THE SEARCH FOR A THIRD WAY: My Path Between East and West

by Heinz Brandt ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 23, 1969

Heinz Brandt's search for ""a third way"" has cost him thirteen years in both Nazi and Communist jails. His autobiography, a testament of both historical and political importance, recreates the turbulence and terror of the Hitler years and their aftermath and illuminates the personal and ideological travails of a generation of humanist socialists and Communists who, rejecting the watered-down socialism of the right-wing Social Democrats, were caught tragically between the excesses of Nazism and Stalinism. As a young Communist, Brandt fought against Hitler until arrested in 1935 and spent the next ten years in prisons and concentration camps, while close comrades who'd escaped to the East were slaughtered in the Stalinist purges. Liberated at Buchenwald in 1945, Brandt joined Ulbricht's government as East Berlin's director of ""informational activities,"" became increasingly disillusioned with the East German regime, and, fearing political imprisonment, fled with his family in 1958 to West Germany and apparent safety. But while in West Berlin for a trade-union congress in June 1961, he was kidnapped by East German State Security agents, tried secretly, and sentenced to thirteen years. International pressure finally forced his release in 1964, and, remarkably unembittered, Brandt has now translated his rich experiences, his perceptive judgment, and his political insights into a readable and revealing document. It is particularly valuable for its portrait of the resistance fighters against Hitler, their political conflicts, splits, and struggles.

Pub Date: Jan. 23, 1969

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Doubleday

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1969

Categories: NONFICTION