Nuremberg and Beyond The Memoirs of Siegfried Ramler HomeOrder BookExcerptsAboutReviewsContact

Nuremberg Legacy

When checks on governmental power and control do not exist, when a dictatorship disregards and nullifies existing laws and creates its own decrees, when the achievement of a desired end for a nation justifies any means to obtain it, when persecution of segments of a population becomes governmental policy, and when the world community fails to react to crimes being committed by a dictatorship, the result leads to the abyss into which Germany descended during the Nazi regime. In this sense the Nuremberg legacy, as a cornerstone of international law, takes on a universal significance beyond the role of Germany during the Hitler regime.

Pioneering Simultaneous Interpretation

For the simultaneous interpreter the work in Nuremberg was fascinating, challenging, but also very stressful. The task required total , almost trance-like concentration, staying in tune with the speaker and keeping him in sight, so that simultaneity could be achieved. We were so preoccupied with our language tasks that we could not easily focus on the substance of the trials. Emerging from a dramatic session, I would be asked at times outside the courtroom what had happened, and often I would be unable to answer, though I may have been on the microphone most of the time. It was only later, with time for perspective, that the substance and meaning of the testimony came into sharper focus.

This method is now in use at the United Nations and at most international conferences, with the principles and practices of simultaneous interpretation taught at universities and special schools in many parts of the world. The pioneering and successful application of simultaneous interpreting remains one of the important legacies of the Nuremberg trials.

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