<< 1 >>
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent Book about a sensitive subject.
Review: I came across this book by accident just searching for books about East Germany on Amazon.com. On a personal note, I myself immigrated from the USA to the DDR (Home of my fathers family) in 1982 and lived there until 1987 when I was expelled for political reasons. This book told of many things I personally experienced, confirmed many things I had long suspected and informed me of many things I never knew.
It is an excellent, accurate look at a country and a system that have passed into oblivion but left many scars on many people.
Rating:
Summary: The kind of book that slaps you in the back of the head.
Review: I did not read this book for the reasons I ended up enjoying it. Timothy Garton Ash's delving into his Stasi file is a peek into the madness and organized obsurdity of the East German State. The reader is presented with a wonderful feel for what it was like to live in East Berlin as well as the motives and workings of both Stasi IMs and the Federal Authority which now oversees the administration of the Stasi files. On another level it is a book about a middle aged man looking back on his Romantic youth, on a man he can not remember well, and sees again through the eyes of the slightly paranoid and slightly inaccurate secret police. In the end though, this is a frightening book that leaves the reader wondering what are in the secret intelligence files of the Western style democracies.
Rating:
Summary: The kind of book that slaps you in the back of the head.
Review: I did not read this book for the reasons I ended up enjoying it. Timothy Garton Ash's delving into his Stasi file is a peek into the madness and organized obsurdity of the East German State. The reader is presented with a wonderful feel for what it was like to live in East Berlin as well as the motives and workings of both Stasi IMs and the Federal Authority which now oversees the administration of the Stasi files. On another level it is a book about a middle aged man looking back on his Romantic youth, on a man he can not remember well, and sees again through the eyes of the slightly paranoid and slightly inaccurate secret police. In the end though, this is a frightening book that leaves the reader wondering what are in the secret intelligence files of the Western style democracies.
Rating:
Summary: Thrilling introduction to a very topical subject in Germany
Review: It reads like a spy-thriller, but Timothy Garton Ash's book 'The File' is based on research and personal experience. Garton Ash's language is compassionate, gripping, and educated. An exciting look into the effect the Stasi had on the people of the GDR and the effect that the opening of the secret police files is having now, this book will make good reading for both scholars and laypersons alike.
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting Look At The Stasi Through One File
Review: This is essentially an internal adventure story: it is the story of one man returning to his past and revisiting his younger self by reviewing his East German security service (Stasi) file. Ash, a Briton, was a graduate student at Humboldt University in the late 1970s-early 1980s. As a foreigner in East Germany, he was monitored by the ever-thorough Stasi, which managed to keep records on millions of East German citizens as well. Reading his Stasi file (made available after German unification) forces Ash to remember incidents from his past and reveals to him the identities of numerous Stasi informants -- some of whom were his friends. Ash then visits these informants and confronts them with evidence of their collaboration. In perhaps the most interesting part of the book, Ash visits the Stasi officers in charge of his case.
While Ash's writings caused him to be banned from East Germany, he was never imprisoned, nor was he subject to the depradations faced by average citizens of the GDR. Ash acknowledges that as a foreigner, he was always free to leave, and this makes his file less interesting than those of true dissidents. Ash describes, however, the story of an East German dissident who discovered that her own husband was informing the Stasi of her activities and discusses his friendships with brave East Germans who bucked the regime, and paid the price for it.
This is not the definitive work on the Stasi. It provides some background of the agency, but if you are looking for a more thorough treatment, look to "Stasi: The Untold Story of East Germany's Secret Police," by John Koehler. This book is worth reading, however, to understand, through the file of one man, why men joined the Stasi and how the Stasi turned so many ordinary East Germans into informants. Ash also raises important moral questions about spying and intelligence agencies, which are relevant to free societies as well.
Rating: 
Summary: A British "Romeo": Fascinating Facts, But Not Well-Written
Review: this story is exceptional, ans depcits the horrifying lengths that the Stasi went to in order to secure their state. Ash's account delivers a candid look at the East German Secret Polic and then an open look a Intelligence Organizations in today's society. Excellent story with real accoutns
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting but lacking....
Review: Timothy Garton Ash's book the file was very provocative and interesting. I thoroughly enjoyed reading the personal experience of one man who happened to be in East Berlin before unification and then was able to see his file afterwards. However, i am a bit disillusioned. The story interests me but Garton Ash really doesn't say anything! I am disappointed that he so poignantly and blatantly pokes at communism and a totalitarian state. And yet he does not back it up. The book is good under the premise of democracy good, communism bad. It feels like he is just pooling for support. And nobody knew the wall was going to "fall" when it did. I know of many professors who were writing books critiquing communism who had to throw out their text because of the abrupt fall of communism. I'm wondering if this book is just a way to cash in an unexpected event. I am dissappointed. Maybe i just don't know enough of Garton Ash but if this is the case, i should not have to feel the need to know his history before reading the book. The book had some good points and kept me entertained but on the whole didn't do anything for me. Peace.
Rating:
Summary: Skip it
Review: While this book provides detail to what everyone knows (the Stasi spied on everyone, including the sixth of the population that worked for it) it offers very little else. Missing is any sense whatsoever of the psychological effects of living in this kind of society or any kind of nuanced understanding of what it has meant to confront these files. Ash gives some small indications of what his own responses were, but as a Westerner who expected to be spied on for his activities, his experience is not very instructive. Garton Ash has many things to be proud of, but this book is not one of them.
<< 1 >>
| 
