Novel set in LONDON and PARIS
Dual timeline novel set in RAVENSBRÜCK / MAJDANEK and NEW YORK
14th October 2024
The Mare by Angharad Hampshire, novel set in Ravensbrück / Majdanek and New York.
This novel is the fictionalised account of the life of Hermine Braunsteiner. who served as a prison guard – an Aufseherin – in two concentration camps during WW2.
The chapters are short and punchy and move between the years during WW2 and the post War period in America. The chapters alternate between Hermine’s experiences during the war and her subsequent life with her husband Russell, whom she met in Austria after the war; Russell’s running narrative addresses his wife directly as ‘you’ as the story unfolds.
The structure of this novel, I thought at first, would be off putting, I am not overly fond of a storyline whereby one character addresses another character directly. I thought I would struggle to engage. Further, when the present tense is used, it needs a capable writing hand to confidently handle prose and can often fall flat, but here, it works well, as it offers pathos and immediacy – it feels like we are peering over the shoulders of the characters. This is very competent, snappy writing and storytelling and the chosen format works really well, as the narrative is propelled forward through the war years and beyond.
Hermine is an average Austrian young woman, who is in her early twenties during the war years. Work was scarce at that time and she was offered the opportunity of working as a guard at Ravensbrück, a burgeoning women’s camp. At first it seemed like a run-of-the-mill job but as the numbers of prisoners began to swell, the brutality rose incrementally – and much of the novel looks at the complicity of the overseers, whilst balancing the notion that the ‘warped logic of Nazism held you in its thrall’. Spurned by her early lover, she exacts revenge on the nearest humble being. She fell in love but was betrayed (or, so she saw it) and seeks to move to another camp. She lands at Majdenek, which is beyond description. Disease is rife and several times she herself is felled by typhus, coming close to death on at least one occasion. It is beyond intolerable and she requests a transfer back to Ravensbrück.
A couple of decades after the war, she is extradited and put on trial in Germany, examining her time in Majdanek and for the atrocities she is deemed to have committed there. Her defence is that she suffered repeat attacks of typhus and was confined to bed during the alleged mistreatment/killing of prisoners. She also ‘doesn’t remember‘, although plenty of witnesses are prepared to testify against her.
Her husband’s blind faith in her is, of course, rattled but he is a loyal soul who sacrifices his life and friendships because of his (almost) unwavering commitment to her. During the trial, however, he is shocked to the core by what he hears but cannot reconcile the woman he married with the eponymous ‘mare’ of the book title, someone who kicked prisoners to death with her steel capped boots.
This is a very interesting fictional rendition of Braunsteiner’s life, weaving a great many recorded events into the storyline and set against the unfolding political developments in Europe, Vietnam and the USA. It encourages the reader to think about the situation from a good many perspectives and ponders the notion of amnesia and whether it can be a physical manifestation when someone has behaved barbarically, or whether it is a useful tool to avoid admitting culpability. How can someone live with themselves when they have been responsible for murdering thousands? How, even, is a monster created?
Justice for the victims is fittingly served and the reader is left to reflect on the reading experience. This novel set in in Ravensbrück / Majdanek and New York is well worth picking up, the research shines through.
Tina for the TripFiction Team
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