Rating: 
Summary: A Lost World
Review: I read this book, cover-to-cover, about four times in a row. While it certainly has its humour and a certain amount of irreverance and parody, it is a book which captures an age, an epoch, and a culture that was completely destroyed shortly afterwards, and the sense of spiralling into doom is apparent. It is interesting to see how it was not just Berlin, and the way of life there which was on a precipice, but also the English life with which Isherwood had grown up.
The style is quite dry, but it captures the characters so well, that I felt that I knew them, or at least wanted to know them and be part of their world.Definitely one of my top books of the year.
Rating: 
Summary: the camera that captures it all
Review: isherwood sits back and gives a good summary on how life was in berlin during the 1930's. he gives a gay view a jewish view a view of a whore and of course a nazi view. one of the most fascinating books ever, especialy good to read if in college
Rating:
Summary: MUST HAVE FOR "CABARET" FANS!
Review: Ladies and Gentlemen...Wilkommen, Bienvenue and Welome to the book that started it all: Christopher Isherwood's "Berlin Stories." This book is what the play "I am a Camera" by Erik Von Deutten wrote...later being adapted into the hit musical known as "Cabaret", which has a lot of stuff missing from the original book. It is devided into several different stories included in each chapter. I am a fan of the musical "Cabaret" and it's one of my favorites!! So I decided to buy the book that it was based on, as a lot of musical fans do...and was NOT dissapoitned. "Berlin Stories" is reccomended to "Cabaret" fans or anyone who has even just enjoyed the musical and/or film.
Rating:
Summary: MUST HAVE FOR "CABARET" FANS!
Review: Ladies and Gentlemen...Wilkommen, Bienvenue and Welome to the book that started it all: Christopher Isherwood's "Berlin Stories." This book is what the play "I am a Camera" by Erik Von Deutten wrote...later being adapted into the hit musical known as "Cabaret", which has a lot of stuff missing from the original book. It is devided into several different stories included in each chapter. I am a fan of the musical "Cabaret" and it's one of my favorites!! So I decided to buy the book that it was based on, as a lot of musical fans do...and was NOT dissapoitned. "Berlin Stories" is reccomended to "Cabaret" fans or anyone who has even just enjoyed the musical and/or film.
Rating:
Summary: A Lost World
Review: The black and white design of the New Directions Book is very fine. When Isherwood returned to Berlin in the fifties, it came to him that he had been heartless and youthful when the stories were written. THE LAST OF MR. NORRIS is dedicated to W.H. Auden. Berlin is mysterious, vibrant, and dangerous. The writing is first rate. The narrator, a stand-in for the author, is youthful and untried. It is noticed that Mr Norris has a wig. There is a story going around that Norris is some kind of a cheap crook. He did spend eighteen months at Wormwood Scrubbs. Arthur Norris is a communist. He receives a notice from the political police. He is questioned about his business activities in Berlin. The narrator, William Bradshaw, gives English lessons. Other characters are Otto, Anni, Bayer, and Helen Pratt who seems to be a forthright sort. Arthur Norris's roommate is Schmidt, and then there is William's landlady, Frl. Schroeder. Norris turns up missing and William receives a letter from him from Prague and another from Paris. Berlin is in a state of unrest and William returns to England. When he returns Norris is staying at Frl. Schroeder's and several adventures ensue involving travel and deception on Norris's part. When last heard of, Norris is in Brazil. GOODBYE TO BERLIN starts with I am a camera, passive observation. The narrator here has the author's name, Herr Issyvoo. As everyone knows, this work portrays Berlin nightlife and the inimitable Isherwood creation, Sally Bowles. Sally sings badly. She seems to know everyone in the place, the place being the Lady Windermere, a bar. Sally moves to Frl. Schroeder's. She has an abortion and Christopher leaves town for a bit, realizing that he has not managed to get any writing done. Returning several month later he finds that Sally no longer lives at Frl. Schroeder's establishment. The narrator spends time with Otto and Peter. Peter is a student of psychology. Christopher moves in with the Nowak family, the family of Otto. When Frau Nowak is to go to a sanitorium, he moves out. Later he visits the sanitorium with Otto. Finally he becomes acquainted with Natalia Landauer and her family and her cousin Bernhard. In May Isherwood leaves Berlin for the last time. The book retains its interest and its freshness. It is our good fortune, and possibly was Isherwood's tragedy, that he attained such mastery so early in his career as a novelist.
