title: In Stahlgewittern by: Jünger, Ernst published: 1920 read: 2024-03-02 preview

A simple, straightforward book, with a a narrative I can only describe as linear: the experience by the author in the first world war, fighting in the mud in northern France as well as in Belgium.

The book describes the war from 1915 to 1918, autobiographically described by Jünger. And it does just that. Jünger gets wounded six times (allowing him to go back home), and has holidays (allowing him to go back home), and those parts in his experience are gaps in the story; as soon as he’s back at the front, and gets shot at and almost blown up – many a time – is always described in detail. Which finger parts he loses, which of his companions get killed how, how they attack the (French or English) enemy; all of that is described in one seemingly endless graphic array of terror, slaughter, destruction, and death.

But for Jünger, and the other soldiers, it is their daily routine, and it is just how it is. Without attaching any value statement, without any interpretation, without delay.

And, remarkably, the last page is not on how the war ends, but on how he earns the order of merit, the highest royal Prussian order of bravery for officers of all ranks. Indeed, history tells us, he was the last living recipient of this award, having died in 1989.

A colourful figure; a war book like never before. Not an easy read, yet a historical milestone.