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Every Man for Himself and God Against All: A Memoir
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About This Book
Legendary filmmaker and celebrated author Werner Herzog tells in his inimitable voice the story of his epic artistic career in a long-awaited memoir that is as inventive and daring as anything he has done before Werner Herzog was born in September 1942 in Munich, Germany, at a turning point in the Second World War. Soon Germany would be defeated and a new world would have to be made out the rubble and horrors of the war. Fleeing the Allied bombing raids, Herzog's mother took him and his older brother to a remote, rustic part of Bavaria where he would spend much of his childhood hungry, without running water, in deep poverty. It was there, as the new postwar order was emerging, that one of the most visionary filmmakers of the next seven decades was formed. Until age 11, Herzog did not even know of the existence of cinema. His interest in films began at age 15, but since no one was willing to finance them, he worked the night shift as a welder in a steel factory. He started to travel on foot. He made his first phone call at age 17, and his first film in 1961 at age 19. The wildly productive working life that followed—spanning the seven continents and encompassing both documentary and fiction—was an adventure as grand and otherworldly as any depicted in his many classic films . Every Man for Himself and God Against All is at once a personal record of one of the great and self-invented lives of our time, and a singular literary masterpiece that will enthrall fans old and new alike. In a hypnotic swirl of memory, Herzog untangles and relives his most important experiences and inspirations, telling his story for the first and only time.
Reviews
"Herzog is witty and captivating as he recollects all kinds of odd, curious, and outlandish events ..."
"Packed with memorable vignettes and tidbits of information."
"There is a great deal in this book about Mr."
"But, for me, the real story here is of a somewhat cross little boy with an empty stomach and a howling sense of his own difference, clinging to a mountainside populated by gods and demons."
"A massive history that captures a pivotal moment in Asian history that would affect the latter half of the 20th century."
"The book is written in a literary voice that is outspoken and conversational ..."
"This book will be a boon to those people who, after dinner, sometimes like to unwind by reading choice morsels from books aloud."
"It comes as a surprise that, after recounting a life full of astonishing adventures and unique achievements, he closes on a pessimistic note."
"The book's oddities will delight devotees of Herzog's singular cinema, but readers unfamiliar with his tragicomic tirades and brooding philosophical meditations may find his digressions vexing ..."
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