Research Catalog

Title

The theory and practice of hell : the German concentration camps and the system behind them / Eugene Kogon ; translated from the German by Heinz Norden.

Author

Kogon, Eugen, 1903-1987

Publication

New York : Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Description

xxi, 343 pages : illustrations; 21 cm

Summary

"By the spring of 1945, the Second World War was drawing to a close in Europe. Allied troops were sweeping through Nazi Germany and discovering the atrocities of SS concentration camps. The first to be reached intact was Buchenwald, in central Germany. American soldiers struggled to make sense of the shocking scenes they witnessed inside. They asked a small group of former inmates to draft a report on the camp. It was led by Eugen Kogon, a German political prisoner who had been an inmate since 1939. The Theory and Practice of Hell is his classic account of life inside"--Page 4 of cover.

Uniform Title

SS-Staat. English

Alternative Title

SS-Staat.

Subjects

• Concentration camp inmates
• Concentration camps
• 1900-1999
• World War > (1939-1945)
• National socialism
• Buchenwald (Concentration camp)
• Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiter-Partei > Schutzstaffel
• Concentration camp inmates > Germany > 20th century
• Concentration camps > Germany
• World War, 1939-1945 > Concentration camps > Germany
• Holocausto judeu
• Campo de concentração
• Nazismo
• Germany
• Nazi concentration camp inmates > Germany
• Nazi concentration camps > Germany > Management

Note

• Previously published: New York : Farrar, Straus, 1950.
• "With a new introduction by Nikolaus Wachsmann"--Cover.

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references and index.

Processing Action (note)

• committed to retain

Contents

Introduction: Eugen Kogon and the SS State / Nicolaus Wachsmann -- The aims and organization of the SS State -- The purpose, character, and number of the German concentration camps -- The categories of prisoners -- The physical setup of the camps -- The organization of the camps -- Admission to the camps and duration of imprisonment -- Daily routine -- Working conditions -- Discipline -- Food -- Money and mail -- "Recreation" -- Sanitation and health -- Scientific experiments -- Reprisals against the Jews -- Reprisals against other "inferior races" -- Liquidation of other "undesireables" -- Special places of execution and disposal of the dead -- Statistics of mortality -- The underground struggle -- The end of the camps -- The psychology of the SS -- The psychology of the prisoners -- The German people and the concentration camps, after 1945.

ISBN

• 9780374529925
• 0374529922

LCCN

2006008432

OCLC

• 64624973
• SCSB-11662371

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library