Those Who Forget: One Family's Story; A Memoir, a History, a Warning

About the Book

A memoir of the past and a warning for today: the urgent account of a woman delving into her family's complicity with the Nazis during World War Two

"An utterly original memoir for our times, elegant, courageous and deeply affecting" Philippe Sands, author of East West Street

During the war, Géraldine Schwarz's grandparents were neither heroes nor villains - they just followed the current. Afterwards they wanted to forget, to bury it all under the wreckage of the Third Reich.

But decades later, delving through the basement of their apartment building, Géraldine discovers that her grandfather Karl profited from the forced 'Aryanisation' of Jewish businesses - and so she is compelled to investigate her ancestors' past. On her mother's side, she delves into the role of her French grandfather, a policeman during the Vichy regime. How guilty were they?

Combining generations of family stories with the history of Europe's post-war reckoning, Géraldine asks: how did Germans transform their collective guilt into democratic responsibility? And, given rising populism in Europe today, how can we ensure we learn from history?

Géraldine Schwarz is a German-French journalist, author and documentary filmmaker based in Berlin. Those Who Forget, an account of her family's complicity with fascism, is her first book. It has been translated into eight languages and won the European Book Prize 2018, the German Winfried Preis and the Italian Nord-Sud Prize.

About the Author :
Géraldine Schwarz is a German-French journalist, author and documentary filmmaker based in Berlin. Those Who Forget, an account of her family's complicity with fascism, is her first book. It has been translated into eight languages and won the European Book Prize 2018, the Winfried Preis and the Nord-Sud Prize.

Review :
An utterly original memoir for our times, elegant, courageous and deeply affecting I was gripped by Schwarz's book partly because she writes from a new generational perspective... I was moved by this book... she highlights the consequences of acquiescence in wrongdoing Out of all the books I read this year-and I read many, stuck at home during 2020's endless quarantine-the one that resonated perhaps the most was Those Who Forget... It made the very convincing case that, until and unless there is a full accounting for what happened with Donald Trump, 2020 is not over and never will be Incredibly moving... I could not put it down Although she has written a searing book about the past, Schwarz's work is oriented toward the present and the future... Those Who Forget is as readable as it is persuasive. Schwarz embeds her appeal to citizens and nations to do memory work in a gripping detective story centered on her own family's history... [an] invaluable warning [A] riveting exploration of Germany's post-World War II reckoning with guilt and responsibility... with eloquence and passion [Schwarz] demonstrates that we can never be reminded too often to never forget [Schwarz] helps us understand the importance of openly facing our past, and of actively learning from it, at a time when our democracy, once again, is under threat. Those Who Forget is a powerful monument to our time, and an urgent wake-up call It took only two generations for her family's unexceptional wartime past to recede from view. But as the author painstakingly peeled away decades of denial, it was precisely the family's ordinariness that would prove so chilling. Geraldine Schwarz's book is a brave and important contribution to our understanding of memory A powerful and unflinching look at Germany during World War II and Europe's postwar reckoning with far-right nationalism... In searing yet engaging prose, Schwarz makes her case for the need for memory work in this highly recommended read for fans of memoirs and World War II history [An] astute debut... This timely memoir also serves as a perceptive look at the current rise of far-right nationalism throughout Europe and the U.S.