Between Apologetics and Progression

Autobiography and Diaristics in the Period 1945–1955

Abstract

Following a general overview on German language autobiography after 1945, Michaela Holdenried examines in her contribution the functions of diaristics in and after the Third Reich. In National Socialism because the functioning or the dominance of the formal type of the diary after 1945 would be impossible to understand without the approach to and the propagandistic use of this ‘purposeful form’ in the preceding years. Numerous examples address the question of individual self-staging, the possibility of discovering the present, and the innovative capabilities of the diary genre after 1945.