Obituary of a Democracy
Martha Gellhorn’s 1940 novel is not a
great book, but an important one. Her book can be viewed as a novelized version
of her December 10, 1938 Collier’s Weekly article entitled “Obituary of a
Democracy” which described life in post-Munich Prague. Gellhorn arrived in
Prague just after covering the Spanish Civil War where she established her
reputation as a war reporter and was Ernest Hemingway’s lover. She would become
his third wife in 1940 and go on to become one of the great war reporters of
the 20th Century.
The novel’s protagonist is reporter Mary
Douglas, Gellhorn’s alter ego if you will. She is there to cover the
demoralization of Czechoslovakia after being sold out by England and France at
Munich. As a result the Czechs surrendered the Sudetenland to Hitler. With that
the Czech’s lost their defensible border with Germany and it became inevitable
that the Germany would ultimately swallow up the heart of the country.
Mary Douglas notes the demoralization of
the Czech Army which was not defeated in battle as the soldiers return home. It
is one thing to lose a war; it is another to surrender without a fight. With
the German occupation of the Sudetenland, Prague is flooded with refugees who
join other fleeing Hitler from Germany and Austria. Among the Germans are two
communists, Peter and Rita who Douglas befriends. Little did they know that
their resistance to Hitler would soon be sold out by Stalin. Those two organize
safe houses for the refugees but with European borders closed they are trapped
when the Czech government orders them all home. Rita and Peter then go on the
run and Peter would soon face a horrific torture by Gestapo agents operating
with seeming impunity in Prague. Democracy is dying.
Gellhorn’s prose puts you in the place
of the demoralized soldier, the struggling resistance and the hopeless refugee.
In a way it is a lesson for our time.
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