An Underground Life: Memoirs of a Gay Jew in Nazi Berlin by Gad Beck [FIRST PAPERBACK EDITION] 1999 • UW

An Underground Life: Memoirs of a Gay Jew in Nazi Berlin by Gad Beck

FIRST PAPERBACK EDITION [1999] UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN PRESS

Larger trade paperback in very good condition with some visible shelf wear to cover.

Gad Beck, a half-Jewish German, managed to evade the Nazis and live illegally, underground, in Berlin throughout the duration of World War II. While that in itself was notable, Beck didn’t simply exist in some nocturnal world of hiding. Coming of age as a gay man during the war, he also helped organize a Jewish youth group, free friends from the Gestapo, and maintain a series of romantic relationships. The result is An Underground Life: a Holocaust memoir that conveys the surreal horror of the times but also focuses more on living than dying, and captures a life that was fueled as much by a sense of romance, adventure, and humor, as it was by suffering.