Hitler's Piano Player

Hitler's Piano Player: The Rise and Fall of Ernst Hanfstaengl, Confidante of Hitler, Ally of FDR by Peter Conradi

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This was one of the better history books I've ever read. It's a biography of a German-American gentleman that played an interesting role in WWII finding himself working for both Germany and the Allies. Hanfstaengl or Putzi had jumped on Hitler's National Socialist movement early on during the formation of the Nazi party. He had even become the Chief Foreign Affairs correspondent for the Nazi Party during the early part of the Third Reich. But after an unfunny "joke" played on Putzi's life that was orchestrated by Joseph Goebbels Putzi had enough of this "gangster" regime and fled the country for England. A great quote about Hanfstaengl's life comes from the last sentence in this book. Putzi once said of how events in his own life turned out "It is a terrible thing when you think you got on a bandwagon and it turns out to be a dustcart." The author of this book, Peter Conradi, used many interviews with Putzi's son Egon when writing this book. Putzi's son actually had the terrible honor being a godson Adolf Hitler. Hitler will probably go down as the worst godfather in history. I'd be curious as to candidates for the second worst Godfather. Maybe Vito Corleone would make the list. I was originally interested in this book after seeing a television movie "Hitler: The Rise of Evil" (2003) and how this "piano player" (played by Liev Schreiber) had a prominent role in the ascent of Adolf Hitler. Along with being Hitler's preferred piano player who most often requested Richard Wagner's "Tristen und Isolde" musical drama. During the Beer Hall Putsch of 1923 an injured Adolf Hitler fled to the Hanfstaengl's household in Uffing for asylum. Hanfstaengl's wife at the time (Helene) allegedly dissuaded Hitler from committing suicide when the police came to arrest him.

One thing that I thought was very interesting in the book was when the American government had finally brought Putzi to Washington from his prison of war camp in Canada. Putzi was staying at an officer's barracks and was asked by General Max how the war was going so far as kind of an open ended question. Putzi went to a large map of Europe and Africa and (thinking that he was stating the obvious) had predicted what was to be the United States' first military operation in the Atlantic theater at Casablanca in Morocco known as Operation Torch. While Putzi was revealing his thoughts the General had stormed out of the room to a puzzled Putzi. The General probably worried about what the Nazi's might know about their operation (p. 269-70).

Overall I thought this history book was very well written by Conradi. I felt anxious as to when and how Putzi was finally going to flee Nazi Germany and eventually become the American informant for President Roosevelt. I thought Conradi did a great job in revealing that to the reader.



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