The Language of the Third Reich

by Victor Klemperer

Paperback

Published December 19, 2013

About the author

Victor Klemperer (9 October 1881 – 11 February 1960) worked as a commercial apprentice, a journalist and eventually a Professor of Literature, specialising in the French Enlightenment at the Technische Universität Dresden. His diaries detailing his life under successive German states -the German Empire, the Weimar Republic, Nazi Germany and the German Democratic Republic- were published in 1995. His recollections on the Third Reich have since become standard sources; extensively quoted by Saul Friedlander, Michael Burleigh and Richard J. Evans.

Reviews

[Len Rudner · Rating 4 out of 5]

Victor Klemperer was a Professor of Philology at Dresden University in the years after WWI until dismissed from his position after the Nazis came to power. He survived the Third Reich only due to his marriage to a non-Jew, but was subject to arrests, privations, and other humiliations. At great risk to himself and his wife, he maintained a diary of the years 1933-1945 that was later published as “I Will Bear Witness.”

At the same time, Klemperer began an informal study of the language that the Nazis deployed during their time in power. He saw this language – and the way that it insinuated itself into everyday usage - as a key element in the corruption of Germany and of Nazi control. After the war, he gathered his scribbled notes into “The Language of the Third Reich,” – or Lingua Tertii Imperii (LTI) - which was published in 1947.

I think I benefited from an earlier reading of Klemperer’s diary. While I have reasonable familiarity with the historical period, LTI is less a historical document and more an extended footnote on his own personal experiences and observations. Nevertheless, it is an important read for those who consider the ways in which language can illuminate and obscure our perceptions of reality. As Klemperer noted in his post-war introduction: “it isn’t only Nazi actions that have to vanish, but also the Nazi cast of mind, the typical Nazi way of thinking and it's breeding-ground: the language of Nazism.”

Readers who are familiar with the power and purpose of Newspeak in George Orwell’s “1984” will appreciate the similarities. As language becomes more tightly controlled, its users find their ability to express – or even form – provocative thoughts is constrained. As Klemperer notes: “cliches do indeed soon take hold of us. Language which writes and thinks for you.”

[Zeckrin Rahman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Such a great book capturing the ordinary moments and life of Viktor Klemperer during the period of the Nazi Regime. His perception on language and the use of it in that period gives elaborated views of how language connects with ideology.

This book is good as a contribution for research and understanding on language, culture and ideology.