Novel
The Outlaws
Die Geächteten
Ernst von Salomon · 1930
Synopsis
A sixteen-year-old boy leaves the cadet school just as the war ends and the army falls apart. He joins the Freikorps fighting in the Baltic countries, then in Upper Silesia, and returns to a Germany he no longer recognises. He then joins a clandestine group that wants to bring down the republic by striking at its politicians.
Context
The book was completed in 1929, during the three months of pretrial detention its author served after a mock bomb attack on the Reichstag staged to support his brother's peasant movement; it was published in 1930 by Rowohlt. This autobiographical narrative runs from the Freikorps to the plots and the prison that followed the assassination of Rathenau by members of the Organisation Consul. The French translation by Andhrée Vaillant and Jean Kuckenburg was published by Plon as early as 1931; it has been reissued since with a preface by Michel Tournier.
Who it is for
A large volume, told in the first person by one of the participants; it is read knowing who wrote it, the narrator taking no distance.
Prizes and reception
An inside account of the Freikorps, and then of the far-right terrorism of the early Weimar years, written by one of its participants.