Propagande et Realite - Allemagne IVèmes Jeux Olympiques D'Hiver du 6 au 16 Février 1936 Garmisch-Partenkirchen (Propaganda and Reality. The IV. Olympic Games from February 6–16, 1936 at Garmisch-Partenkirchen)

Bruxelles: Edite par le Comité International de Defense de I'Idee Olympique/ Imprimerie BOLYN, 1936. Original document. Softcover. vg to near fine. Quarto (9 3/4 x 7 3/4"). Unpaginated, 8 leaves, each folded vertically and printed in two columns, creating a thinner brochure format. Original color illustrated wraps with black lettering on cover, protected by modern mylar. An extremely scarce Anti-Nazi brochure campaigning to boycott the Winter Olympics in Garmisch-Partenkirchen in 1936. The work published by the International Committee for the Defense of the Olympic Idea, an organization founded during the antifascist congress (First International Congress of Writers for the Defense of Culture) in Paris in 1935. The brochure is folded vertically in the middle presenting German propaganda on the left of the cover and second page, anti-Nazi content on the right. This pattern is repeated on pages six, seven and eight while the other pages feature anti-Nazi statements exclusively.

The cover features an Olympic poster showing a German skier with equipment and Hitler salute on the left, famously designed by Ludwig Hohlwein, and the identical motif on the right fold with Swastika instead of the Olympic Rings on his chest and holding a bloody sword in his left hand with a holstered pistol strapped around his waist. The text here reading "access prohibited for Jews," with Garmisch-Partenkirchen Tourist Office as header. Hohlwein was a pioneer of commercial art with an output of some 3,000 commercial art works by the year 1925. During the reign of the Nazis Hohlwein worked closely with Reichs-Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels.

Page two features a statement by Bruno Malitz, NSDAP district leader in Görlitz, on the left. The right half features a New York cartoon showing Hitler, Göring and Goebbles in sports gear executing a haphazard Hitler salute with an anti-Nazi blurb from the London "Times" beneath. Page three features a statement by the American 1932 Olympic decathlon champion James Bausch (Jarring Jim) listing the measures against German Catholics in sports measures taken by the Nazi administration from 1934 through 1935, calling for a boycott of the 1936 Olympics by American athletes. The right half shows a "Temps" blurb regarding the compulsory youth and military service instituted in Nazi Germany with a b/w photograph depicting Jewish children being chased out of a public bath in Mannheim.

The centerfold features a statement by Czechoslovakian marathon champion Oskar Heks opposing the Berlin Olympics deeming participation to be equal to sanctioning the Hitler regime, accompanied by a list of Nazi measures from 1933 to 1936 taken against German Jews in sports matters. The upper right corner features a cartoon showing a uniformed Nazi whipping a person lying on the ground. A comment points to the expulsion of the Jew Fritz Rosenfelder from a sports club he had founded, as published in a sinister note by the magazine "Der Stürmer." The right half features a photograph from the Oranienburg concentration camp showing an inmate collapsing during an obstacle course, surrounded by Nazi soldiers. Underneath a statement by US Supreme Court Justice J. T. Mahoney declaring the Olympic Games in Berlin a propaganda tool of the Nazis.

Page six features a photo showing Hitler, Goebbels and Ernst Rohm with a headline regarding Rohm's assassination and a note the looting of the premier sports institute in Leipzig in the amount of one hundred million Marks to benefit the Nazi sports organization. Column two with four caricatures headlined "Camp Instructions" and a statement by the Belgium water pool player Maurice Blitz stressing the Olympic idea as being a fraternity in honest struggle with respect for the adversary. But who today would dare to claim that the Olympic Games in Berlin deserve such and interpretation.

Page seven is headlined "Physical Culture in the III. Reich" showing a photograph with men lined up against a wall with their hand up secured by a group of policemen. Underneath a quote from the German Sports Manual: "a true sportsman must not limit himself to contributing to the fight against the Jews, but he must also help to isolate the Aryans who do not subscribe to the eviction of the Jews." The right column features quotes with notes aimed at foreigners from various European sources and newspapers.

The two columns on the last page feature a statement German poet Hans Johst headlined "Propaganda for abroad" announcing that Jews and non-Aryan Germans are prohibited from participating in the Olympic art competitions. The column on the right is a statement by Justin Godard, former Minister of Health, headlined "The Heirs of Greek Civilization..." and we think rather that today's Germany would have burned the literary masterpieces of Aeschylus and Herodotus, forced into exile Plato, imprisons Demosthene who directed his "philippics" against Philip of Macedon who enslaved the party!

Text in French. Light wear along edges and lightly age-toned. Wrappers in very good, interior in near fine condition overall.