The Prison Diary of 1944 is a record of growing resignation and despair, written in the hope of bearing witness.
The genesis of the Prison Diary manuscript
The original text of the Prison Diary from the autumn of 1944 forms part of the so-called ‘Drinker manuscript’, which is kept at the Academy of Arts in Berlin. The manuscript consists of 92 sheets of lined, A4 paper – i.e. 184 pages – with page numbers inserted by the author. On pages 1–6 Fallada wrote the short story Little Jü-Jü and Big Jü-Jü and the first five pages of the novel The Drinker: this portion of the manuscript was lost in the chaos of the post-war era. The surviving text begins on page 7: the rest of the novel The Drinker (pp. 7–131) is followed by the short stories Looking for Father and The Story of Little and Big Mücke (pp. 131–41, line 7).
Fallada had begun writing these literary works on 6 September 1944. As he was able to write relatively undisturbed in his confinement, he soon embarked on a highly dangerous undertaking: here of all places – ‘inside these four walls’ – he sets about writing down his memories of the Nazi period. On 23 September 1944 he writes the date at the top of the last page (page 184) – ‘23.IX.44.’ – and adds the title of a short story Der Kindernarr as a cover for the compromising content of his memoir. He then goes back to p. 141, line 7, inserts the same date again – ‘23.IX.44.’ – and begins to write the account that we now know as the Prison Diary: ‘One day in January 1933 . . .’
In the weeks that followed he produced a highly intricate and virtually indecipherable manuscript. Fallada wrote 24 lines per page in the German form of cursive handwriting known as Sütterlin, until he reached the last line of page 183. At the end of the page he began a new sentence with the word ‘And’. On page 184, where the date – ‘23.IX.44’ – and the title Der Kindernarr were already noted at the top, he now wrote the short story of that name. When he got to the bottom of page 184 – having now used up all the 92 sheets of paper allocated to him – he turned the page upside down, wrote the page number 185 on the bottom edge, and continued writing in normal Latin script between the existing lines of Sütterlin script. He proceeded in the same way with the remaining pages: they were turned upside down, numbered in sequence, and Fallada carried on writing between the existing lines of text. On page 189, line 1, he ends the short story Der Kindernarr. On page 183 Fallada picks up the sentence he began earlier with the word ‘And’ and continues to record his memories, in Latin script, until he reaches page 202, where he interpolates the short story Swenda – A Dream Fragment, or My Troubles. As the ‘Swenda story’ is an integral part of the Prison Diary, it has been included here. It follows on from one of the three ‘separate entries’ in which Fallada provides a commentary and an update on his present situation in the psychiatric prison.
The Prison Diary account is continued on pages 204 to 228 in Latin script. Fallada now inserts up to three additional lines at the top of the pages and up to two more lines at the bottom. Page 228 brings him back to the first page of his memoir – page 141. He continues to write between the lines of this page in Latin script, then inserts the page number 229 between the first and second lines at the top of the page; from this point he carries on writing between the lines again, this time in Sütterlin script, until he reaches page 241.
The last 14 pages – 228 to 241 – each contain three sets of handwritten lines, amounting to at least 72 lines on each page. The highly compromising notes became a kind of secret code or cryptograph, the minuscule handwriting zigzagging back and forth for up to eighty lines a page. The text ends with a final entry dated 7 October 1944.
The editors would like to thank the staff of the Archive Collection at the Academy of Arts in Berlin for their kind assistance in making the manuscript available, as well as the Hans Fallada Archive in Carwitz for the opportunity to examine the later typescript version. The School of Applied Language and Intercultural Studies at Dublin City University, Ireland, facilitated the completion of the edition by granting Jenny Williams a period of sabbatical leave.
Chronology
1893 21 July: Rudolf Ditzen, alias Hans Fallada, is born in Greifswald.
1899 The family moves to Berlin.
1911 Attempts suicide in a pact with his friend Hanns Dietrich von Necker.
1912 Committed to Tannenfeld sanatorium (until 15 September 1913).
1919 Meets the publisher Ernst Rowohlt. First course of treatment for morphine addiction in Tannenfeld.
1920 Debut novel Der junge Goedeschal [Young Goedeschal].
1922 Employed as a bookkeeper on the Neuschönfeld estate near Bunzlau (present-day Bolesławiec in Poland).
1923 Sentenced to six months in prison for embezzlement; the novel Anton und Gerda is published.
1924 Imprisonment in Greifswald.
1925 Arrested again for embezzlement; sentenced to a prison term of two and a half years.
1928 Released in the spring from the Central Prison in Neumünster.
1929 5 April: marriage to Anna (Suse) Issel.
