206001500413 |
| Author | S. Mack Eastman |
| Published date | 01 December 1960 |
| Date | 01 December 1960 |
| Subject Matter | Book Review |
BOOK
REVIEWS
361
Goebbels'
sister,
his schoolteacher,
a
close
boyhood
friend
and
from
many
hitherto
unpublished
letters
and
diaries.
The
picture
which
first
emerges
is
that
of
a
vain,
yet
frustrated
writer
embittered
against
a
society
which
apparently
failed
to
give
him
his
proper
recognition;
a
man
who
had
also
been,
and
for
the
rest
of his
life
remained,
an
actor. In
the
beginning
Goebbels
was
"always
more
concerned
with the
effect
on
the
audience
than
with
the
signi-
ficance of
what
he
was
saying".
His
early
speeches seemed
to
be
no
more
than
scripts
with
which
he
could
achieve
his
ambition
of
swaying
the
emotions
of
an
audience.
Even
in
later
life
Goebbels
never
seemed
really
to
leave
the
stage
and
found
it
necessary
to
act
out
any
part
he
was playing.
"Much
of
what
he
claims
for
himself
is
just,
but
he
is
so
vain
of
his
achievements
that
he
basks
almost indecently
In
the
sun-
shine
of his
self-assumed
virtues."
Yet
this
self-conscious
posing
is
only
one
side
of
Goebbels'
character.
His
later
diaries
give
us
a
picture
of
a
man
who
assumed
responsibility
for
the
way
in
which
Germany
conducted
herself
in
a
total
war
of
sur-
vival.
Making
no
sharp
distinction
between
the administration
of
the
country
and
the
propaganda
associated
with
it,
he
considered
that
his
work
as
propagandist
made
it
necessary
that
he be
given
the
fullest
plenary
powers
to
"become
the
ruler
of
Germany while
Hitler
con-
trolled
the
war".
The
plan
for
the
new
order
of
Europe
in
time
had
to
be
replaced
by
visions
of
a
new
Germany
which would
one
day
rise
from
the
rubble
of
the
one
now
being
destroyed.
Goebbels'
final
atti-
tude
was
one
of
utter
disregard
for
the
fate
of
the
German
people
who
had
proved
themselves
unfit
for
the
Nazi
ideal,
and
a
fanatic's
preoccu-
pation with the
foundations
of
a
heroic
Hitler
legend.
This
is
a
biography
that
needed
to
be
written,
if
only
to
counter
Goebbels' own
version
of
his
role
in
the
Nazi
movement,
yet
we
still
have
no
clear
picture
of
this
contradictory
figure.
Goebbels,
by
far
the
most
interesting
member
of
the
Nazi
gang, remains
something of
a
mystery
whose
power
and
influence
became
meaningful
only
in
terms
of
the
history
of
the
people
and
events
around
him.
University
of
Waterloo
T. H.
QuALTn
TR_
LONG
WAY
TO FREEnmo.
By
James
T.
Shotwell.
1960.
(New
York:
The
Bobbs-Merrill
Co.;
Toronto:
McClelland
&
Stewart
Ltd.
639pp.
$8.25.)
Among
all
Professor
Shotwell's
writings, this
remarkable
book
is
possibly
his
maximum
opus.
Despite
the
title,
it
is
not a thesis but
an enlightening
world
history-
a
summing
up
of
what
he
deems
"most
important
in
the
history and
destiny
of
mankind"-by
a
profound
scholar,
a
great
teacher
and
a
life
long work
for
the betterment
of
international relations through
knowl-
edge
and reason.
It
clarifies
the
main
processes
through
which
human
society
came
to
be
what
and where
it
is
today.
The
central theme
of
these
twenty-six
masterly
chapters
is
man's
unending though
often
frustrating
struggle
for
individual
and
collective
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