Laurent Binet - HHhH

Hitler likes Heydrich for very different reasons. Just as Speer is the embodiment of the “normal” elite world to which Hitler has never belonged, Heydrich is the perfect Nazi prototype: tall, blond, cruel, totally obedient, and deadly efficient. It is an irony of fate that, according to Himmler, he has Jewish blood. But the violence with which he fights against and triumphs over this corrupt part of himself is proof—in Hitler’s eyes—of the superiority of the Aryans over the Jews. And if Hitler really believes in these Jewish origins, then it is all the more satisfying for him to turn Heydrich into the Angel of Death for the people of Israel by making him responsible for the Final Solution.

The images are well-known: Himmler and Heydrich, wearing civilian clothes, conversing with the Führer on the terrace of his eagle’s nest, the Kehlsteinhaus—the gigantic luxury bunker built on the side of an Alpine peak in Bavaria. What I didn’t know was that they had been filmed by Hitler’s mistress. I learn this during an “Eva Braun evening” organized by a cable TV station. This is a real treat for me. I like to delve as deeply as possible into the private lives of my characters. So I take pleasure in rewatching these images of Hitler welcoming the blond, hook-nosed Heydrich, a head taller than everyone around him, smiling and relaxed in his beige suit with its too-short sleeves. Frustratingly, there is no sound. But the producers have done things properly: they’ve hired the services of lip-reading experts. So now we know what Himmler said to Heydrich, standing by the low stone wall that overhangs the sunlit valley: “Nothing must divert us from our task.” So there you go. Clearly they had the next step in mind. I’m a bit disappointed by this, but happy at the same time. It’s better than nothing. And besides, what was I hoping for? He was hardly going to say: “You know, Heydrich, I reckon little Lee Harvey Oswald is going to make a very fine recruit.”

Despite being increasingly weighed down by the enormous responsibilities of organizing the Final Solution, Heydrich does not neglect the Protectorate’s internal affairs. In January 1942, he finds time for a ministerial reshuffle of his Czech government, effectively suspended since his sensational arrival in Prague last September. On the nineteenth, the day before the conference at Wannsee, he names a new prime minister—although that doesn’t mean much, since this position no longer carries any real power. The two key posts in this puppet government are those of finance minister, given to a German whose identity is irrelevant to this story, and minister of education, given to Emanuel Moravec. By appointing a German as finance minister, Heydrich imposes German as the language of government. By naming Moravec as the head of education, he assures himself of the services of a man he recognized as an eager collaborator. The two ministers are united by the same objective: to maintain and develop an industrial production that satisfies the Reich’s needs. The role of finance minister consists in forcing all Czech companies to help the German war effort. As for Moravec, his role is to create an education system whose sole aim is to train workers. Consequently, Czech children will now learn only what is necessary for their future profession. Mostly this means manual abilities, with a bare minimum of technical knowledge.

On February 4, 1942, Heydrich gives a speech that interests me because it concerns my own honorable profession:

It is essential to sort out the Czech teachers because the teaching profession is a breeding ground for opposition. It must be destroyed, and all Czech secondary schools must be shut. The Czech youth must be torn away from this subversive atmosphere and educated elsewhere. I cannot think of a better place for this than a sports ground. With sport and physical education, we will simultaneously guarantee their development, their education, and their reeducation.

I think that covers all the main points.

The possibility of reopening the Czech universities—hit by a three-year ban in November 1939 for political agitation—is not even considered. It’s up to Moravec to find an excuse for prolonging their closure when the three years are up.

Reading Heydrich’s speech, I have three comments:

1.In the Czech state, as elsewhere, the feeblest defender of the values of national education is the responsible minister. Having been a virulent anti-Nazi, Emanuel Moravec became, after Munich, the most active collaborator in Heydrich’s Czech government and the Germans’ preferred Czech representative—much more so than senile old President Hácha. Local history books tend to call him “the Czech Quisling.”

2.The staunchest defenders of the values of national education are teachers because, whatever we might otherwise think of them, they have the authority and the will to be subversive. And they deserve praise for that.

3.Sport? What a load of fascist rubbish it is.

Once again I find myself frustrated by my genre’s constraints. No ordinary novel would encumber itself with three characters sharing the same name—unless the author were after a very particular effect. Me, I’m stuck not only with Colonel Moravec, the brave head of Czech secret services in London, but with the heroic Moravec family who are part of the internal Resistance, and with Emanuel Moravec, the infamous collaborationist minister. And that’s without even counting Captain Václav Morávek, the head of the Tri kralové Resistance network. This must be tiresome and confusing for the reader. In a fiction, you’d just do away with the problem: Colonel Moravec would become Colonel Novak, for instance, and the Moravec family would be transformed into the Svigar family—why not?—while the traitor might be rebaptized with a fanciful name like Nutella or Kodak or Prada. But of course I am not going to play that game. My only concession to the reader’s convenience consists in not declining the proper nouns: so, even if the feminine form of “Moravec” ought logically to be “Moravcova,” I will nevertheless keep the basic form when talking about Aunt Moravec. I do this in order not to add one complication (the homonyms of real people) to another (the declension of feminine or plural proper nouns in the Slav languages). Well, I’m not writing a Russian novel, am I? Anyway, it’s worth noting that in the French translation of War and Peace , Natasha Rostova becomes (or remains) Natasha Rostov.

Goebbels’s diary, February 6, 1942:

Gregory gave me a report on the Protectorate. The atmosphere is very good. Heydrich has worked brilliantly. He has shown such prudence and political intelligence that there is no more talk of crisis. Heydrich wanted to replace Gregory with an SS-Führer. I don’t agree. Gregory has an excellent knowledge of the Protectorate and the Czech population, and Heydrich’s staff is not always very intelligent. Above all, it does not show much leadership. That’s why I keep faith with Gregory.

Sorry, I don’t have the faintest idea who this Gregory could be. And just so my falsely offhand tone doesn’t give you the wrong idea: I have tried to find out!

Goebbels’s diary, February 15, 1942:

I had a long conversation with Heydrich about the situation in the Protectorate. Sentiment there is now much more favorable to us. Heydrich’s measures are producing good results. It is true that the intelligentsia is still hostile to us, but the danger to German security from Czech elements in the Protectorate has been completely neutralized. Heydrich is clever. He plays cat and mouse with the Czechs and they swallow everything he tells them. He has carried out a number of extremely popular measures, first and foremost the almost total conquest of the black market. It is absolutely staggering to see how much food people have hidden away. He is successfully Germanizing a large number of Czechs. He proceeds in this matter with great caution but he will undoubtedly achieve good results in the long term. The Slavs, he emphasized, cannot be educated as one educates a Germanic people. One must either break them or humble them constantly. At present he does the latter. Our task in the Protectorate is perfectly clear. Neurath completely misjudged it, and that’s how the first crisis in Prague arose.