1930 Joins the staff of the Rowohlt publishing house – Rowohlt Verlag – in Berlin. Birth of first son Ulrich (Uli).
1931 Publication of Bauern, Bonzen und Bomben [A Small Circus].
1932 Kleiner Mann – was nun? [Little Man – What Now?] is published and becomes an international best-seller. The family moves to Berkenbrück.
1933 7–22 April: held in protective custody in Fürstenwalde.
18 July: birth of twins, of whom only one, the daughter Lore (Mücke), survives.
Purchase of the smallholding in Carwitz.
1934 Publication of Wer einmal aus dem Blechnapf frisst [Once a Jailbird] and Wir hatten mal ein Kind [Once We Had a Child].
1935 May: suffers nervous breakdown as a result of attacks in the Nazi press and money worries.
September: following the publication of Altes Herz geht auf die Reise [Old Heart Goes on a Journey], Fallada is declared an ‘undesirable author’.
October: finishes writing Das Märchen vom Stadtschreiber, der aufs Land flog [Sparrow Farm].
November: another nervous breakdown.
Early December: his status as an ‘undesirable author’ is revoked.
1936 Publication of Hoppelpoppel, wo bist du? [Hoppelpoppel, Where Are You?].
1937 Wolf unter Wölfen [Wolf among Wolves] is published, and is an unexpected success. Signs a contract with the Tobis Klang Film Company to write ‘the story of a German family from 1914 to 1933 or thereabouts’. The project secures the backing of Joseph Goebbels, Emil Jannings is lined up to play the leading role.
1938 Goebbels insists that the story of the family in the film be continued into the Nazi period. Fallada agrees, but the project is shelved anyway. The material is published as a novel, Der eiserne Gustav [Iron Gustav], with a revised ending approved by the powers that be. Renewed attacks in the Nazi press. Publication of Die Geschichten aus der Murkelei [Stories from a Childhood].
1939 The Rowohlt publishing house is incorporated into the Nazi-controlled Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt. Writes Kleiner Mann, grosser Mann – alles vertauscht [Little Man – Big Man, Roles Reversed].
1940 3 April: birth of son Achim.
October–December: hospitalized again.
1941 Publication of Damals bei uns daheim [Our Home in Days Gone by].
1943 January: suffers severe depression, admitted to the Kuranstalt Westend, a clinic in Berlin. Publication of Heute bei uns zu Haus [Our Home Today]. Undertakes three tours abroad on behalf of the Reich Labour Service (RAD).
November: Rowohlt Verlag is closed down for good. Fallada is readmitted to the Kuranstalt Westend.
1944 Meets Ulla Losch. 5 July: divorced from Anna Ditzen.
28 August: during an argument with Anna Ditzen, Fallada fires a shot from his pistol. He is committed to the Neustrelitz-Strelitz psychiatric prison, where the novel Der Trinker [The Drinker], a number of short stories and the memoir of the Nazi period are written.
13 December: he is released.
1945 1 February: marriage to Ulla Losch. Following the entry of the Red Army into Feldberg, he is appointed mayor of the town. August: suffers another nervous breakdown and is admitted to a hospital in Neustrelitz for treatment of his morphine addiction. Later moves to Berlin and meets Johannes R. Becher. Contributes to the Tägliche Rundschau.
1946 Further stays in various clinics and hospitals. The last novels Der Alpdruck [The Nightmare] and Jeder stirbt für sich allein [Alone in Berlin] are written.
1947 5 February: Hans Fallada dies in Berlin.
