Michael E-Book

Joseph Goebbels

• Herausgeber: Antelope Hill Publishing LLC
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Beschreibung

Dr. Joseph Goebbels (1897-1945), best known for his role as the leader of the Berlin NSDAP and later as the chief publicist for the National Socialist government of Germany, was a man of humble beginnings. Unable to serve in World War I due to a deformed foot, the young Goebbels dedicated himself to academic studies, performing well and eventually earning a Doctorate of Philology from the prestigious University of Heidelberg. Like most Germans in the years following the war, Goebbels was underemployed and aimless for a time, during which he continued to pursue his love of literature. What emerged from this time was Michael, a novel that merged his own experiences with those of his close friends and the styles of the writers who had made a profound impression upon him in his formative years.

Michael follows the story of a soldier returning from the war, experiencing the highs and lows of the rapid changes emerging in the new Germany, as told through a series of diary entries. Ruminations on politics and philosophy, the war, romance, art, and culture, all combine to offer a piercing insight into the author's soul and the world in which he lived. Goebbels was, beyond his role as a political figure, a man deeply immersed in an aesthetic view of life and the role of the German people.

Antelope Hill Publishing is proud to present a new English edition of Michael by Dr. Joseph Goebbels, translated by Olivia Van Dorn and with a foreword by Joseph Jordan. This exceptional work of literature, authored by the man who became the voice of the Third Reich, tells a story vital to understanding the origins of National Socialism and is necessary to preserve for generations to come.

Leseprobe

Michael

Michael

A German Destiny in Diary Form

DR. JOSEPH GOEBBELS

Translated by Olivia Van Dorn

A N T E L O P EH I L LP U B L I S H I N G

English Translation Copyright © 2023 Antelope Hill Publishing

First edition, first printing 2023.

Translated by Olivia Van Dorn, 2023.

Originally published in German by the Franz Eher

Nachfolger Publishing House, 1929.

Cover art by Swifty.

Edited by Harlan Wallace, Rollo of Gaunt, and Margaret Bauer.

Layout by Margaret Bauer.

Antelope Hill Publishing | antelopehillpublishing.com

Paperback ISBN-13: 978-1-956887-73-0

EPUB ISBN-13: 978-1-956887-74-7

DEDICATION

1918.

You stood, your arm still bandaged, the gray helmet on your battered head, chest covered in medals, in front of some well-fed gentlemen, to pass the Matura. Because you didn’t know some numbers, they decreed that you were not yet mature.

Our answer was: Revolution!

1920.

We were both on the verge of surrendering to mental breakdown, but we lifted one another up and hardly stumbled.

My answer was: Outrage!

1923.

You challenged your fate. Bend or break! It was still too early. For that, you became a victim.

Your answer was: Death!

1927.

I stood at your grave; in glistening sunshine lay a quiet, green hill. And it preached impermanence.

My answer was: Resurrection.

I dedicate this book in memory of

RICHARD FLISGES

a brave soldier, who on July 19th, 1923,

met an ill-fated death in a mine outside Schliersee.

FOREWORD

By Joseph Jordan

Conventional historians portray Joseph Goebbels as an opportunist, a megalomaniac, and a Machiavellian sociopath, but in Michael, this snapshot into the consequential German figure’s soul only transmits pure sincerity. Goebbels and his creation, Michael, are nothing more than what all can see.

We know from reading Dr. Goebbels’ diaries that he believed everything he said, including when he tried to dig deep for optimism as Germany began losing World War II. He did not use subliminal messaging or conspire to fool people—quite the opposite. Michael, written in 1929, puts his style on display as it earnestly debates the destiny and grand world-historical mission of a demoralized and divided German people.

Goebbels, a concise and succinct writer in the vein of Goethe, never leaves anything up to interpretation or the imagination, nor does the novel contain any needless words or sentences. His style in Michael is indistinguishable from his polemical writings and speeches he is better known for. Michael is unmistakably Dostoyevskian; it is primarily socio-ethical and political commentary that utilizes storytelling tropes and romantic prose as a vehicle for ideas, rather than “art for art’s sake,” which the book’s protagonist derides as a “sin in the Germanic sense of art.”

Michael, the main character, is a tribute to the life of Dr. Goebbels’ best friend, World War I veteran Richard Flisges, who passed away in a mining accident in 1923. Flisges is widely believed to have introduced Goebbels to the revolutionary ideas that whet his appetite for anti-establishment politics.

Throughout the story we experience a see-saw between confusion and clarity, victory and tragedy, light and darkness, and joy and sorrow—thesis and antithesis—experienced through the eyes of a young man seeking to transcend his sterile, middle-class upbringing by embarking on a quest to embody the trinity of Soldier—Student—Worker, the three classes of young Germany Michael believes must unite to rescue the dignity of the folk against a failed state ruled by decadent aristocrats, bourgeois snobs, faux socialists, and Jews insolently looking down upon the nation as it is being raped and looted.

Academics cite Michael as a “proto-Nazi” work, which is semi-accurate if one interprets Nationalsocialism as a conclusion produced through the practical application of German (or more broadly, Western) genius and Aryan race-feeling. This was certainly the view of the Frankfurt School. Michael loudly proclaims the names of Friedrich Nietzsche, Vincent Van Gogh, Richard Wagner, Johannes Brahms, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, and others throughout his journey. He carries the Bible and Goethe’s Faust with him everywhere he goes, a nod to Oswald Spengler’s Faustian theory of European civilization in The Decline of the West, which had its second volume published around the time Michael was written.

Goebbels’ Michael adores Christ, though he saves some of his harshest words for German clergy. On November 2nd, 1920 (pg. 147), Michael states that the “German question about God cannot be separated from Christ” but then follows this by declaring that “the denominations have failed” to spiritually satiate the German people as they resentfully “terrorize any formation of a new religious will.”

To Goebbels, Christ is the archetype of love and socialism—what he believes makes a human being humane, which he sharply contrasts with the Jew, whether he presents as capitalist or Marxist, who exemplifies hate and Mammonism.

According to Michael, speaking on true socialism, “The idea of sacrifice found visible form for the first time in Christ. Sacrifice is part of the essence of socialism. Give yourself for others.” (pg. 80) When characterizing Marx, who he uses as an avatar for the Jew, he summarizes the ambition as “property is theft as long as it is not mine.” (pg. 80) The difference between socialism as a moral prerogative (Christ) versus a sterile monetary theory (Marx) that supplants the nation-retarding, bourgeois pursuit of profit above all with a proletarian version of the same nihilistic sentiment strongly overlaps with Spengler’s critique of Marxism, which he dismissed as nothing more than an anti-German reworking of Manchester liberalism.

Michael’s chief rival in the story is Ivan Vienurovsky, a Russian emigre fleeing Bolshevism who dreams of a resurgent pan-Slavist Russia. This offends the protagonist’s pan-Germanist sensibilities.

Michael clearly admires Ivan, even if begrudgingly. He finds the Russian’s zeal and confidence to be intimidating, and Ivan’s visage haunts him long after the two are no longer in contact.

He sees in Ivan an energy that has been sapped out of post-war Germany. After the experience of World War I, the conflict between pan-Slavism and pan-Germanism was a pressing concern for German nationalists, as the bold Serbian refusal of the Austrian ultimatum in 1914 that led to the latter’s humiliating battlefield defeats and snowballed into a broader conflict was widely believed to have been the product of the Russian state’s policy of arming and empowering Balkan Slavs. Kaiser Wilhelm II and Tsar Nicholas II were first cousins whose worldviews mirrored one another, and the interplay between the two men as Germany and Russia careened into direct collision is on display in the metaphorical relationship between Michael and Ivan.

Nostalgia for the Frontsgemeinschaft, or spirit of the front, features prominently in Michael. As a contemporary of Ernst Jünger, Dr. Goebbels appears to be living vicariously through Jünger, whose memoir, Storm of Steel, portrayed the Great War as a time of individual men conquering their fears and marching to destiny together as a collective volk, where deed was valued above money. Michael fondly recalls the replacement of class with rank on the battlefield, where men from different walks of life became brothers over shared strife, only to lament the return of class division upon returning to civilian life.

“Outside in the trenches we lay side by side, the one from the palace and the other from the miner’s hut. We bonded, became friends, and just got to know each other. And when the war was over, this unfortunate chasm opened up again.” (pg. 143)

In Michael, Goebbels throws Kant’s transcendental idealism, Goethe’s Becoming (to be born, transform through time, and perish), Nietzsche’s Will to Power, the solidaristic anti-materialism of Christ’s Sermon on the Mount, Schiller’s enchantment of beauty, Wagner’s revolutionary faith, Hegel’s Great Man and Geist theories, and Spengler’s Faustian man together into a pot.

The finished product: Nationalsocialism.

PROLOGUE

The greatest blessing in life is that from its mysteries arise the dynamic forces of youth. Hardship is the way to happiness. Decay and dissolution do not spell doom, but rather herald a new dawn. Amidst the chaos of daily life, these powerful forces of creation are at work in the stillness.

The youth are more alive today than ever. They believe. About what, that’s what the fight is about. Out of this conflict, new forms of existence wrestle up toward the light.

Youth is always veracious, before old age.

The will to create, to live, and to build burns hot and bright in hearts filled with optimism for the future. Millions painfully wait for this day. In the attics of the tenements, in day laborers’ shacks, and in migrant camps full of hunger, cold, and mental anguish, the hope and symbols of a new era are formed. Faith, struggle, and work are the virtues that unite today’s German youth in their Faustian drive to create.

We are gradually coming together: the spirit of resurrection; the shedding of the ego; the movement toward the other, toward the brother, toward the people, serves as a bridge connecting us.

We await the day that will bring the thunderous winds. At that moment, we will have the courage to pull our will together to act for the Fatherland. We want life, and we will win life.

Michael’s diary is a monument of German fervor and devotion, intended to both distress and console. In its quiet, modest mirror are reflected all the forces that shape us young men from thought today into action tomorrow. That is why Michael’s life and death is more than chance and blind fate. It is a sign of the times and a symbol of the future.

Devoting one’s life to work, and sacrificing it for the good of our people’s future, is the most noble and comforting thing one can do on this earth.

DR. JOSEPH GOEBBELS

On the D-Train, May 2nd, 1919

No longer does the thoroughbred stallion strain under my thighs; no longer do I sit upon the edges of the barbettes, yet still I plod through the mud of dilapidated trenches. How long ago, since I made my way through the wide Russian plain or the razed French countryside. Gone!

I’m slowly losing myself. I rise up like a phoenix out of the ashes from war and destruction.

Peace!

This word lies like a balm on a wound that still trembles with blood. It is as if I could reach out and take this blessed word in my hands.

If I look out of the window, I can see the German countryside passing by: cities, villages, forests, fields. A quiet path lined with blooming flowers goes through the brown fields.

Children play in village streets.

Towering factory chimneys pierce the crystal-clear air.

Vast green fields, shining in a thousand colors, fly by. I open the window and breathe—deep breaths. The sun beams down upon German land.

This is surely how the Greeks greeted the sea.

Home! Germany!

The fields and gardens in bloom, extravagant beauty wasted on eyes that for four years saw nothing but debris, dirt, blood, and death.

I am carried like a floating island. Toward freedom!

I made my pilgrimage to Goethe’s childhood home in Frankfurt.1 He is still a leader today in the spirit of controversy, and a champion of every young will. Weimar is not our Mecca.

I carry only one book in my bag: Faust. I have read the first part; for the second I am too stupid.

Heidelberg! Embedded in the lovely valley with a castle above. Students sing on the platform.

Onward roll the impatient wheels. Onward!

Hills become mountains! The land shimmers in the sun.

My eyes drink in God’s beauty!

May 5th, 1919

I’m now sitting in my own four walls, a student, free, my own lord and master. How often have I longed for this, amidst the rage of the war.

I stroll through the streets and alleys as if I had never left them. We learned in our time away to stop and live in the present. The city is as pleasant as it is beautiful. The people of this country have plenty of time; you rarely see them in a hurry. We’re already deep into the south.

The benches at Karlsplatz are always full, from dawn and into the night. I’ve never seen a bench that wasn’t occupied.

The chestnuts on the hill of Heidelberg Castle are in bloom. If I have time—and when would I not have time—I stroll up to the top. The city lies below. Like chicks around the mother hen, the old houses are grouped around the Church of the Holy Spirit. The sun glitters on the red roofs of Neuenheim.

The land shines far and wide. In the distance, the Vosges Mountains swim through the clouds.

