Censorship and Mythmaking in Nazi Germany

In the language of Nazism, Gleichschaltung meant the complete ideological coordination of all political, social, and cultural activities, so that every element of German life would become part of the National Socialist machine under Hitler's dictatorship. Literature, including children's literature, was either banned, censored, "adjusted" to Nazi mythology, or produced specifically to propagandize for that mythology. As Christa Kamenetsky repeatedly demonstrates in her comprehensive and carefully researched study, all children's literature published under Nazism was aimed to further single-minded and politically empowered indoctrination.

Professor Kamenetsky's book affects the reader beyond its declared intention of demonstrating how the Nazis used censorship and "völkisch ideology" to teach children to "internalize National Socialist ideology and defend it enthusiastically" (xii). Her study overwhelms the reader with the picture of what must surely have been a censor's utopia, for she reveals the two-fold dream of censors in operation: aggression against everything that does not fit the censor's view and imposition of a predetermined value system by the censor whose aggression has been successful. The personal and developmental needs of the child and young adult were, of course, totally disregarded under ideological Gleichschaltung. Kamenetsky covers all aspects of her subject, from origin to publishing trends, but all her discussions are variables of those key terms—censorship and mythmaking.

In Part One of her four-part study, Kamenetsky finds the origin of Nazi "Literary Theory and Cultural Policy" in nineteenth-century German romanticism which, along with an emphasis on the free play of the imagination and a revival of folklore and mythology, reflected a developing German nationalism and built up the complex meanings of the words Volk and völkisch with their concomitant anti-Semitic connotations. Concerted efforts were made to bring art and folklore into the educational system. Heinrich Wolgast, who supported this movement and wanted to bring its principles to children's literature, argued for quality control in The Troubled State of Our Children's Literature (1896). Because Wolgast argued that children's literature should never be used as a means to an end, his work was criticized for its "art-for-art's-sake" stance (11). The great variety of German children's literature guaranteed indeed that it would not be used as a means to an end.

All this changed when the Nazis came to power and made their intentions clear with the book burnings beginning May 10, 1933. This "cleansing action" destroyed one third of all library holdings in Germany; in Berlin alone 70,000 tons of books were removed from the libraries. "In contrast to the Romantic concept, the Nazis' concept no longer stood for diversity in unity" but aimed for a society "totally committed to the Führer and the National Socialist ideology" (37). Kamenetsky cites the new goals of children's literature as they were outlined for the Hitler Youth and the Reich Youth Library in Berlin:

We Expect of Good Books That They Will:

1. 1. Arouse among children an enthusiasm for the heroes of sagas, legends and history, for the soldiers of the great wars, the Führer and the New Germany, so as to strengthen their love of the fatherland and give them new ideals to live by.

2. 2. Show the beauty of the German landscape.

3. 3. Focus on the fate of children of German ethnic groups living abroad and emphasize their yearning for the Reich.

4. 4. Deal with the love of nature and promote nature crafts.

5. 5. Relate old German myths, folktales and legends, in a language reflecting the original folk tradition as closely as possible.

6. 6. Give practical advice and help to the Hitler Youth, both in relation to recreational programs and camp activities.

(55-56)

In Part Two, "The Interpretation of Children's Literature," Kamenetsky shows how the genres of folktales, sagas, and picture books were adjusted to Nazi ideology while books with religious themes, nonsense verse, books about urban life, and books about friendships between children across...