In early 1936, New Yorker writer Janet Flanner, a regular contributor to the magazine’s “Letter from Europe” column, filed three lengthy profiles on Adolph Hitler. The New Yorker ran them in a format more commonly used for Americans of note—people whom we now call celebrities. With the Berlin Summer Olympics on the way, and trouble brewing in Europe under Fascist governments, the editors of the magazine clearly felt that Hitler was a personality its readers should understand more intimately. Flanner, who visited Germany from her adopted home in Paris, did not meet Hitler. She did receive carte blanche, a car, and a driver in order to view the Nuremberg rallies and other Nazi events. Through her own social set, which included American and British elite, she gained access to Hitler’s political and social circles.
The outcome of Flanner’s fact gathering strikes the contemporary reader as odd: we learn of Hitler’s favourite gruel, his doting way with...
Norman Ravvin’s recent novel is The Joyful Child (Gaspereau Press, 2011). Previous books include a story collection, Sex, Skyscrapers and Standard Yiddish (Paperplates Books, 1997), and a volume of essays entitled A House of Words: Jewish Writing, Identity and Memory (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1997). He lives in Montreal.
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