A WWII story with a focus on women: ‘The German Midwife’ by Mandy Robotham

Along with writing historical fiction, Mandy Robotham delivers babies. She is an experienced midwife – and it shows in this, her debut novel. The story opens in a Nazi labour camp during WWII, where Anke, the midwife of the book’s title, is imprisoned for helping pregnant women in the enforced Jewish ghetto of Berlin.

Immediately we are plunged into the darkness, despair and filth of the camp, where giving birth is another trial to be faced by exhausted women weakened by harsh conditions and malnutrition. Having endured labour and birthed a child, their babies are ripped from their arms to be murdered by the guards. This is not a war story where miracles happen and people live happily ever after.

Then Anke is transported from the camp and taken to a mansion high in the mountains, which we learn is the Berghof, Hitler’s luxury Bavarian complex. She is to be midwife to none other than Eva Braun, Hitler’s mistress. This is the what if? question at the heart of the novel: if Hitler had fathered a child, what might that have meant for the Reich, the progress of the war, and the victims of that war – including the midwife and her family, who are all at the mercy of the Nazis and their leader?

At a deeper, more personal and profound level, the question becomes: how should a person act in such circumstances? What is the right choice: to care for a woman and her innocent child, or to sacrifice either or both for the greater good?

The stakes are high for Anke as she navigates her way through this treacherous territory. There are flashbacks to her loving family before the war, her work in a Berlin hospital as the Nazis ramp up their cruelty and their control of the nation, and to Anke’s actions which lead to her arrest and imprisonment in the camp. There are examples of the various ways in which ordinary people coped and survived in a world that had become savage and unforgiving. Anke’s dilemma underlines everything from the moment she is chosen to be Eva Braun’s midwife:

I didn’t know whether to be grateful for my life chance, or angry at her naivety. A thought flashed, ‘a child within a child,’ and I forced a smile in response, while every sinew in me twirled and knotted.

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One thing that makes this novel stand out from others set during WWII and the Nazi regime, is that childbirth, and the midwives who assist, are the central points around which the story spins. Against a backdrop of widespread death and destruction, the descriptions of birthing are a welcome shift of attention to the act of creation of new life. The midwifery expertise of the author lends great credibility to these scenes: they are believable; never once do they feel gratuitous. The birthing scenes are there for a reason and they anchor the protagonist to a reality other than the one presented by war. Anke reflects on this:

I soon realised my role – and that of the ten or so other qualified midwives in the camp – was to bring dignity where we couldn’t prolong life. We could create memories, perhaps of only hours or days, where kindness and humanity won out…
Each of us had our way of creating a small world impenetrable to the harsh reality of noise and stench around us. It was a tiny cosmos where we cried and laughed with them, where we held a space – perhaps only for a few minutes – so pure that only their child, their baby, existed for that time. Their history. The burning ache of a child’s parting was no less painful, but alongside the sadness sat memories of what they did for their babies – memories of being mothers.

The German Midwife p280

The German Midwife has plenty of tension as the pregnancy of Eva Braun plays out, and plenty of drama. At its core, though, is an invitation to ask ourselves: What would I do, if this were me? What is the right choice in a world where every decision is fundamentally flawed?
It’s a gripping read with the experience of women at its heart.

The German Midwife is published by Harper Collins Australia in
August 2020.
My thanks to the publishers for a copy to read and review.