A meticulously researched exploration of collaboration, memory, and the elusive nature of truth…
Wolfe’s ambitious biography is a searching and deeply researched portrait of a man who lived a double life. Jan Jürgen “John” Petersen was a respected Canadian social worker, foster parent, and spiritual mentor. Before emigrating to Canada, however, he had served in the Dutch SS and the Sicherheitsdienst during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands. As Wolfe reveals, Petersen occupied a morally ambiguous world in which he assisted both the German authorities and, at times, the Dutch Resistance, contributing to some horrors, including the Holocaust, while mitigating others. His wartime record resists simple judgment, and Wolfe wisely refuses to force it into one.
Drawing on more than four decades of research, Dutch archival records, interviews, and family testimony, Wolfe reconstructs Petersen’s life with admirable care. Just as compelling is the author’s willingness to examine his own role in the story. Once Petersen’s admirer and confidant, Wolfe gradually discovers that the man he thought he knew had spent much of his life constructing alternate versions of himself. The biography thus becomes an investigation into memory, self-deception, and the elusive nature of historical truth. Wolfe presents Petersen as both victim and victimizer, a man whose troubled childhood, wartime experiences, and postwar imprisonment left wounds that shaped his relationships and prevented genuine self-understanding. The narrative is meticulously documented yet remarkably humane, balancing scholarly restraint with emotional insight.
A compelling and intellectually honest examination of one man’s moral contradictions and the biographer’s long pursuit of truth.
***
Iguana Books
Pub date March 16, 2023
ISBN 978-1771806183
Print length 512 pages
Price $9.99 Kindle edition $37.77 Paperback, $48.78 Hardcover
