title: Munich 1919: Diary of a Revolution
author: Victor Klemperer
description: "Klemperer guides us through the confusion of those troubled days in Munich with empathy, subtlety and a perceptive eye." - <b>Christopher Clark, University of Cambridge, UK<br /><br /></b> "Klemperer has once again proven himself to be a brilliant reporter and an intelligent essayist. A sensational testimony. - <b>Die Zeit<br /><br /></b> "With his talent for dramatic portrayals, for reflection, and his knack for boiling things down to their essence, <i>Munich 1919</i> gives us a more intimate view of Klemperer than we've ever seen before." - <b>Die Welt</b><br /><br /> "Klemperer's ability to grasp moods and attitudes has a truly Dickensian quality." - <b> Los Angeles Times</b><br /><br />"A message in a bottle, with real immediacy." -<b>Sydney Morning Herald<br /><br />"</b>A compelling chronicle" -<b>The Times Literary Supplement<br /></b><br />This account needs to be read for itself and its dramatic descriptions of chaos and political madness. But it also needs to be read as a harbinger of the future  and attitudes that shaped German acquiescence in, and belief in, the violent antisemitism of Nazi ideology"<b><b>- The Jewish Chronicle<br /><br /></b></b>"Klemperers diary provides an invaluable, unique perspective on the creation and suppression of the Munich Soviet Republic. Observing and recording how events unfolded from his university perch, Klemperers account conveys the sense of confusion, of isolation, and of uncertainty that pervaded Born in Prussia to Jewish parents, Klemperer uneasily records how Bavarian particularism blurred anti-Prussianism, anti-Semitism, and anti-Bolshevism into a toxic brew of resentment, fear, and loathing. Klemperers Munich 1919. Diary of a Revolution will become essential reading for those interested in the Weimar Republic, Bavarian identity, and the backstory to the rise of Hitler and National Socialism." -<b>H-Net: Humanities &amp; Social Sciences Online</b><br /><b><b><br /></b></b>
zlib_text: **CHAPTER VIII**
  
  **THE BEGINNING OF MY POLITICAL ACTIVITIES**
  
    
  
  Towards the end of November I returned to Munich. I went to the depot of my
  regiment, which was now in the hands of the ‘Soldiers’ Councils’. As the whole
  administration was quite repulsive to me, I decided to leave it as soon as I
  possibly could. With my faithful war-comrade, Ernst-Schmidt, I came to
  Traunstein and remained there until the camp was broken up. In March 1919 we
  were back again in Munich.
  
  The situation there could not last as it was. It tended irresistibly to a
  further extension of the Revolution. Eisner’s death served only to hasten this
  development and finally led to the dictatorship of the Councils  or, to put
  it more correctly, to a Jewish hegemony, which turned out to be transitory but
  which was the original aim of those who had contrived the Revolution.
  
  At that juncture innumerable plans took shape in my mind. I spent whole days
  pondering on the problem of what could be done, but unfortunately e