newcritics - Latest Comments in Berlin Noir

Re: Berlin Noir

Alex — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 02:03:49 -0000

"I donÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t remember that Gunther was trained as a lawyer. Is that mentioned in the first three books and I missed it?"

Yes, I believe it's in the first book where Gunther mentions that he has a law degree. Law degrees were (and are) very common in Germany and continental Europe as preparations for many careers - Proust and Kafka both had them, for example.

Re: Berlin Noir

Claire Helene — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 21:35:41 -0000

I don't remember that Gunther was trained as a lawyer. Is that mentioned in the first three books and I missed it? Does the fourth go more into his background?

Re: Berlin Noir

Bill Roberts — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 20:58:30 -0000

Type your comment here.

Re: Berlin Noir

Alex — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 18:27:36 -0000

I've owned the trilogy for many years, and I have to say that the three books (and the most recent fourth one) have tended to descend in my estimation over time.

1. I just don't buy Gunther as a character. He just doesn't hold together: he's a university-trained attorney from a well-placed family, who was initially a member of a very prestigious government department (if I remember, the Foreign Service?). It's very unlikely he would interpret his Weimar descent into becoming a police officer positively (he claims this in the books, but it doesn't really make sense), and becoming a private investigator would just about drive him crazy. He's not an American with our loose sense of class, he's a (previously) high-status German born and educated under the Wilhemine Reich (i.e. Gunther is precisely in the class of people who most supported the Nazi party).

2. Pretty clearly, the other characters don't understand Gunther precisely because he's so anomalous - his career just doesn't make sense. Unless he was a Communist (essentially an unbelievable thing for a high-ranking police officer to be), which he clearly isn't. He's not fond of the Weimar regime, either and, later in the series, is extremely skeptical of the post-war regime. Which makes it totally unclear why he does what he does - he's not proceeding on trying to survive, yet, he becomes a highly placed SS officer when he could have escaped at multiple previous points in his life. He seems to have no coherent or clear politics (remember, he has a doctorate in law, worked in the government, lived in a politics soaked time and seems to be extremely intelligent - he's not the lug from the lower classes that most American hard-boiled PIs are) yet he behaves as if he's heroic.

3. Noir in it's core is a Left critique of capitalist societies. I.E. they end badly (or at least not very positively) partially because capitalism is wrong. Kerr's four books generally show Gunther prospering though the course of the four books, even though Gunther is a relatively honest and just character living in literally the worst regime ever in noir's eyes (he continually gets promoted, he survives the war and becomes a hotel operator by the fourth book).

Re: Berlin Noir

Claire Helene — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 20:53:15 -0000

Oh, thanks guys for the tips on books.

Re: Berlin Noir

Tom Watson — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 11:33:56 -0000

Howard's right - the Polish Officer is wonderful, but I really loved the World at Night. Brilliant.

Re: Berlin Noir

Howard Chaykin — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 09:03:05 -0000

The Bernie Gunther books are good--but if you really want to read the best material out there that deals with this era, read Alan Furst. He wrote a number of forgettable books in the 70s and 80s--none of which show up on his resume--but since 1989's NIGHT SOLDIERS, he's made Europe between 1933 and 1945 his own. A good place to start would be THE POLISH OFFICER, about a cartographer who becomes a secret agent, or THE WORLD AT NIGHT, about a filmmaker in occupied Paris. All his World War II stuff is sensational.

Re: Berlin Noir

Tom Watson — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 07:42:58 -0000

Hey Claire, I loved this book - read it last year. Scratched the same itch.

Re: Berlin Noir

Kathleen Maher — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 22:28:35 -0000

Sounds like fun reading, Claire. A shade familiar but not entirely, the background one I've never gotten near: that researched presentation of street level Nazism in Berlin.
Too often I assume I've read all I want about WWII and seen as many movies about it I can take: not that I suppose I've got the whole story; rather than it's all so horrible and so ugly and wrenching that I really need to find something nice and soothing, at least for a minute. But I never quite lose my own itch for noir and Bernie Gunther does sound as if he'll tickle me, despite street level despair.