Victor Klemperer (9 October 188111 February 1960) was a German scholar who also became known as a diarist. His journals, published in Germany in 1995, detailed his life under the German Empire, the Weimar Republic, the Third Reich, and the German Democratic Republic. Those covering the period of the Third Reich have since become standard sources and have been extensively quoted by Saul Friedländer, Michael Burleigh, Richard J. Evans, and Max Hastings. Early life Klemperer was born in Landsberg an der Warthe (now Gorzów Wielkopolski, Poland) to a Jewish family. His parents were Dr. Wilhelm Klemperer, a rabbi, and Henriette née Frankel. Victor had three brothers and four sisters: Georg, 1865–1946, physician, director of the hospital Berlin-Moabit (who treated Vladimir Lenin) Felix, 1866–1932, physician, director of the hospital Berlin-Reinickendorf Margarete (Grete), 1867–1942, married Riesenfeld Hedwig, 1870–1893, married Machol Berthold, 1871–1931, lawyer Marta, 1873–1954, married Jelski Valeska (Wally), 1877–1936, married Sussmann Victor was a cousin to the conductor Otto Klemperer, and first cousin once removed to Otto's son, the actor Werner Klemperer. In 1903 Klemperer converted to Protestantism for the first time, shortly thereafter returning to Judaism. Victor Klemperer attended several gymnasia. He was a student of philosophy, Romance and German studies at universities in Munich, Geneva, Paris and Berlin from 1902 to 1905, and later worked as a journalist and writer in Berlin, until he resumed his studies in Munich from 1912. Though not a religious man, Victor Klemperer needed a religious identity, as Jew, Christian or dissident, to support his academic career. He chose Christianity as being most compatible with his much stronger conviction of being German, and became baptised again in Berlin in 1912. He completed his doctorate (on Montesquieu) in 1913 and was habilitated under the supervision of Karl Vossler in 1914. From 1914 to 1915, Klemperer lectured at the University of Naples, after which he became a decorated military volunteer in World War I. From 1920 he was Professor of Romance Languages at the Technical University of Dresden. Third Reich Despite his conversion to Protestantism in 1912 and his strong identification with German culture, Klemperer's life started to worsen considerably after the Nazis' seizure of power in 1933. Under the 1933 Nazi "First Racial Definition", a person was defined as a Mischling if they had one Jewish parent or grandparent, regardless of religious belief. Klemperer's diary, which he kept up throughout the Nazi era, provides an