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Ernst Junger was one of twentieth-century Germany's most
important-and most controversial-writers. Decorated for bravery in
World War I and the author of the acclaimed western front memoir
Storm of Steel, he frankly depicted war's horrors even as he
extolled its glories. As a Wehrmacht captain during World War II,
Junger faithfully kept a journal in occupied Paris and continued to
write on the eastern front and in Germany until its defeat-writings
that are of major historical and literary significance. Junger's
Paris journals document his Francophile excitement, romantic
affairs, and fascination with botany and entomology, alongside
mystical and religious ruminations and trenchant observations on
the occupation and the politics of collaboration. While working as
a mail censor, he led the privileged life of an officer,
encountering artists such as Celine, Cocteau, Braque, and Picasso.
His notes from the Caucasus depict the chaos after Stalingrad and
atrocities on the eastern front. Upon returning to Paris, Junger
observed the French resistance and was close to the German military
conspirators who plotted to assassinate Hitler in 1944. After
fleeing France, he reunited with his family as Germany's
capitulation approached. Both participant and commentator, close to
the horrors of history but often distancing himself from them,
Junger turned his life and experiences into a work of art. These
wartime journals appear here in English for the first time, giving
fresh insights into the quandaries of the twentieth century from
the keen pen of a paradoxical observer.
Presenting the desperate conflict of the First World War through
the eyes of an ordinary German soldier, Ernst Junger's Storm of
Steel is translated by Michael Hofmann in Penguin Modern Classics.
'As though walking through a deep dream, I saw steel helmets
approaching through the craters. They seemed to sprout from the
fire-harrowed soil like some iron harvest.' A memoir of astonishing
power, savagery and ashen lyricism, Storm of Steel depicts Ernst
Junger's experience of combat on the front line - leading raiding
parties, defending trenches against murderous British incursions,
and simply enduring as shells tore his comrades apart. One of the
greatest books to emerge from the catastrophe of the First World
War, it illuminates like no other book not only the horrors but
also the fascination of a war that made men keep fighting for four
long years. Ernst Junger (1895-1998) the son of a wealthy chemist,
ran away from home to join the Foreign Legion. His father dragged
him back, but he returned to military service when he joined the
German army on the outbreak of the First World War. Storm of Steel
(Stahlgewittern) was Junger's first book, published in 1920.
Greatly admired by the Nazis, Junger remained at a distance from
the regime, with books such as his allegorical work On the Marble
Cliffs (1939) functioning as a covert criticism of Nazi ideology
and methods. If you enjoyed Storm of Steel, you might like Edward
Blunden's Undertones of War, also available in Penguin Modern
Classics. 'To read this extraordinary book is to gain a unique
insight into the compelling nature of organized, industrialized
violence' Niall Ferguson, author of War of the World 'Hofmann's
interpretation is superb' The Times 'Unique in the literature of
this or any other war is its brilliantly vivid conjuration of the
immediacy and intensity of battle' Telegraph 'Storm of Steel is
what so many books claim to be but are not: a classic account of
war' Evening Standard
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Storm Of Steel (Paperback)
Ernst Junger; Translated by Michael Hofmann; Introduction by Michael Hofmann
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A memoir of astonishing power, savagery, and ashen lyricism,
Storm of Steel illuminates not only the horrors but also the
fascination of total war, seen through the eyes of an ordinary
German soldier. Young, tough, patriotic, but also disturbingly
self-aware, Junger exulted in the Great War, which he saw not just
as a great national conflict but--more importantly--as a unique
personal struggle. Leading raiding parties, defending trenches
against murderous British incursions, simply enduring as shells
tore his comrades apart, Junger kept testing himself, braced for
the death that will mark his failure.
Published shortly after the war's end, Storm of Steel was a
worldwide bestseller and can now be rediscovered through Michael
Hofmann's brilliant new translation.First time in Penguin
ClassicsAcclaimed new translation based on a new authoritative
textWidely viewed as the best account ever written of fighting in
World War I
Beginning in 1949, the German novelist and essayist Ernst Junger
began a correspondence with the philosopher Martin Heidegger that
lasted until Heidegger's death in 1975. This volume contains the
first English translation of their complete correspondence, as well
as letters from Heidegger's wife and son and others referred to in
their correspondence. It also contains a translation of Junger's
essay Across the Line (UEber die Linie), his contribution to a
Festschrift celebrating Heidegger's sixtieth birthday. Junger's and
Heidegger's correspondence is of enormous historical interest,
revealing how both men came to understand their cultural roles in
post-war Europe. It is valuable as well for showing the emergence
of themes pervasive in Heidegger's post-war thought: his cultural
and political pessimism and his concern with the problem of global
technology. The correspondence also reveals the evolution of a
philosophical friendship between two writers central to twentieth
century European thought, and the mutual influence that friendship
worked on their writing.
Written in 1932, just before the fall of the Weimar Republic and on
the eve of the Nazi accession to power, Ernst Junger's The Worker:
Dominion and Form articulates a trenchant critique of bourgeois
liberalism and seeks to identify the form characteristic of the
modern age. Junger's analyses, written in critical dialogue with
Marx, are inspired by a profound intuition of the movement of
history and an insightful interpretation of Nietzsche's philosophy.
Martin Heidegger considered Junger "the only genuine follower of
Nietzsche," singularly providing "an interpretation which took
shape in the domain of that metaphysics which already determines
our epoch, even against our knowledge; this metaphysics is
Nietzsche's doctrine of the `will to power.'" In The Worker, Junger
examines some of the defining questions of that epoch: the nature
of individuality, society, and the state; morality, justice, and
law; and the relationships between freedom and power and between
technology and nature. This work, appearing in its entirety in
English translation for the first time, is an important
contribution to debates on work, technology, and politics by one of
the most controversial German intellectuals of the twentieth
century. Not merely of historical interest, The Worker carries a
vital message for contemporary debates about world economy,
political stability, and equality in our own age, one marked by
unsettling parallels to the 1930s.
Beginning in 1949, the German novelist and essayist Ernst Junger
began a correspondence with the philosopher Martin Heidegger that
lasted until Heidegger's death in 1975. This volume contains the
first English translation of their complete correspondence, as well
as letters from Heidegger's wife and son and others referred to in
their correspondence. It also contains a translation of Junger's
essay Across the Line (UEber die Linie), his contribution to a
Festschrift celebrating Heidegger's sixtieth birthday. Junger's and
Heidegger's correspondence is of enormous historical interest,
revealing how both men came to understand their cultural roles in
post-war Europe. It is valuable as well for showing the emergence
of themes pervasive in Heidegger's post-war thought: his cultural
and political pessimism and his concern with the problem of global
technology. The correspondence also reveals the evolution of a
philosophical friendship between two writers central to twentieth
century European thought, and the mutual influence that friendship
worked on their writing.
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