Juenger in the 20s

[Markus Schopmeyer <mschopm@stud.uni-goettingen.de>]

Dear List Members,

Now that I finally launch my first contribution, I must apologise for
having remained mute for nearly a year. (I particularly beg John's
pardon.) I admit that I have been sponging on the active subscribers and
I realise that lethargy is hardly conducive to the project. However, I
felt uncomfortable to interrupt the predominant flow of hero worship. I
was hoping for more traces of the controversial reception Juenger had
received in the literary public. Frankly, I was under the impression
that the list constituted a fan club. Silence is certainly appropriate
for muffling the noise ratio. Nonetheless, I would like to turn up the
volume a bit. Was Dr. Oswald not looking for approval when he introduced
us to his devotion to Willi Winkler? The critic "nobody has ever heard
of" writes for several German news - not bog roll - papers and literary
publications. Some people happen to appreciate his work. No apt answer
had followed this adolescent outburst. (Yes, I have myself to blame.)

As a consequence I was even more apprehensive to take heretical stands.
My reluctance to celebrate Juenger's writings is based on a number of
reasons, I name but a few: his elusive style, the debatable significance
of his political ventures, and his constant yet tacit endeavour to amend
- some say self-censor - his early texts over decades. (What Juenger
camouflaged as linguistic improvement was much rather designed to erase
nationalistic anachronisms and to get rid of contents he considered
unpalatable to post-war generations.) This sort of criticism has been
around for years, I do not pretend to be original. Nevertheless, it is
valid and I regard it as more convincing than what Alfred Andersch said
in Juenger's defence or what Karl Heinz Bohrer keeps coming up with.
Stereotypes are one thing, facts another, the rest is a matter of taste.

Having said that, John's and Guenter Rebing's recent remarks changed my
mind. I am quite grateful for the encouragement to propose a dissident
point of view. The list is obviously no fan club and I had better start
participating. What I have to offer is some knowledge of literature in
general, of Juenger's accounts of both wars, and a pretty sceptical
attitude to them.  - ( Mind you, I would object to being dismissed as
"feminist" or "leftist" - these hackneyed labels do not exactly stick on
me, as it were. Neither would I suffer from ideological derangement, if
I were a Theweleit disciple, however.)

I would now like to point your attention to some fairly new essays on
Juenger. Michael Klett, Rudolf Burger, and Karl Heinz Bohrer published
three short articles headed: "In memoriam Ernst Juenger" (in: Merkur.
Deutsche Zeitschrift für europaeisches Denken, no. 5, Munich: May 1998,
52. set of issues). All of them very respectful of course (I'd call them
apologetic). More interesting, and I really mean it, are Jan Philipp
Reemtsma's observations regarding Juenger's "Kaukasische Aufzeichnungen"
("»Es schneet der Wind das Aergste zu« - Ernst Juenger im Kaukasus" in:
"Mord am Strand: Allianzen von Zivilisation und Barbarei; Aufsaetze und
Reden", Hamburg: March 1998) I am perfectly aware that mentioning Herrn
Reemtsma in this circle is a somewhat adventurous undertaking. For those
of you who read the "Junge Freiheit": relax. - Reemtsma's findings may
surprise to you. He takes Juenger as an eyewitness and tries to unveil
what Juenger had come across in Russia. In fact, the essay forces me to
reconsider my conception of Juenger's viewpoint as he was grasping what
made the Second World War unique. I wonder what you make of it.

As for Juenger's anti-Semitism in the 20s, I fail to comprehend the line
of argument. Juenger "added respectability" to the prevailing "attitude"
of the time? Are we not talking about the fatal NS propaganda preceding
the dehumanisation, deportation and murder of the European Jewry? Given
that Juenger could not foresee what was precisely going to happen, he
voluntarily acted as mouthpiece for the Nazis. By no means did he just
portend the notion that Jews posed a threat to Germany - he helped to
spread it. But was this really "mainstream thinking" between the wars?
Goldhagen would agree, I am not so sure. At any rate, Juenger's "Ueber
Nationalismus und Judenfrage" was rubbing the message in. He blotted
more than his personal integrity when he virtually threatened the Jews
with extermination and speculated on the "Zivilisationsjude" being the
dangerous result of liberalism.

   In dem Augenblick, jedoch, in dem der Jude als eine
   eigentuemliche und eigenen Gesetzen unterworfene Macht
   unverkennbar wird, hoert er auf, am Deutschen virulent
   und damit gefaehrlich zu sein.

This sentence is not just another stylistic disaster. It reinforces the
uncanny threat by omitting what was supposed to diffuse (or defuse) the
ominous "power" of "the Jew" once it had become visible. With all due
respect, a recognition of difference, let alone a Zionist one, directly
translates into exclusion, if not expulsion. (Ultimately and with the
benefit of hindsight, it translates into Auschwitz, no matter whether
that had been intended or not.) John points out that Juenger refrained
from adopting the anti-Semitic terminology of infection and pest control
when he was referring to Jews. The quotation above, however, contains
the adverb "virulent" - need I continue?

The book "Aufmarsch des Nationalismus" (Berlin: Vormarsch-Verlag, 1928)
published and prefaced by Ernst, written by his brother Friedrich Georg
Juenger, provides another source as to Juenger's political bearings in
the late twenties. It is all there: the myth of the stab in the back of
the German army, militarism, nationalism, socialism, dictatorship, war.
Juenger has never been the "seismograph" he later claimed to be, he was
one of many shrill advocates of the devil whose individual impact is now
hard to tell. (See Wolfgang Matz, "Nach der Katastrophe - Juenger und
Heidegger", in: Text und Kritik, "E. J.", 105/106, Muenchen, 1990. Matz
scrutinizes the utterly hopeless passage: "Nach dem Erdbeben schlaegt
man auf die Seismographen ein. Man kann jedoch die Barometer nicht für
die Taifune buessen lassen, falls man nicht zu den Primitiven zaehlen
will." [Strahlungen I, 1949, p. 9.])  

Is it a stereotype to keep in mind what Juenger wrote for the notorious
"Voelkische Beobachter" in 1923 - if you forgive me for quoting Johannes
Saltzwedel's article: "Ein zackiger Flaneur. E. Juenger und die deutsche
Literatur - Kniefaelle, Attacken und Ratlosigkeit", in: DER SPIEGEL, Nr.
12, 20.02.1995, pp. 213-222)?
 
   Die echte Revolution hat noch gar nicht stattgefunden, sie
   marschiert unaufhaltsam heran [..] ihre Idee ist die voelkische,
   zu bisher nicht gekannter Schaerfe geschliffen, ihr Banner das
   Hakenkreuz, ihre Ausdrucksform die Konzentration des Willens in
   einem einzigen Punkt - die Diktatur! Sie wird ersetzen das Wort
   durch die Tat, die Tinte durch das Blut, die Phrase durch das
   Opfer, die Feder durch das Schwert.
 
Reemtsma's article muses on the difference between the two world wars
for Ernst Juenger and on the literary consequences he drew as he was
coming to grips with it. But I had better stop here. - I am in favour
of discussing some of "Der Arbeiter" and I can't wait for John's post-
modernist reading of "Sturm"!

Regards,

Markus Schopmeyer