A Ladder to the Sky(19)
Of course, looking back, I can see that I had used the wrong words to describe Oskar’s painting of Alysse. Despite my youth and ignorance of art, I knew it was the furthest thing in the world from unsophisticated or obscene. In fact, it was magnificent. The irony was that, in 1939, I had seen something beautiful and told its creator that it was a travesty. And now, almost fifty years later, I had read something terrible and, when asked, would surely praise it.
Really, it was unconscionable behaviour.
6. New York
The flight to New York was the first occasion that we actually travelled together and, while on the plane, we planned our itinerary. I was to give a reading at the 92nd Street Y, another as part of a panel of novelists at New York University and a third in a Brooklyn library, along with the usual interviews, signing sessions and radio broadcasts, and Maurice agreed to accompany me to all of these as long as he could keep one evening free to catch up with some friends who lived in the city.
The readings themselves went well, except for the panel event, where I was teamed with a much-praised novelist from Park Slope some twenty years my junior who looked as if he’d spent the entire day shooting a fashion commercial for a high-class designer label and a young woman whose debut had been published six years earlier but showed no sign of committing to a second book. For some reason, she insisted on calling me Herr Ackermann, despite repeated pleas on my part for her to call me Erich. (‘I couldn’t,’ she said backstage, as she demanded a glass of wine from a volunteer. ‘You’re, like, old enough to be my grandfather.’) The woman (let’s call her Susan) and the middle-aged man (we’ll try Andrew) sat on either side of me on the stage and, as Susan’s novel drew artificial and deeply contrived parallels between the political tensions in Germany during the thirties and American opposition to the Vietnam War some thirty years later, the moderator asked me whether I found that her writing accurately reflected my experience of the city during those days.
‘It’s so long ago that it’s difficult for me to remember,’ I said, looking out at an audience whose attention seemed entirely focussed on the younger man to my left. ‘You must remember that I was just a teenager then and my mind wasn’t particularly concerned with politics. I was thinking about my future and hoping for a career as a writer. However, while I think Susan’s book is very well researched – she certainly captures the geography of the city well – my concern would be for the lack of a moral compass among the German characters.’
This was a considerable understatement on my part for I had read the novel a few weeks earlier upon receiving my schedule and found it to be not only trite in its depiction of racial conflict but deeply na?ve in its thinking, while her research seemed to have been conducted exclusively from watching old Second World War movies. At even the merest hint of criticism, however, she turned to me, instantly defensive. ‘A moral compass?’ she said. ‘Could you clarify what you mean by that, Herr Ackermann?’
‘The fact is,’ I replied, impressed by how she could use a form of address to suggest a lack of balance on my part, ‘there were some Germans during those days who were quite vocal in their dissent to the policies of Hitler and many who sought to escape the country entirely. It seems unfortunate to me that their presence is so rarely represented in war fiction.’
‘I don’t write war fiction,’ she said, making inverted comma signs in the air with her fingers. ‘Please don’t compartmentalize my work.’
‘I think you want to be very careful how you tread here, pal,’ said Andrew, who was sitting forward in his chair now, amusement and outrage competing for dominance in his tone. ‘Susan’s something of an expert on that period of history.’
‘And I actually lived it,’ I replied.
‘But like you said, you were just a kid.’
‘Yes, but people often assume that, after the rise of National Socialism, the entire nation turned, overnight, into a horde of anti-Semitic barbarians. Surely as writers of fiction we should look for the stories that are less often told? And some can be found in the lives of those who both took a stand against the Nazis and died for their troubles.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Susan, holding her hands in the air and looking as though she might need a tranquillizer if I were to continue speaking. ‘My best friend’s husband’s entire family was killed in the camps. So this is a very emotive issue for me. For you even to suggest, Herr Ackermann—’
‘I’m simply saying—’ I began, but was immediately cut off by Andrew, who placed a hand on my knee to silence me.
‘Am I right in thinking, Erich,’ he asked, ‘that you were a member of the Hitler Youth?’
‘Well, yes,’ I said, feeling a prickle of perspiration creeping along my back. ‘That’s been well documented. All boys my age had no choice but to sign up. Just as all girls had to be members of the Bund Deutscher M?del.’
‘Women don’t fight wars,’ insisted Susan. ‘And they never start them.’
‘Tell that to Mrs Thatcher,’ I said. ‘Tell it to Helen of Troy.’
‘And you were a soldier in the German army?’ continued Andrew.
‘In the Wehrmacht, yes,’ I admitted. ‘I’ve never denied it. Although I didn’t see any action, of course. I was part of a clerical team in Berlin during—’