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Die Weiße Rose. 100 Seiten (Reclam 100 Seiten)
Der deutsche Widerstand gegen Hitlers Diktatur hatte viele Gesichter. Eines der markantesten ist die Gruppe "Weiße Rose", unter ihnen die Studenten Hans und Sophie Scholl, die nach 1945 zu Helden der frühen Bundesrepublik wurden. Ihr Mut, den sie mit dem Leben bezahlten, machte sie zu Vorbildern einer ganzen Generation. Wie lassen sich die verschiedenen Persönlichkeiten der Gruppe charakterisieren? Was waren ihre zentralen Motive? Und wie sah die politische und militärische Situation 1942/43 aus, auf die sie reagierten? Der Historiker und NS-Forscher Wolfgang Benz gibt einen kompakten Überblick über das Geschehen, frei von Glorifizierung und Heroisierung.
109 pages, Kindle Edition
Published September 29, 2017
49 people want to read
About the author
Wolfgang Benz
174 books9 followersWolfgang Benz war Leiter des Zentrums für Antisemitismusforschung der Technischen Universität Berlin.
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November 17, 2025This 100-page long book is an easy introduction to the history of the White Rose, a small group of university students in Munich (and one professor-mentor), who were executed for distributing pamphlets opposing the Nazi regime. The most famous (and the youngest) was Sophie Scholl, who was brought into the group by her older brother, Hans. Together with their friends Willi Graf, Christoph Probst, Alexander Schmorell, and a professor, Kurt Huber, the Scholls planned to foment opposition to the Nazi regime among students in Munich and -- they hoped -- other cities. Starting in the summer of 1942, several members of the group (but not Sophie) wrote pamphlets first calling on Germans to engage in passive resistance and later to resist more actively. All members of the White Rose came from the "educated bourgeoisie" with families that strongly supported learning, including in the Humanities, even for future doctors and chemists and biologists. Although studying science and medicine, they thus also took course in philosophy and music and read widely in German literature. This "liberals arts" element of their education gave them a commitment to individualism and fundamental liberal values -- individualism, resistance to tyranny -- that inspired their resistance. They were also motivated by religious conviction -- although it had not caused them to embrace pacifism before 1942. The shocking (to Germans) and devastating loss in Stalingrad further fed their conviction that the Nazi regime was doomed and that it would take Germans down with it. The group was responsible for authoring and distributing six pamphlets, several of which were only printed in a few dozen copies and mailed to randomly-selected addresses in Munich, as well as a few phrases (along the lines of down with Hitler) painted on walls in the university neighborhood in Munich. This would cost them their lives.
Willi Graf stands out as the only member of the group who was never drawn to the Nazis. The others were largely happy to join the Hitler Youth and didn't initially question German foreign policy or the nationalist justifications for the war. Exposure to the horrors of the Eastern Front, including the Warsaw ghetto, however, turned Hans Scholl in particular from willing participant in the German national military project into a dedicated opponent of it.
On a fateful February day in 1943, Hans and Sophie Scholl were distributing some of their anti-war and anti-regime pamphlets in the main university building in Munich when they were spotted by a janitor who turned them into the Gestapo. They would be executed only four days later -- and by the fall, all members of the group, Willi, Alexander, Christoph, and Professor Huber, would be executed as well.
It is well worth learning about the White Rose one way or another. This book, only available in German as far as I know, in particular was helpful in understanding the individual contributions of various members (who wrote which pamphlet, for example), in learning more about the content of the pamphlets and in analyzing what they can tell us about the "ideology" they represent (to the extent there is any ideological basis to them at all), in connecting the core group of 7 to others who were questioned by the Gestapo, in some cases put on trial, and in one case also executed. It was most especially helpful in finding a balance between appreciating and commemorating the courage and integrity of these young people and recognizing the limitations of their actions and motivation and ideological commitment. They showed, for example, little concern for the fate of European Jews, except as a warning for what might eventually befall non-Jewish Germans. Benz manages this sensitive and difficult task with nuance and care.
Willi Graf stands out as the only member of the group who was never drawn to the Nazis. The others were largely happy to join the Hitler Youth and didn't initially question German foreign policy or the nationalist justifications for the war. Exposure to the horrors of the Eastern Front, including the Warsaw ghetto, however, turned Hans Scholl in particular from willing participant in the German national military project into a dedicated opponent of it.
On a fateful February day in 1943, Hans and Sophie Scholl were distributing some of their anti-war and anti-regime pamphlets in the main university building in Munich when they were spotted by a janitor who turned them into the Gestapo. They would be executed only four days later -- and by the fall, all members of the group, Willi, Alexander, Christoph, and Professor Huber, would be executed as well.
It is well worth learning about the White Rose one way or another. This book, only available in German as far as I know, in particular was helpful in understanding the individual contributions of various members (who wrote which pamphlet, for example), in learning more about the content of the pamphlets and in analyzing what they can tell us about the "ideology" they represent (to the extent there is any ideological basis to them at all), in connecting the core group of 7 to others who were questioned by the Gestapo, in some cases put on trial, and in one case also executed. It was most especially helpful in finding a balance between appreciating and commemorating the courage and integrity of these young people and recognizing the limitations of their actions and motivation and ideological commitment. They showed, for example, little concern for the fate of European Jews, except as a warning for what might eventually befall non-Jewish Germans. Benz manages this sensitive and difficult task with nuance and care.
June 1, 2023
Ein Buch für jeden und jede! Sehr gutes Einstiegsbuch in das Thema. Chapeaux’s an Wolfgang Benz. Auch das Buch “Der Holocaust” von ihm ist sehr empfehlenswert.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews