/lit/ - Literature

>>21901697
Ernst Junger is actually a great writer

>>21901697
GGM was writting about wars that were 5-1, and those in the 5 side had weapons, while those on the 1 side had only farming tools. You US people are truly despicable.

>>21901754
>thread about German writers
>you US people!
??

>>21901754
>US people
They're not people anon

Most men on this board would not enjoy a years or two of WWI trench warfare. Reading that perspective doesn’t mean that is how WWI would be experienced by you, as if you can determine to experience it like Jünger did without having any sense of the deprivation, grief, pain and terror.

>>21901863
You don't think Junger had a sense of the deprivation, grief, pain, and terror of the war?

>>21901866
Without having as in you cannot determine if you can experience it as he did without experiencing those things which he did.

Junger clearly was a violent, passionate Romantic man. I feel as if he was desperate to find the same joy in modern warfare as he perceived in older forms of war. He was fascinated with the sharp, harsh and ravishing nature of modern machinery. I suppose that's the link between him and the Futurists which were so common during the war.

>>21901697
You people must not have read the part of the book where Junger literally breaks down and cries after his company is wiped by an arty shell.

Junger isn’t a warmonger, he was a nationalist and someone who, at the time, thought war was transformative in a positive way, he also respected the courage and honor of those he was fighting with and against, but also saw modern war for the horror it was: industrialized and anonymous killing. Also you’re retarded for comparing a fictional account to a non-fiction account.

On another note, one of the most informative memoirs I’ve read that concerns WW1, aside from SoS, was Poilu. It’s the diary of a 30-something Southern French socialist who basically had no reason, ideologically, personally, or materially to fight but still willingly participated in the war. His story gives great insight into the psychology of the everyman, of those who made up the bulk of the armies. He fought not because he believed in what the war was about, he fought just because he didn’t want to let his country down in its time of need.

>>21901735
Is he any good in translation? I always struggle to start translated books because there's so many options and you have to worry about fidelity.

>>21901697
I think these books show it’s complete natural to have any diverse number of outlooks on your own experiences in war. I know that sounds extremely dumb and obvious to say but I feel like most people expect you to come back from war only broken and anything different from that makes you psychotic. Or maybe I’m just retarded and completely off the mark idk

>>21901886
>he fought just because he didn’t want to let his country down in its time of need.
Isn’t this an ideological reason to fight in the war? I feel like the true Everyman slave would just fight because they have nothing else to do and are just aimless

>>21901863
>tripfag
>retard
checks out

>>21901897
Listen, when you read books in English translated from German, Nordic languages, Dutch you aren't missing out on too much.
Italian, French, Spanish you are missing out on more due to the languages lyricism and rhythm, but you will be okay.
When you start translating Russian, Greek, any Slavic language, that's when you start to get worried as these are written in different script, completely different word lineage and so lots of nuance is loss.
When Chinese, Japanese, Sanskrit, Arabic, Persian is translated lots and lots of meaning and beauty in the language is lost.
Translation is always better than nothing but be wary.

>>21901905
No, Barthas (the guy who wrote the book iirc) wasn’t driven to fight for France because of typical ideological reasons, in fact hated everything about the then French government, he was motivated by a romantic idea of being a “Frenchman,” but not in an exclusionary nationalistic way; he basically fought out of honor and chivalry (which I guess is a type of ideology, but not in the common political sense that the word is used). Ideologically Barthas was an unironic socialist who believed in the brotherhood of mankind and genuinely wanted to shake hands with the Germans across from him rather than shoot them, in fact Barthas never shoots his rifle in an effort to kill his fellow man, but none the less he participated in the French war effort and looked down upon those who avoided the war.

>>21901697
Storm of Steel is high T. Reading it you can feel the exhilaration Junger felt in battle. It was a peak experience for him but that was because of his own personal makeup and random chance accounts for him not being killed. Also he later said that war has become so mechanized that there is no more heroic potential in it left.

