Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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4.0 out of 5 stars
What a Difference 100 years Makes, 5 Sep 2008
I moved to the Netherlands in 2002 and was interested in understanding how the country has changed in the last half a century. Geert Mak's account of the changes that have occurred in this small country are as profound as they are personal. Geert Mak examines the last 100 years through the lens of his family. His father was born in 1899 and his mother in 1903. By examining private family correspondence Geert Mak reconstructs the 'mood' of the early 20th century before the First World War. He concludes that the societal ideal in the early 20th century was the myth of stability; the belief that Western society had reached such an advanced phase that stability had to be maintained.
Perhaps many Europeans had a premonitiion of the destruction that was at hand. The outbreak of WWI shattered that idea of stability. However, while the rest of Europe fought the first industrialised warfare in the history of mankind, The Netherlands was neutral. Therefore, at the end of the war, the Netherlands did not share the anti-war feeling that characterised the great powers in the inter-war years.
Fast forward to 1939. Germany is resurgent and is intent on invading Poland and Czechoslovakia. The Third Reich seems invincible and they find fertile ground for their virulent anti-semitism in The Netherlands. Yes, staid Holland has an efficient political bureaucracy that transports 105,000 Jews to the Concentration Camps. Furthermore, the 'Jewish' question in the Netherlands was seen as one of religion. It was seen as a problem for the Jews and not for Christian Holland. How wrong. Using letters from his father, who was a Reformed Church Minister in Indonesia, Geert Mak notes the feeling at the time. If Hitler wanted to have the Jews then we'll give them to him. There was not sense that Hitler would exterminate Dutch citizens. Instead, the Jews were seen as some sort of resident aliens. Geert Mak opines that The Netherlands has never really come to terms with its role in the Nazi Final Solution.
Geert Mak's family experiences first-hand the horrors of War in the far East, where his family is separated for three long years. After the war, Europe is rebuilt with help from the Americal Marshall Fund. However, while Britain, concedes its possessions in India, the Dutch refuse to give up its colonies in Indonesia. The result was a sad tale of bloodshed and guerilla war. At its high point, The Netherlands had over 100,000 troops in Indonesia. But like all colonising nations, the Dutch were on the wrong side of history. The rag-tag army of Indonesian insurgents led by Suharto won independence from Holland.
According to Mak, the pre-independence war in Indonesia was Holland's Vietnam. Ironically, whenever the Dutch remember Indonesia these days, it is with a sense of nostalgia for the 'good old days'. My Dutch friends speak of colonial times when the Dutch master drove around the manor the whole day and his family was tended hand and foot by 'native' help. No one seems to remember the blood shed, war crimes and grisly murders that took place for over 2 years. This is regrettable, according to Mak.
The book then chronicles the post war years the signal events of which were
- Declining importance of the Church
- Importance of personal religion as opposed to confessional, proselytising religion
- Mass immigration of low skilled workers from Greece, Turkey and Morrocco
- The rise of the 'counter-culture' in the 60's
Geert Mak, who was born after WWII when his mother was 44, was very different from his sibling who were all born before WWII. He knew a different mother from the strict, authoritarian one that his much older siblings knew. With the death of his maternal grandfather, his mother seemed transformed into a woman of the 60's. Indeed, his maternal grandfather seemed to be the "dead hand" of the 19th century that weighed heavily on his mother.
In conclusion, I found the book to be stimulating and deeply personal. Indeed, all the changes that Dutch society experienced in the last 100 years were mirrored in his family. Geert Mak does an excellent job of telling a family tale with contemporary history as a baackdrop. De Eeuw van mijn vader is an excellent read. It deserves 4 stars.
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