Goodbye, Transylvania: A Romanian Waffen-SS Soldier in WWII (Stackpole Military History Series)

It's refreshing to read something about World War II written from the German perspective. The Germans and Hungarians weren't the worst people active in Romania during the war. They had a sense that they were protecting Europe from the Russian Communists and that the British and Americans will ultimately have to fight the Russian Communists themselves. Well told story with lots of personal details.

Goodbye Transylvania reading this book I must say the author saw a lot of combat and a lot of different style missions. Easy to read and understand makes t he book worthwhile. The many training schools and the actual battles are described in detail. His description before the war of ethnic people living in Romania in the beginning is the most interesting to me. It gives a feel of the hostile towards people of not Romanian ancestry. One tough combat soldier who survived the war with a lot of near misses and was lucky to make it to British lines. Interesting read

Great account given by someone who kept his feet on the ground and survived. A German's service in the cause who wore a death's head ring presented to him by Himmler.

Well written, easy read with a unique viewpoint. I cannot say (none of us can) if it is all true. I have not lost any sleep over that. Some of the Stackpole books can be difficult to read because the quality can be unpolished, this one had it's issues (i.e. major leaps in time and space, glossing over the gestapo bit) but the axe the author had to grind, to renounce Romania and tell his tale, was cohesive. The viewpoint (ethnic German living in old Hungarian territory forcibly allocated to Romania) put a unique spin on his tale.

A look back into a forgotten world , that of the large German minority in Transylvania , its friendly relations with the Hungarian minority , and their mutual contempt for their Romanian neighbors . His explanation for the hostility toward his family from an unknown source and murder of his relatives seemed to be missing a great deal . Luftwaffe General Milch would have found Landau's story on the source of his troubles rather incredible . Still , an interesting book .

A good account of a soldier's life on the eastern front by a non-German citizen. I travelled through Romania in 2008 and was surprised at the existence of ethnic Hungarian and German enclaves (using their language and having schools in their language) that the author talks about during the war years.

Good documentation of your average soldier continuing to courageously fight in horrific conditions despite overwhelming material and personnel advantage of the Red Army.

A great first-hand account of the Ethnic German recruits from Eastern Europe during the Second World War. Also the deteriorating position of the position of Ethnic Germans in Transylvania and surrounding areas as the war progressed.

This must surely rank among the most engaging military memoirs of the twentieth century, quite unique in being written in English by an ethnic German (a Transylvanian Saxon) who spoke Romanian and Hungarian as fluently as any native - and who later added Russian to his linguistic armoury. Aside from Landau's cosmopolitan background, it is his sense of humour which most captivates the reader, a youthful veteran who seeks out the comic side of each fresh predicament in amusingly idiomatic English and almost never whinges about the perilous situation facing him each and every day, if not hour. He has little to say in favour of Romanians or Russians, however, so this book is probably best avoided if you are from either of these nations or strongly empathise with them: Landau and his family paid dearly for their minority status in post-Trianon Romania, both before and after the Communist takeover, and this accounts for the bitterness felt by most of those isolated 'ethnics', rarely expressed so frankly and fluently in ordinary everyday English.Music, song and poetry play a big part in this story, and on several occasions even ensure our hero’s survival. They are woven into the narrative in the most beguiling way, with lyrics presented in English as well as German/Hungarian, providing insights into the warp and weft of Transylvanian culture, its linguistic sophistication, civilised values and deep respect for family, folkways, and nation. I have recently been studying the Donauschwaben (Danube Swabians) of the Banat (since 1919 part of Romania) and southern Hungary (Schwäbische Turkei), many of whom crossed Landau's path during the war. By contrast with the town-dwelling ‘Saxons’ of the Carpathian foothills, these were rural types who drained, tilled and harvested the Hungarian/Habsburg breadbasket for the best part of two centuries. A vivid sense of complex loyalties beset all the Volksdeutsche (ethnic Germans) of central-eastern Europe, bound by language, folk music, and countless other ties to throw in their lot with the Third Reich after decades of oppression under various masters. Their story is little known in the English-speaking world, so this book performs a real service, a picaresque tale of a young man eager to enter a life of male comradeship and adventure, while also escaping the perils of small-town persecution. Landau was clever and lucky enough to come out alive, but that is what makes his story so engaging: challenges met, overcome and relished. There is something of the Good Soldier Svejk in this ‘ordinary’ private (later lieutenant) who somehow gets the better of senior officers for whom he is little more than cannon fodder, a humble soldier from a semi-mythical frontier town (Kronstadt/Brasov practically lives off the Dracula industry these days), who is finally reconciled with the Anglo-Saxon foe, and whose dogged enthusiasm for life and laughter wins through against all odds.

Excellent and informative personal account shedding light on a little highlighted region of the war

An embellished account but nonetheless a lot is true. A war that was so huge in its scope it's barely understood today. Incredible story!

GREAT

From a Axis perspective, it is a very open view of the war at a soldiers level.Stories like this are a view rarely though or written about since the axis lost the war.I recommend.