>>21901964
>Also he later said that war has become so mechanized that there is no more heroic potential in it left.
I don’t think this is true. At least not until drones were made. Most wars afterward feel very personal at least to some extent like Vietnam and Rwanda. Of course it isn’t heroic but not for the reasons he says

>>21901913
>your a retard because you don’t think I would be a badass based on nothing!
Man zip your mouth

>>21902026
By WW1 it had nothing to do with you. It was up to the idiocy of your commandors, quality of food and equipment you were provided and whether or not you would die of disease.
Once bombing airplanes became more widespread, it was over. A sniper could shoot you from the other side of a field, guerilla warfare meant that the nice family you met is about to kill you. In reality, war has always been like this. But even the aesthetic of nobility of war had now finally been stripped, and even those like Junger couldn't deny it.

>itt seething beta male snoys compensate for their shriveled low t genitals by haranguing on the horror of war
War is for men, and men are for war.

>>21902037
>war has always been like this
Maybe in part but also no. In olden time armies met in fields and did battle mano a mano. Industrial society changed all that.

>>21902053
you can't even talk to a cashier without stuttering

>>21902068
Projecting DAMN HARD there anon.

>>21902053
>>21901697
Why is it assumed you should even have a reaction to war anyway? I mean all the people I know that went to war talked about it like it was just normal memories. There’s no romance, and there’s no horror it just is. You people are to binary

>>21902067
It still depended on whether your lord decided to give you proper food, execute correct strategies, give you proper armor/weapons and so on.
If not, numbers would win.
Large scale conflict is out of the participants hands. Maybe local tribal battles may have been fought more "mano a mano."

>dying for the government like mindless cattle is based actually

>>21902026
You’re an idiot. WW1 was a war marked by artillery and machine guns. It is the very definition of industrial warfare and what was to come. There is nothing heroic about killing 200 anonymous men as they rush headlong into your machine gun or the killing of anonymous 100s with an artillery bombardment (later airstrike); or on the flip-side being the poor bastard who has to run headlong into machine gun fire or stand under enemy shells as they rain down upon you. Granted, you have to retain unrealistic and romantic ideas of ancient warfare to come to the idea that modern warfare is unique in the scale of death, anonymity, and depersonalization, but it’s hard to ignore the fact that today millions can die in a brief amount of time, in the most depersonalized ways, and no one will ever know their names or deeds.
> Most wars afterward feel very personal at least to some extent like Vietnam
How was Vietnam personal? Sure the soldiers were affected by their experience, but the US killed like 1 million Vietnamese soldiers while only losing 50,000, its almost a stereotypical depiction of industrial warfare.

>>21902053
What if you think the war is immoral and the people on the other side don’t deserve to be killed. Are you still a hitch if you don’t go to war?

>>21902080
War conducted by the west today is low intensity and often mostly police actions, so to speak. Very different

>>21901697
Barbusse for the weird trench experience.

>>21902119
Are you really going to argue urban warfare isn’t personal when bombings aren’t involved? Sure it’s less but not gone completely

>>21902124
I’m not talking about westerners this is war in their own land

>ancient hand-to-hand warfare where you were rewarded with land, money, and women for succeeding, and regardless of whether you were attacking or defending, you could practically be sure that you fought for yourself and your people's interests and benefit
Based.
>modern mechanized warfare where you get fed into the meat grinder for no reward at all by a government that hates you and your people and wants you to fight for causes that are not at all your own or your people's, but theirs or that of others
Cringe.

>>21902145
This,
see this
>>21902084

>>21902129
It’s literally not. In urban warfare you are shooting at individuals hundreds of feet away or blowing them up with a variety of things, most of the time via artillery or air strike. Personal warfare is two men fighting hand to hand, face to face, with a sword, shield, spear, etc…
Long distance weapons, explosives, and machine have introduced an unprecedented level of depersonalization and anonymity in warfare, even urban.

>>21902084
Heroism is about your own personal conduct and valor, not which side wins the war or your own fate. Worrying about any of that at all is already cowardice. Junger and his comrades don't even consider that they might lose the war until late in the book and he fully accepted his death when it looked it he was finally going to die.
You started off in agreement with what I had said earlier, that from WW1 onward technology had irreversibly changed the condition of war for the negative. Now it seems that you've changed the topic from personal virtue to "who wins the war". Last stands are the ultimate expression of heroism.

>>21902145
based and truthpilled

>>21902175
I have changed my view. Well, all that romantic stuff is very well and good, but really thinking about is, what does it amount too? The act of taking some ones life is the most selfish thing you can do. I do feel that war has become yet worse in the sense of "heroism" but really, Junger and those like him were deluded.

>>21902186
If you don't get, you don't get it. There's nothing more to explain than that. Some people simply do not have the same constitution. From your perspective, he is deluded. But that's just your perspective, because you don't have the same kind of soul, or constitution.

>>21902186
At least you didn't call Junger a psychopath like some other anons who disagree with him have. Perceiving it as romanticism is still much closer to the truth than that outright slander.

>>21902233
He isn't. I think Junger was a good man. A bit Quixotic however.

>>21902175
>not which side wins the war or your own fate
I think it’s disingenuous to say your a coward if you fear what might happen to you or if you care in general, most people are afraid in life threatening situations, of course what matters what they’re willing to do despite that

>>21902322
Courage is being scared to death - but saddling up anyway.
— John Joel Glanton

>>21902322
>most people are afraid in life threatening situations
Read Plato

>>21902186
Jünger is interested in the contest, the struggle, the duel, and the sensation of men unified in it. Just massacring people is not what he find appealing.

>>21901697
Storm of Steel is the most boringly written Junger novel

(still more intersting than All Quiet on the Western Front)

>>21902338
Yes, but that why he is deluded. Because along with sensation comes death. Maybe tell him to play football instead. I know Junger is a good man though.

Junger's romanticism is beautiful but the modern Westerner is incapable of living up to the ideal.
I joined my nation's army and was sour shortly after. The men were fat, lazy and unintelligent in the worst kinds of ways.
It felt like everyone was roleplaying if that makes any sense. As if everyone was in on some play and they were all playing their part.
Authority did not come naturally from anyone except from this one Officer who I think embodied the type of figure Junger would've enjoyed.
Stern, old school, commanding voice. He spoke and people seemed captivated.
My direct superiors however were fatter than me, less fit, less intelligent.
It was a depressing venture and I would take it all back if I could. A complete waste of time.
Western militaries are set about the path of Nihilism, defeatism, etc., with no romantic values to uphold. Most likely because they have never held a romantic view in their life or are incapable of forming one.

>>21902119
What are catapults
What are archers

>>21902186
Who would you consider a hero?

>>21902406
Garibaldi.

>>21902352
Death is what makes it meaningful.

>>21901960
>he was motivated by a romantic idea of being a “Frenchman,”
That's absolutely an ideological reason you nitwit tripnigger. The everyman fights because he was told to and keeps choosing the path of least resistance at every step. Which in an army is always keeping your head down and following orders, until you actually run into the enemy - at which point it's too late and the system has served its purpose.

>>21902415
But that is a non-Sequitur. What kind of meaning is that? Fighting and killing for political machinations is not meaningful.

>>21901697
>Which way westoids?
I went to Afghanistan and loved it. Smoked a few Taliban, none of my friends died, and now I have an engineering degree and get 2k a month for PTSD and tinnitus. It was a mercenary transaction for me, and I only enlisted in the first place to go to war and I consider myself lucky to have been able to get into a few firefights.

>>21902466
We missed your stories, man. You killed 2-5 people right?

>>21901697
Heg

>>21902035
Cringe, put back your trip

>>21902466
>I killed a few innocent people for defending their homes and now I'm making money so it's all good
Enjoy hell I guess, I'm sure it's a good transaction to sell your soul for eternal fire

>>21902493
Do you think that all soldiers go to hell?

>>21902470
Yeah, it's hard to give an exact number because I never needed to clear the bodies of people I shot, and other times I would be one of like 15 people to put rounds into a guy. I had it so easy compared to guys like Junger and Remarque that there really isn't even a comparison. Everyone in my unit loved deployments. Training cycles are the part that actually suck.

>>21902493
>killed a few innocent people for defending their homes
Literally the first person I shot was standing in his front door with a gun as my platoon walked past. It all happened so fast that I only heard his AK chamber a round, and then me and the guy in front of me turned left and each dumped a mag. One of the reasons I estimate killing 3-5 people is I think I might have seen another silhouette in the doorway, and if I had to guess I would assume it was the guys wife. We never checked though, I just got a high-five from a squad leader and we kept moving to the target compound.

comcam took this pic of me in Khost. Notice my Gustav lying to my left

>>21902493

Oh go away men are talking.

>>21902528
maybe Paktia actually

>>21902503
At least you acknowledge it wasn't a proper war. I don't feel Junger OR Remarque would look kindly on Afghanistan.

>>21902541
Also I was special operations so a lot of the bullshit that big army guys had to deal with during patrolling or living in an outpost I avoided. I would usually just fly to within a couple clicks of a compound, walk to it, set up a perimeter, and then the interpreter would hop on a megaphone and tell everyone inside to come out with their hands up. Almost always went off without a hitch. All with triple stacked airsupport and night-vision and intelligence and every advantage imaginable. Then we would search the place for sim cards and guns, take the guys we were tracking and fly away to play fifa and lift weights.

>>21901697
No book in the world has ever made me laugh as much as Storm of Steel - the first time he misses a grand offensive because he and all the other sons of the aristocracy with CO positions are pulled off the line to do a 8-week seminar on troop tactics, which they spend womanizing and drinking, I nearly died from the cramps. Another passage that never fails to make my sides go into orbit is when he is given command duty of the telegraph lines, and has a long passage detailing the absolute brutality of the work of repairing phone-lines that he now has to give to his subordinates while he sits in his CP and eats cheese.

Ernst Jünger is based beyond belief, and honestly, the way he has duped every 22 year olds who thinks Sabaton is good and that the warrior-poet archetype isn't turbocringe, that just makes him even more based.

>>21902553
Where you ever in contact with troops from other countries, such as Australia?

>>21902408
Didn't he sent soldiers to their death?

>>21901697
Junger was a privileged aristocrat who never really saw any combat. Easy to write favorably about war when you dont have to do it.

>>21902563
What do you mean?

>>21902053
>War is for men, and men are for war.
Well said dear sir. I often recall the musings of the Judge of Blood Meridian and find that his weighty words resonate greatly with the steel of my katana:

>“War was always here. Before man was, war waited for him. The ultimate trade awaiting its ultimate practitioner.”

>“Whatever in creation exists without my knowledge exists without my consent.

>“This is the nature of war, whose stake is at once the game and the authority and the justification. Seen so, war is the truest form of divination. It is the testing of one's will and the will of another within that larger will which because it binds them is therefore forced to select. War is the ultimate game because war is at last a forcing of the unity of existence.War is god.”

Now if you will all excuse me, it is time for me maintain my mastery with the blade - I train 5 hours a day. Since you have proven yourself to be masculine equal with your interesting observation on the nature of war, I bring you the gift of music - the very music I listen to as I hone my skills with the blade and ponder the nature of war: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oo8H5vUKMlk&list=RDEMkpmfHthfKbPpzGE_lALZvQ&start_radio=1

If only there were more gentlemen such as ourselves on these interwebz forums, dear sir, perhaps the world would not be in such a sorry state.

>>21902560
No, I only worked with and trained the Ktah Khas, an Afghan commando unit. I've heard you Aussies were getting pretty rowdy over there with the war crimes.

