Sign-In
Cart
My Father Against the Nazis
Paperback
Biographies GeneralGeneral Political ScienceImmigration & Refugees
Publisher Price: $21.99
ISBN13: 9781962834520
Publisher: Calumet Editions
Published: Aug 22 2025
Pages: 230
Weight: 0.69
Height: 0.52 Width: 6.00 Depth: 9.00
Language: English
What does it mean to stand against tyranny across generations?
In 1959, sixteen-year-old Steven Mayer performed in The Diary of Anne Frank, wearing his father's coat from their 1939 escape from Nazi Germany. In the audience was his father, whose silent scream revealed depths of trauma that would take young Steven decades to understand.
Through intimate family memories, long-hidden documents, and his father's own words, Mayer traces a journey that begins with his father's childhood in Köln, the life-killing force of fascism, the life-sustaining force of family history, the agony of deciding to stay or leave, his service in the US Army with the Ritchie Boys, and postwar life in pursuit of justice and a life lost.
Post-war, My Father Against the Nazis is more than a Holocaust memoir. It's the story of Paul Mayer's lifelong battle in pursuit of justice, the intergenerational transmission of trauma, and a son's quest to understand his difficult father within the vast currents of 20th-century history.
Blending history, memoir, reflection, and a light foray into prophecy, My Father Against the Nazis is a powerful reminder that the fight against fascism and hate is never over. Using an innovative structure inspired by John Dos Passos, Mayer weaves personal narrative with historical context to explore questions that resonate powerfully today: How do we recognize the warning signs of authoritarianism? Does one flee, hunker down, or fight back? And what can we usefully learn from history?
Also in
Biographies General
Bluesland: Portraits of Thirteen Major American Blues Masters
Pete Welding (ED.)
Toby Byron (ED.)
Hardcover
Karl Popper - The Formative Years, 1902 1945: Politics and Philosophy in Interwar Vienna
Hacohen, Malachi Haim
Hardcover
The Children of Athena: Greek Intellectuals in the Age of Rome: 150 Bc0-400 AD
Freeman, Charles
Hardcover
Make It a Double: From Wretched to Wondrous: Tales of One Woman's Lifelong Discovery of Whisky
Sackier, Shelley
Hardcover
The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race
Isaacson, Walter
Hardcover
An Enemy Such as This: Larry Casuse and the Fight for Native Liberation in One Family on Two Continents Over Three Centuries
Correia, David
Hardcover
Agents of Chaos: Thomas King Forçade, High Times, and the Paranoid End of the 1970s
Howe, Sean
Hardcover
The Secret Life of the Savoy: Glamour and Intrigue at the World's Most Famous Hotel
Williams, Olivia
Paperback
The Badger: The Life of Bernard Hinault and the Legacy of French Cycling
Fotheringham, William
Paperback
The Devil's Diary: Alfred Rosenberg and the Stolen Secrets of the Third Reich
Wittman, Robert K.
Kinney, David
Paperback
Florence Kelley and the Nation's Work: The Rise of Womens Political Culture, 1830-1900
Sklar, Kathryn Kish
Paperback
The Rise and Fall of Anne Boleyn: Family Politics at the Court of Henry VIII
Warnicke, Retha M.
Paperback
A Woman of No Importance: The Untold Story of the American Spy Who Helped Win World War II
Purnell, Sonia
Hardcover
Living with a Wild God: A Nonbeliever's Search for the Truth about Everything
Ehrenreich, Barbara
Paperback
Seafaring Women: Adventures of Pirate Queens, Female Stowaways, and Sailors' Wives
Cordingly, David
Paperback
The Butcher, the Embezzler, and the Fall Guy: A Family Memoir of Scandal and Greed in the Meat Industry
Cherington, Gretchen
Paperback
Gift of Power: The Life and Teachings of a Lakota Medicine Man
Erdoes, Richard
Lame Deer, Chief Archie Fire
Paperback
My Own Devices: True Stories from the Road on Music, Science, and Senseless Love
Dessa Wander
Hardcover
Nobody's Girl: A Memoir of Surviving Abuse and Fighting for Justice
Giuffre, Virginia Roberts
Hardcover
How to Be Okay When Nothing Is Okay: Tips and Tricks That Kept Me Alive, Happy, and Creative in Spite of Myself
Lawson, Jenny
Hardcover
Family of Spies: A World War II Story of Nazi Espionage, Betrayal, and the Secret History Behind Pearl Harbor
Kuehn, Christine
Hardcover
Dangerous, Dirty, Violent, and Young: A Fugitive Family in the Revolutionary Underground
Dohrn, Zayd Ayers
Hardcover
A Walk in the Park: The True Story of a Spectacular Misadventure in the Grand Canyon
Fedarko, Kevin
Paperback
Catch the Devil: A True Story of Murder, Deception, and Injustice on the Gulf Coast
Colloff, Pamela
Hardcover