Index
A
alcoholism/drinking The Drinker
Rowohlt
wife’s aversion to
Alone in Berlin
Americans at Berlin guesthouse
bombing of Berlin
Knickerbocker (journalist)
anti-Semitism novel commissioned by Propaganda Ministry
see also Jews
army medical examinations
B
Barlach, Ernst
Berkenbrück village, Spree river Eher Verlag case
house search by brownshirts (SA) attempted shooting and imprisonment
second visit
left for Berlin
see also Sponars (landlords)
Berlin bombing of
brownshirts/stormtroopers’ songs
Fallada’s son in
Hotel Kaiserhof
order for arrest of Fallada
repair man’s story
Rowohlts’ house in
Schlichters Wine Bar
Stössinger guesthouse
Blitzkrieg
book burning
Brecht, Bertolt
British
brownshirts/stormtroopers (SA) house search and arrest see Berkenbrück village, Spree river
visit to Mahlendorf (Carwitz farm)
C
Carwitz farm see Mahlendorf (Carwitz farm)
Communists
D
Das Reich
Das Tagebuch
Daumier, Honoré
Der Kindernarr
Der Stürmer
Die Weltbühne
Ditzen, Anna (Suse) (wife) arrest of Fallada nighttime journey to Fürstenwalde
prison visit and release
birth of twins
Fallada’s drinking
move to Berlin
relationship and divorce shooting incident vi–
and Ritzners
Rowohlt and lawyer
and SA officers
and Suhrkamp
The Drinker
drug addiction
Düsterberg, Theodor
E
Eher Verlag
Einstein, Carl
émigrés and ‘those who stayed behind’
Ernst (Jannings’ manservant)
F
Fallada’s son at Berlin guesthouse
at Berlin sanatorium
at Easter
at Mahlendorf school
journey to Berlin school
return of photograph of
Teddy
Fallada’s wife see Ditzen, Anna (Suse)
Fein, Franz
French
Froelich, Carl (film director)
Funk, Walther
Fürstenwalde charge of ‘conspiracy against the person of the Führer’
Jewish prisoners
Plauen in
police constables
police custody
wife’s nighttime journey to
Furtwängler, Wilhelm
G
Gestapo arrest of Sas
Plauen informer
Rowohlt publishing house
Suhrkamp
Goebbels, Joseph army exemption certificate signed by
Das Reich
expulsion of Rowohlt from publishing profession
and film script
and Jannings
letter to Fallada and reply
propaganda
public loudspeaker announcements
Reich Chamber of Culture
speeches on Führer and Kaiser
and Wieman
Göring, Hermann edicts
and Wieman
Gröschke, Karl (Party branch leader) and Suhrkamp
H
Hebel: Tales from the Calendar
‘Heil Hitler!’, use of
Himmler, Heinrich
Hindenburg, Reich President von ‘Edict for the Protection of the Nation and the State’
A History of National Socialism
Hitler, Adolf Adolf Hitler Wilhelm III
Blitzkrieg
charge of conspiracy against
collapse of regime
farmer’s remark and punishment
intervention in Goebbels’ marriage
lack of humour
law passed for protection of animals
need for hopes and dreams under
rule of
power and property redistribution
radio broadcast
Stork’s loyalty to
and Streicher
suppression of free press
tablecloth embroidered by housekeeper
‘thousand-year Reich’
wartime
and Wieman
Hitler Youth
Hofmannsthal, Hugo von
Holl, Gussy
Holst (senior nurse)
Hölz, Max
Hotel Kaiserhof, Berlin
Hotop, Dr vi–vii
house search see Berkenbrück village, Spree river
Huch, Ricarda
I
Indians, at Berlin guesthouse
informers
see also Sponars (landlords)
‘inward emigration’
Iron Gustav (novel and film script)
Is the Third Reich Coming?
J
Jailbird (Once a Jailbird)
Jannings, Emil (actor)
Jews air-force general Milch
Berlin publishing house owner
Fallada’s political innocence
Führer’s position discussed with Stork
Goebbel’s criticism of film script
Kroner (magazine editor)
lady friend’s evasion at house search
Reich Day of Broken Glass
Rowohlt publishing house, writers and staff
school teachers in Fürstenwalde jail
Stössinger guesthouse, Berlin
see also anti-Semitism
jokes, about Nazis
K
Kippenberg, Anton
Knickerbocker (American journalist)
Kroner, Friedrich (senior editor)
Küthe, Friedrich Hermann (soldier)
L
Lampe, Friedo
lawyers divorce
Eher Verlag contract negotiations
protective custody
RCL membership application
Ritzner’s
Rowohlt’s
Sas case
Ledig-Rowohlt, Heinrich Maria (publisher)
legal system case of Sas
‘clerical error’
expediency and disregard for
and Stork
Ley, Robert Little Man – What Now?
Losch, Ursula
Ludwig, Emil (Cohn)
M
Mahlendorf (Carwitz farm) Eher Verlag case
feud with farmer (Mechthal)
firewood issue
‘German evening’
local Party office
mayor
see also Stork (schoolmaster/mayor)
old gardener
Ritzner (schoolmaster)
roads
Rowohlt and new publisher at
SA visit
visit from prison with smuggled MS
wartime dreams
Mann, Thomas
‘March Martyrs’
Marx, Karl
Mayer, Paulchen
Mecklenburg see Neustrelit
z-Strelitz prison, Mecklenburg
medical examinations, army recruiting office
Milch, Erhard (air-force general)
N
Nathansohn, Professor
National Socialist Teachers’ Association
Nazi regime advent of
arbitrary dealings with Communists and Jews
book burning
brownshirts see Berkenbrück village, Spree river; brownshirts/stormtroopers (SA)
cultural policy