H.C. van Maasdijk (1904-1985). (Memoirs)

Stenciled typoscript, n.d. (foreword dated Herfst 1946), main text: IV,201[=?] p., appendices I-V: 5;4;5;15;9 p., contemporary ring binding, folio.

Lacks leaves 1-24 and various leaves from the main text. Very interesting first-hand source. On the author, see: https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henri_van_Maasdijk. Henri Catharinus van Maasdijk was a passionate admirer of Adolf Hitler and a staunch anti-Semite. In the foreword (Autumn 1946), addressed to his 4 sons and his daughter, he writes that he has been condemned to 20 years in prison [for collaboration] and that he thinks that the mother of the children will read them from the bundle of memoirs. He tells of "de strijd, waaraan jullie vader heeft deelgenomen, een strijd om een betere wereld, waarin hij geloofde". The introduction (9 p.) is written in Cel 387, "Einde 1945" and in it the writer notes he began on 12 November 1945 with writing "deze terugblik op jaren van innerlijke ontwikkeling, van hard werk en strijd voor een ideaal" in the political prisoners ward of the Scheveningen prison. The memoirs themselves cover, according to the table of contents, the year 1926 (first further acquaintance with Germany) up to his arrest on 7 May 1945. The appendices contain the texts of two published articles (1939 and 1940), that of his radio speech for the opening of a Dutch Art Exhibition in Cologne, April 1941, and two lectures (training days Dutch police and the founding of the work community of the Ned.-Duitse Kultuurgemeenschap Maastricht). In 1942 Van Maasdijk published the work Nederlandsche mogelijkheden in het Oosten: een reisverhaal. With 1 other typoscript: De Nihilistische revolutie, schijn en werkelijkheid in het Derde Rijk. By Herman Rauschning. N.pl. or date, 19 p., contemporary half cloth with title on front cover. Part or summary of the translation of the much more extensive work with the same title by Menno ter Braak (1939).