One year ago, I stood somewhere over there, caught in a drumfire of artillery, and had only one wish: end the agony, die, fall, be a hero, know nothing more.

And today I’m standing here and want life to tear into me with every fiber of my being.

May 8th, 1919

I live out in the suburbs, in the last house. The view from my window is of a blooming garden.

The sun shines in my room most of the day. The sky over this southern city is deep blue.

When I go to university, I walk through the cleanest of streets, streets that can only be found in Germany. Next to the sidewalks run broad gutters, in which pearly, clear, spring water flows. Crowds of children wade in it up to their knees and play tricks on those who pass.

I’m living the dream!

In the evening I walk home through a narrow and deserted alley past the church. Sometimes I only hear my own footsteps. The evening air caresses my face. If I stand still, then I hear a fountain mumbling and splashing somewhere.

Away from mankind, I speak to the night.

At the open window:

One last breath

Of a tired birdsong

And the evening wind

Brings the fragrant lilacs

Into my room.

I can’t sleep!

May 12th, 1919

I run into Richard from university. We have seen each other in town a couple of times. What a joy to meet again! He asks me what I’m studying.

What am I actually studying?

Everything and nothing. I’m not motivated or scholarly enough for the humanities.

I aspire to become a true man! To establish my identity.

Character! This is the way to the new German!

Style is everything! Style is the harmony between form and expression. Anyone who wants to have style must have both form and expression.

That means that to have style is to do what is natural: to act, suffer, and shape your life in accordance with your own state.

It sounds obvious, but is often taken for granted.

How can you be a shining beacon, if the fire does not burn within you!

May 16th, 1919

Richard visits me in the evening. We sit down in the garden and talk into the night. He is intelligent, understanding, and most importantly, knowledgeable.

We exchange our earliest memories. Before me lies the village, the garden, and my parent’s house. Through an open window, I hear my mother fiddling around in the kitchen.

Mother!

One needs nothing, except for a mother.

A mother who is not everything to her children—friend, teacher, confidante, source of joy and established pride, motivation and damper, accuser and reconciler, judge and forgiver—has obviously neglected her duty.

My mother is selfless and generous: in everything, from money to pure-hearted kindness.

She gives what she has, and often more.

Only a mother has the right instinct for her children.

May 17th, 1919

I have thought for a long time about what it is that makes me drink life so carelessly and to the fullest.

I stand with both feet on the hard soil, surrounded by the smell of earth. The blood of my ancestors, hardworking farmers, flows steadily within me.

Richard says that it’s human nature.

I walk alone through the narrow passageway to Heidelberg Castle and breathe in the warm scent of a blooming May night.

I wake up with the sun and rest with the stars. I sleep for four hours, and I am refreshed.

May 18th, 1919

Around noon I sit in the quiet old cemetery. In front of me a fountain sprays its fine rain into the hot air. Chestnuts arch a wide roof over me. The ivy twines itself around the moss-covered tombstones.

Blackbirds sing! Otherwise, nothing disturbs the peace of the dead.

A bee buzzes.

I read Nietzsche’s midday prayer from Thus Spoke Zarathustra.

Quiet . . . Quiet. . . .

All is right with the universe. Pan!

May 20th, 1919

Much is written in the lecture halls of the university, more is talked about, and, it seems to me, very little is learned. You always meet a certain kind of scholarly person. Pale face, intelligent glasses, fountain pens, and a thick bag full of books and lecture notes.

The future leaders of the nation!

And the women, oh, good heavens! Even the studious ones are still captivating.

I’m looking for the teacher who is simple enough to be great, and great enough to be simple.

The humanities breed arrogance and jargon. Common sense goes to hell.

Intellect is a danger to the formation of character.

We are not on the earth to cram our skulls full of knowledge. All of this is irrelevant if it remains unrelated to life. We have to fulfill our destiny. Truly educating young men—that is, to make them men—that should be the job of higher education.

We can only make of ourselves what God has put in us.

That’s why Goethe is the greatest, because he came out of the German consciousness and rose above its limits. But it would be wrong to want to be equal to him in this. The whole much-preached imitation of Goethe is nonsense, a fantasy of empty, overeducated minds.

Quod licet Iovi, non licet bovi!2