Rating:
Summary: For a foreigner German politics are very complicated
Review: The black and white design of the New Directions Book is very fine. When Isherwood returned to Berlin in the fifties, it came to him that he had been heartless and youthful when the stories were written. THE LAST OF MR. NORRIS is dedicated to W.H. Auden. Berlin is mysterious, vibrant, and dangerous. The writing is first rate. The narrator, a stand-in for the author, is youthful and untried. It is noticed that Mr Norris has a wig. There is a story going around that Norris is some kind of a cheap crook. He did spend eighteen months at Wormwood Scrubbs. Arthur Norris is a communist. He receives a notice from the political police. He is questioned about his business activities in Berlin. The narrator, William Bradshaw, gives English lessons. Other characters are Otto, Anni, Bayer, and Helen Pratt who seems to be a forthright sort. Arthur Norris's roommate is Schmidt, and then there is William's landlady, Frl. Schroeder. Norris turns up missing and William receives a letter from him from Prague and another from Paris. Berlin is in a state of unrest and William returns to England. When he returns Norris is staying at Frl. Schroeder's and several adventures ensue involving travel and deception on Norris's part. When last heard of, Norris is in Brazil. GOODBYE TO BERLIN starts with I am a camera, passive observation. The narrator here has the author's name, Herr Issyvoo. As everyone knows, this work portrays Berlin nightlife and the inimitable Isherwood creation, Sally Bowles. Sally sings badly. She seems to know everyone in the place, the place being the Lady Windermere, a bar. Sally moves to Frl. Schroeder's. She has an abortion and Christopher leaves town for a bit, realizing that he has not managed to get any writing done. Returning several month later he finds that Sally no longer lives at Frl. Schroeder's establishment. The narrator spends time with Otto and Peter. Peter is a student of psychology. Christopher moves in with the Nowak family, the family of Otto. When Frau Nowak is to go to a sanitorium, he moves out. Later he visits the sanitorium with Otto. Finally he becomes acquainted with Natalia Landauer and her family and her cousin Bernhard. In May Isherwood leaves Berlin for the last time. The book retains its interest and its freshness. It is our good fortune, and possibly was Isherwood's tragedy, that he attained such mastery so early in his career as a novelist.
Rating:
Summary: Modern Classic
Review: These stories are much more than fiction; they are dramatized memoirs, finely tuned documentaries. This modern classic tells us truths about the tragedy of Germany that cannot be found in history books. Isherwood's book is art of an extremely gifted writer.--Diana Dell, author, "A Saigon Party: And Other Vietnam War Short Stories."
Rating:
Summary: Modern Classic
Review: These stories are much more than fiction; they are dramatized memoirs, finely tuned documentaries. This modern classic tells us truths about the tragedy of Germany that cannot be found in history books. Isherwood's book is art of an extremely gifted writer.--Diana Dell, author, "A Saigon Party: And Other Vietnam War Short Stories."
Rating:
Summary: Why buy it? Why not!!!!!
Review: This is the most moving book I have ever read. One of my friends said that when she read reviews about this book it sounded "too clever" and "not for anyone who isn't a 48 year old English Professor" She read the bopok and LOVED it. She keeps a copy of this book by her bed and has read it 3 times. I have only read it once and I love it. This is a must-read for anyone...whether they be teeny-bopper N'Sync Fans to 48 year old English Professors.
Rating:
Summary: A masterclass in the use of the english language
Review: Together with Evelyn Waugh, Christopher Isherwood has to be regarded as one of the most proficient writers of english this century. His ability to capture a mood, a time and a place is remarkable, his efficiency in doing so is breath-taking. The Berlin Stories stand as a record of the seediness and more fundamental corruption of a city, a state and a people in the late 30s. Isherwood represents the impending shadow of nazism through the abdication of responsibility and self-protection of individual characters. Mr Norris, a Falstaff for the 20th Century, is half cartoon conman and half based on an actual person. His depravity and crookedness is admirable, he is technicolour amid the grey shabbiness of Isherwood's Berlin. We must also remember that this is Isherwood's Berlin and he has shaped and invented experiences to achieve an effect, the camera records, but it always lies. It is the technical brilliance of those lies that sets the Berlin Stories apart from any historical or social record that you'd care to mention.
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