Klemperer detected a certain "hysteria of language" in the new flood of decrees, alarms, and intimidation-"This perpetual threatening with the death penalty!"-and in strange, inexplicable episodes of paranoid excess, like the recent nationwide search. In all this Klemperer saw a deliberate effort to generate a kind of daily suspense, "copied from American cinema and thrillers," that helped keep people in line. He also gauged it to be a manifestation of insecurity among those in power. In
( Erik Larson )
[ In the Garden of Beasts: Love, ]
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