By Hannah Bower
Many know of the highly popular musical Cabaret, which is currently being performed on the West End. Similarly, theatre connoisseurs are familiar with the 1972 film version starring Liza Minelli and Joel Grey. However, few have been acquainted with the source material in which the staged and filmed versions were derived.
Written by Christopher Isherwood in 1939, Goodbye to Berlin loosely recounts Isherwood’s experience in Germany during the rise of fascism. Divided into six long chapters in a somewhat chronological order, Isherwood’s novel contains a multitude of characters that come and go as rapidly as Germany’s changing political attitudes, all told through the point of view of the narrator, a novelist that is an extension of himself.
The most memorable character, and perhaps the most representative of the book’s theme, is Sally Bowles, also a principal role in Cabaret. Despite nothing seeming to work out for her, Sally is an idealist, almost painfully so. She is described as only 19 years old yet aged beyond her years from the way life has worn her down. She had gotten herself kicked out of school at a young age, traveling to Europe without the funds to help her.
Isherwood (commonly referred to as “Christoph” by other characters) watches her perform at the Lady Windermere, claiming she is terrible, yet too proud to care. She goes back and forth between feeling deeply in love with another and just needing someone to support her financially through her struggles.
Sally’s dreams of being an actor are repeatedly given false hope. They are finally shattered when she continues to ignore the harsh truths of what is going on around her. She admits that she never reads the newspaper, convinced that the political situation will work itself out. Klaus, the man she was in love with, abandons her. When she attempts to marry for money to help her situation, that falls through as well.
Sally is a deeply sympathetic character, and while her actions aren’t always justifiable, both Isherwood and readers feel for her. Her hopeless optimism, delirium, even, resonated with me and many others, proven by her being based on a real person Isherwood knew.
Goodbye to Berlin differentiates itself from Cabaret through other fleeting characters, many of which don’t make it to the end. Isherwood brilliantly captures Germany at its highest and lowest points, from glamorous nightlife to poor neighborhoods barely getting by.
The book takes place over the course of several years, and with each chapter the Nazis gain more power. Many locals changed their political stances, at least on the surface, just to avoid negative attention.
Isherwood wrote about the present diseases in detail. The Nowack family, which his narrator and protagonist stayed with, struggled to survive daily. Some characters are sent to hospitals, and it is unconfirmed whether they are ever let out. As time passes, Isherwood emphasizes that Berlin seemed to get colder and grayer leading into 1933.
Despite this, life went on. People still hosted parties and went to the cinema. Some were too blissfully unaware; others didn’t care because it didn’t affect them. From each unique division of the book, Isherwood illuminates how the world was closing in before anyone even realized.