>>21901863
Ok, what is your point?

>>21902591
Did you see any war crimes?

>>21902610
I plead the fifth.

>>21902566
>Junger was a privileged aristocrat who never really saw any combat. Easy to write favorably about war when you dont have to do it.
What the fuck did I just read? Are you fucking kidding me? He's literally in the Stormtrooper and was in the frontlines for the entire fucking war while Remarque, that pretentious faggot, was a fucking artillery bitch at the rear who was pulled out in a week because he has a fucking wound and then bitched about war. Again, what the fuck are you talking about?

>>21902466
How long where you in the army?

>>21902566
Junger wasn't an aristocrat, he was the son of a middle class fertiliser salesman. All his aspirations to aristocracy if your typical aspiration bourgeois larp.

>>21902820
I was in the army for 6 years and deployed to Afghanistan 5 times.

>>21902498
No
>>21902530
You're an immature manchild, not a man. But sure act tough. You know everything don't you? There's nothing after death, no consequences, you'll be fine right? Wait till you grow up and you start having to confront your past and your death. That's when you'll learn what it means to be a man and a human. Until then, you're a child.

>>21902145
>you could practically be sure that you fought for yourself and your people's interests and benefit
lol

>>21901897
I looked into the translations of Storm of Steel recently. You have two main choices: the 1929 Basil Creighton trans. or the 2003 Hofmann trans. (there's a 2021 one but I haven't looked into it).

The 1929 trans. is a poorer translation in a literal sense. A few passages are clunky and possibly slightly inaccurate. However these aren't what I would call "important" passages - mainly just sections describing scenery and certain German idioms. It is however the superior trans. because the 2003 one seeks to deemphasise the visceral glory of war. I believe he even removes certain short passages. Since the utter revelry of combat and the mannerbund is what Junger wanted to convey, this being translated accurately is of the highest importance.

To surmise: 1929 Creighton trans. is BASED, 2003 Hofmann trans. is CRINGE.

>>21903007
trans trans trans trans will you chuds ever stop obsessing with trannies holy shit

>>21902856
I thought he was an aristocrat because Sartre said he despised Junger because he was an aristocrat.
I now realize Sartre hated Junger only because he resembled everything Sartre was not: Brave, principled, good-looking, patriotic. Basically everything Sartre was not.

>>21902555
>>21902566
>the man that relished the glory of combat was an upper class aristocrat
this isnt the own you think it is lmao

>>21903014
The greatest lie devil ever told was "Don't judge a book by its cover."
Things are always exactly the way they appear. Always.

>>21903021
based and physiognomy-pilled

there's a disturbing lack of umlauts in this thread

>>21903021
Damn, Hitler is actually good. The chuds were right.

>>21902512
>I gunned down a family and now I make minimum wage from abusing the welfare system
Such bravery zogbot. Thank you for your service. Rot in hell.

>>21903036
too bad hes not going to hell since he didnt kill an innocent man he killed one of you brownoids lmaooo

>>21902421
Good job not reading the rest of the post you illiterate subhuman.

>>21902372
Never as lethal as being hit by artillery or an airstrike, nor did they have the same capacity to mow down 100s of men in seconds like a machine gun. Nice try though hun.
Plus catapults were mainly siege weapons that were used against walls and not troop formations.

>>21902348
It’s a memoir you retard

>>21902512
That‘s called defending their home. Must be good to owe your life to the ever-abundant great satan outspending some enemies of world jewry who are trying to live where they always have.

>>21903198
Maybe next time they here Blackhawks open up with miniguns and see 70 soldiers walking by they will stay inside.

>>21903198
Maybe next time they hear Blackhawks open up with miniguns and see 70 soldiers walking by they will stay inside with their wives and donkey.

>>21903007
Hofmann reads a lot better.

