Aimée & Jaguar: A Love Story, Berlin 1943 by Erica Fischer
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Book Reviews of Aimée & Jaguar: A Love Story, Berlin 1943
Book Review: excellent document of everyday live in Germany during WWII
Summary: 4 Stars
This book is excellent due to its many eyewitness sources on life in Berlin during WWII. The unusual situation of the protagonists is only a backdrop to the difficulties of a prosecuted person in an unusual time and situation.Book Review: an unorthodox but gripping book
Summary: 3 Stars
I enjoyed the film version of "Aimee & Jaguar", but I think the book tells a much deeper story. We get to know the characters on a more profound level: I was especially charmed by the poems both women wrote, especially Jaguar's rhymed comments on her everyday life experiences. The book provides astonishing details about life for Jews who went "underground" in Berlin; somehow, the picture of the slow tightening of the Nazi noose was clearer to me from this book than from the many other works I've read on the period. And Aimee's fate after the war was unexpected--messy, frustrating, and human. A more timid author might have left some of this information out.
I do have a few complaints about Fischer's approach to writing history: I agree with some other reviewers that the story tended to get muddled in the constant mention of unimportant names and dates, and it's difficult to keep track of the minor characters. An index would have helped with this. The author included loads of love letters, which get a little repetitive. I also would have liked to see more photos of Aimee & Jaguar's friends, rather than so many pictures of just the two of them.
I don't have the knowledge to assess how successful Fischer was at capturing lesbian feelings: the love between the characters seemed believable to me, and there was one fairly explicit scene that many historians would not have dared to write, but which I think added to the emotion of the story. I did think it was odd--bordering on irresponsible, for a historian--that Fischer stated in an epilogue that she thought Jaguar would have left Aimee if they had been together longer. This is pure speculation. Though I appreciated Fischer's honest confession of her feelings about Aimee, it might have been fairer to the reader if the author had put this at the beginning of the book. After reading the epilogue, I remembered a number of incidents in the story that portrayed Aimee in a negative light, and I couldn't help but think that Fischer's personal attitude may have colored her telling of those events. For example, when Jaguar is sent to a concentration camp, Aimee tries unsuccessfully to demand her release from the camp authorities. This action is described as "irrational", and one onlooker comments that it may have even harmed Jaguar. But no evidence for this is given--letters from Jaguar after Aimee's visit say nothing about it. Aimee's attempt might just as easily have been described as a sign of her great love for Jaguar, or of her bravery in confronting the Nazis, but instead, a picture is painted of a woman behaving irrationally, a standard sexist stereotype.
I can understand why Fischer was offended that Aimee appropriated Jaguar's Jewish background after the war. I think some of Aimee's attitude might have come from the role of German women in the time that she lived: she would have expected to take on some of the attributes and beliefs of her "husband." Plus, she was disgusted at the system that had robbed her of her lover. And her action can also be looked at in a positive way: one of Aimee's sons became very interested in the Hebrew language, and ended up emigrating to Israel. Is that a bad thing? I thought it was strange that Fischer gave so little credit to Aimee for the risks she took to try and help Jaguar and a number of other Jews. It is true that Aimee was not always on "the good side", and Fischer did some hard work investigating her background. But shouldn't people who learn and change be given some respect?
Fischer closes the book with a description of her own husband's work, which will probably make every reader feel immensely guilty. Again, not something most historians would do, but it is another sign of Fischer's brave, though not always successful, attempts to get to the heart of humanity's struggle with its own dark side.
Book Review: not what I anticipated, still worth the time
Summary: 3 Stars
I came to the book after seeing the film a few times since it's release. Erica Fischer is not a lesbian and indeed her angle on the book is more historical. There is a distance the author keeps in reporting their feelings for one another. I got the feeling from reading the book that to focus more on the passion would perhaps trivialize the plight of Jews for Erica Fischer. The letters and quotes held great interest for me. And after adjusting to the fact that the narrative would feel a little cold and dry, I also found the backround information quite interesting. I did feel that there was a lack of objectivity on the authors part. But then we all have our particular perspective through which we see the world. Hers is as a Berlin heterosexual Jew. If you are a lesbian who has assumed the author is a lesbian and came to the book looking for a full bodied love story, there is an adjustment to make. You might want to skip the epilouge or at least brace yourself. This is the part of the book that I felt was inappropriate. Erica Fischer told me that more information has come forward since this English translation, and can be found in the later German version. This information helps further explain some of the obvious distaste she still holds for Lili. All said, this is a thought provoking book, though not a scintillating love story. I am thankful to the author for the enormous amount of research that went into this book and do recommend it.Book Review: Sorely disappointing....
Summary: 2 Stars
I had heard a lot about this book on various lesbian websites, about how wonderful and affirming it was. Needless to say I was excited when my girlfriend gave me the book for my birthday. My excitement didn't last through the first twenty pages, however.Someone else already stated earlier the problems I had with this book: poorly organized writing, too much emphasis on dates and names that aren't important to the story. The author paints the main lesbian characters in the book as sex-crazed women who are merely lesbians because they've been burned by men. She seems to think that a few paragraphs of a graphic sex scene between Aimee and Jaguar is enough to make us swoon at their apparent "love" for each other. I didn't swoon, I rolled my eyes. I am sure Ms. Fischer is a wonderful author, but I don't think this story is one suited for her. She breaks what I think is a cardinal rule of writing someone's biography: stay objective. It was obvious as I reached the end of the book - after some struggle - that Ms. Fischer thinks of Lilly's Jewish lover as a saint, while Lilly is portrayed as a spoiled little rich Nazi. Ms. Fischer's disdain for Lilly Wust is evident throughout the book, and she even goes so far as to say she doesn't believe that Lilly and her lover would have stayed together! She also states that she has much more sympathy for Lilly's lover than for Lilly herself. I would have thought that subjectivity had no place in Aimee & Jaguar. All in all, despite my respect for Ms. Fischer at attempting to tackle such a deep issue, this book was a profound disappointment. What should have been "A Love Story" instead comes off as a boring history lesson, and a platform for the author's grievances against the Nazis.
Book Review: Great movie, but terribly disappointing book
Summary: 1 Stars
The story of Aimee & Jaguar is a fascinating one -- deep passion set against the backdrop of WWII Berlin. Unfortunately, Erica Fischer has done little to capture the spark that brought these women to life. I can think of few subjects more compelling than that of Lilly, wife of a Nazi, who falls in love with a young, Jewish lesbian in the midst of WWII; nor that of Felice, a dangerously intelligent women so deeply in love that she remains in the center of Nazi Germany. Yet the author repeatedly fails to capture the story behind the details. Instead, she relentlessly chronicles fact after fact -- for example, the exact type of paper used for a love note -- rather than the emotions that crossed Lilly & Felice's faces, for example, or the sound of their voices, or a sense of what it was like for them to even hold hands under these horrific circumstances.
Considering the raw power of this true story, this book is a profound disappointment. The information about the progession of the Nazi's efforts is fascinating, of course, but if that had been my interest, I would have sought a history book.
In all, Aimee & Jaguar is an incredible story. Sadly, only the movie begins to convey its depth.