Rarely does a book cross my radar which combines my interest in crime with what I intend to be my career of history, but Deborah Lipstadt's memoir of what became known as "the Irving Trial" is precisely that. Originally published as History on Trial: My Day in Court with a Holocaust Denier in 2005, the book as been re-titled to link to the 2016 film, which starred Rachel Weisz as Lipstadt and Timothy Spall as David Irving.
Some background may be important here, although Lipstadt provides a reasonable amount thereof in the "prologue" to the main section of the book.
Lipstadt wrote a book in 1993 titled Denying the Holocaust, in which she described David Irving as a Holocaust denier and anti-Semite. Irving, who at that stage was a reasonably respected historian of Nazi Germany, albeit one seen as having a slightly eccentric view of Hitler's culpability on the matter, sued both Lipstadt and the publishers for libel. Significantly, he sued under British libel law, where the burden of proof is placed on the defence. Lipstadt and her publishers, therefore, had to prove that her accusations were substantially true. Had they not defended Irving's lawsuit, they would have essentially conceded this his interpretations were the correct ones.
While this perhaps doesn't sound like the grounds for a particularly gripping read, nothing could be further from the truth.
After a rather slow buildup, in which Lipstadt goes over her family background and early academic history, the preparations for and execution of the trial itself are genuinely fascinating. Lipstadt's team makes the early decision that neither she nor any Holocaust survivors should testify, in order to avoid Irving making the trial personal, and in order to keep the focus on his own words. Instead, a "dream team" of international experts is assembled, including luminaries such as Richard J Evans, Robert Jan van Pelt and others, to give specific insights into the errors of fact and interpretation that Irving perpetrated in his work.
The majority of the book consists of relatively short chapters in which a different aspect of the trial is discussed. Van Pelt's architectural expertise is brought to bear on the question of the design of the Auschwitz gas chambers, for example, and Irving attempts to critique certain of the points van Pelt makes. What is perhaps most striking throughout these exchanges is that Irving's lack of scholarship becomes clear quickly - almost alarmingly quickly. While Lipstadt makes the point in a note at the start that she's elided some of the longer exchanges in the interests of readability, and we always need to remember that her experts are demonstrably at the "top of the tree" in their fields, it's astonishing just how quickly some of Irving's nonsense unravels. His mutually-contradictory criticisms about the design of the gas chambers, for example, would be amusing if it weren't for the fact that he seems to seriously hold the views.
A particularly heated exchange is that between Irving and Richard Evans, which appears set to turn into a personal slanging match. Lipstadt's lawyers are concerned that Evans may be making the wrong impression, but he turns it around in what I understand from people who've seen him in full flight to be typical style.
In the end, despite some rather concerning remarks towards the end of the trial, the judgement holds that Irving is indeed anti-Semitic and a Holocaust denier. This section, and the rather half-hearted conclusion in which Lipstadt receives emails from lots of people and Irving launches a somewhat bizarre (and unsuccessful) appeal is rather less than satisfying. I don't know whether that's simply because it lacks the drama of the preceding section, or whether it's to do with the fact that the outcome is already known and a matter of historical record. Lipstadt, rather annoyingly, also uses the section to link the Irving trial to matters of Middle Eastern politics.
Sadly, for Australian audiences, there are also two of our countrymen (countrywomen, in fact) who don't exactly come up smelling like roses. The relatively obscure Michele Renouf makes a small appearance, as does the eternally-frustrating Helen Darville/Dale, the infamous literary fraud. I have an exceptionally minor personal connection to the latter and will refrain from commenting on her further.
Nonetheless, for a topic which could easily be a bland and legalistic one, this is definitely a book which will surprise. The gruesome details of the Holocaust are kept to a minimum (always a risk when that topic is written about), as are the less interesting legal niceties. It's also a very interesting explanation of what it is that historians really do.
Lipstadt makes the point several times - as does Evans - that the point about history is that there are events that genuinely happened. It's possible to debate some of the details (there is a well-described summary of the different schools of thought about how Hitler arrived at his decision to eliminate the Jews), but the events themselves are beyond question. The fact that a "smoking gun" - an official order signed by Hitler himself starting the Holocaust - cannot be found doesn't, despite Irving's apparent belief to the contrary, mean that it didn't happen on his orders.
Four stars.