>>21903007
>>21903233
>. It is however the superior trans. because the 2003 one seeks to deemphasise the visceral glory of war. I believe he even removes certain short passages. Since the utter revelry of combat and the mannerbund is what Junger wanted to convey, this being translated accurately is of the highest importance.
>To surmise: 1929 Creighton trans. is BASED, 2003 Hofmann trans. is CRINGE.
Junger himself removed and edited parts of the book over the years. There's several versions and reprints since the original. Cringe you say?

>>21902566
>>21902555
It's always good to be reminded what shameless liars your type are. You can genuinely taste the ressentiment in these posts, even as they just make shit up to convince themselves by trying (and failing) to convince others of their "beliefs".

>>21903262
>>21903233
>>21903007
It's amusing to compare the ending of the book in the two versions. Unless you have the original German it's hard to say how much was removed because of the translation or the new revised edition, but either way the difference is sizable and the tone is entirely different. The modern version is very cynical and wry I think.

>>21903370
The 2003 version is so Jewish it is astounding. It reads like a Coen's brother film.

>>21903291
i actually made that post just to bait people. I dont believe that myself at all

>>21903558
You saucy devil

>>21901754
>>21901845
>US people
Literally rent free, not even 1 post into a thread that had nothing to do with America. That's impressive. I cant imagine the state of mind of the Yuropoor.

>>21901883
If you read about the time period, you get the feeling that many people (particularly Germans) were euphoric in the beginning stages of WWI, as though the conflict was saving them from a sort of dissipation and aimlessness that their society had become in half century since the Franco-Prussian war. For many, this feeling evaporated as the war progressed. But for Junger, it seems that he never fully lost this enthusiasm. A result of his upbringing perhaps? One can’t help think of the archetype of the romantic warrior aristocrat when considering him. The way the sons of noble families used to be before modern society emasculated them or they become weak from the lack of struggle.

>>21902104
Yes, you’re very young and edgy. To people without ideals, the only true morality is looking out for their own comfort.

>>21903262
You're right, Junger did edit the book as he got older. I had forgotten this earlier. My point is then that we should read heroic literature, and the unedited writings of a young man are closer to this than an old mans.

Also stop being a faggot.

>>21904055
Woah, so this is the power of death of the author reactionaries.

>>21901863
>Most men on this board would not survive a year or two of trench warfare
Ftfy

>>21901697
>Look up to the starry sky during a silent night and try to immerse yourself in those powerful theories of occidental thinking, according to which a glowing primordial mist hurls the worlds out into space like projectiles and the cycle of systems perpetuates itself for infinite time - the wind chimes of the forces inherent in them, until all this is smashed together again into a whirling chaos that holds new worlds in its fiery womb. And then look with a vigilant eye into the world that a drop of water encloses. You will find in it the same laws of tension and balance. You will discover in it beings, light-green or crystal-clear, that move in tumbling and rolling paths, that seek to control their space, and that stretch out their tiny organs to attack or to defend themselves when the other confronts them. Look into the spring green forest that seems to embody life itself, and consider that every single tree and every tiny stalk has grown up in a fierce struggle for light and food. Cast your net into the deepest, darkest abysses of the sea and you will draw out creatures with huge mouths, with searchlights that seek out the prey, and with tentacles that are meant to grab them. Place any object in front of you and make it quite clear to yourself that no other object can stand where this object stands, that it must already affect other existences by the pure fact of its existence, even if it is only that of the air, which it displaces only by overcoming a resistance, which you may not perceive, but which exists nevertheless.

>>21902466
Know anoyone from 3/75?

>>21905005
This kind of thinking was how I became a half crazed determinist

>>21902512
Do you feel bad for killing the dudes wife?

>>21906351
>We never checked though, I just got a high-five from a squad leader and we kept moving to the target compound.
Hard to say for sure

>>21906351
It doesn't really matter.

>>21906475
Why do you think that

>>21902119
>us killed 1 million
holy shit dude read a fucking wikipedia page.

>>21906565
Vietnamese total dead: 966,000[34]–3,010,000[64].

>>21902104
You'll never reach Valhalla with that attitude