"Marcel Reich-Ranicki was born of Polish Jewish parents in the Polish town of Wloclawek in 1920. At the age of nine he moved to Berlin and it was at school there that he discovered his deep passion for literature and the theatre. But in 1938, he was deported back to Poland, where he spent the war.

Written with subtlety, intelligence and lucidity, Reich-Ranicki's account of the Warsaw Ghetto and the relations between Poles and Jews, Poles and Germans, Poles and Poles is one of the most compelling and dramatic ever recorded.".

"As well as being a related narrative of a remarkable and unusual life, this book is also a love letter to literature and the theatre, especially the work of Shakespeare. It is also an indispensable guide to twentieth-century German culture. Reich-Ranicki has known all the eminent post-war German writers and has written about most of them - often sharply criticising their work, but just as frequently praising it."--BOOK JACKET.