Dead Funny

by HERZOG, RUDOLPHCHASE, JEFFERSON

• ISBN13: 9781935554301
• ISBN10: 1935554301
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2011-04-26
• Publisher: Melville House

Summary

Is it permissible to laugh at Hitler? This is a question that is oft debated in Germany, where, in light, of the dimensions of the horrors committed in the name of its citizens, many people still have difficulty in taking a satiric look at the Third Reich. And whenever some others do precisely that, accusations arise that they are downplaying and trivializing the Holocaust. But there is a long history of jokes about the Nazis. In this groundbreaking volume, Rudolph Herzog presents the first history of humor and jokes directed at the Nazis: from the anti-Nazi theatre scene of the nineteen-twenties and thirties, to the jokes about Hitler and Nazis told during WW II, to the cracks about Hitler in Germany today. Its'a fascinating and frightening history: Here we learn the tales of Germans-including many soldiers-who were imprisoned and executed for telling jokes about Hitler and other Nazi officials. Herzog also documents the surprising number of jokes in circulation during WW II and documents their not infrequent telling, as well as the regime's efforts to suppress them.

Table of Contents

Political Humor Under Hitler: An Inside Look at the Third Reich	p. 1
The Rise and Development of Political Humor	p. 11
The Nazi Seizure of Power	p. 31
Humor and Persecution	p. 81
Humor and War	p. 129
Humor and Annihilation	p. 207
Laughing at Auschwitz? Humor and National Socialism after World War II	p. 223
Notes	p. 236
Works Cited	p. 241
Index	p. 244
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