Peter Moors Fahrt nach Sudwest - Ein Feldzugsbericht by Gustav Frenssen - Frenssen, Gustav

His novelPeter Moors Fahrt nach Swest(1906), which took the genocidal war in Southwest Africa as its theme, was his best-selling work and remained popular up through the Nazi period. Its success even led to his being considered for the Nobel Prize for Literature. The work was praised for its realismhe based the details for the novel on interviews with Germans who had been in the fightingand is noteworthy for its nuanced depiction of the life of a white soldier, which highlights the physical and emotional travails that soldiers endured in the desert even as they fulfilled their duty against impossible odds. The depiction of the Herero enemy betrays little nuance, though. In the passages here, Frenssen depicts the enemy as bestial opponents, advancing in unseen hordes while making wild cries. Such a depiction is necessary for Frenssens ultimate point: although he is troubled by the killing of so many Africansmen, women, and childrenhe reassures himself through the colonialist logic that they have brought it upon themselves.Softcover. Deutsch. Typoprint, Windhoek. 1998. 147 pp with illustrationsand fold-out map. Good but bottom part of half title page cut out. Book No: 2506005