The Commandant
Subtitle: a monologue
By: the Rudolf Hoess text ; edited by Jürg Amann ; afterword by Ian Buruma
Contributors: Amann, Jürg, 1947-; Buruma, Ian
Publisher: Overlook Duckworth
Published: 2012
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 112
ISBN-13: 9781590206775
Subjects: Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945); Auschwitz (Concentration camp); Jews; Persecutions
Description: Rudolf Hoess was the notorious Commandant of Auschwitz. Imprisoned and awaiting execution after the war, Hoess wrote a long memoir, a self-serving account of his life and approaches to management. The amoral sensibility Hoess displayed regarding all that went on in the charnel factory where the industrialization of death was practiced--where probably 3 million people were literally worked to death, shot or quickly gassed--is still almost beyond belief today. Here, noted writer Jürg Amann has distilled Hoess' memoir into an illuminating new work. The Commandant is a book Hoess would certainly not have approved--a chilling insight into Hitler's Final Solution and the nature of evil itself through the prism of the Nazis' totalitarian system, one Hoess and so many others felt no requirement to question. Ian Buruma's afterword sets this frightening excerpt within a broader moral and historical context.--From publisher description.