Evening star., 1947-05-07
Gern1un Penetrotes
. Heart Of Nuziiiisn,
Fritz JJnruh's Book Compared
to Crime and Punishment
By Dorothy Thoru bson

By Dorothy Thom pson
Over the week end / reread / book
which nrst came to me In manuscript
form sonne months ago, and has haunted
me ever since. Ny first impressionof
tremendous breadth. power and depth. az
monstrous horror and profound pity--
was confirmed .The End Is Not YETI
] BY Fritz Won Unruh Is. think, the only
study Of Naziism which has penetrated
Its heart-the sickness Of the modern
soul.
The novel Is descent into hell, and
the he'll IS In the minds and souls OF
men. It Is q hell peopled by monstrous
beasts. Ike the gsrgoyles Of Notre Dame,
Of which this novel contains one Of the
greatest descriptions In literature. Their
names are Hitler. Goering. Hess. Keitel,
but the characters In this novel ara
symbolic. Their resemblance to persons
alive or dead. Is. indeed. . remarkable
coincidence. z
And It Is, one feels. coincidence. Won
Unruh does not believe that the Nuern-
berg trials exercised the evil genii OF
our age. The cause lies deeper. Once.
another novelist, perhaps the greatest,
Fedor Dostoevski. put the same unerring
finger on the source Of social despair. In
the person OF Raskolinkov, In "Crime
and Punishment
Cut on, He Killed.
Raskolnikov was a little Hitler. who
killed but one person. But the source
Of his crime was the same. Like Hitler.
out Of the dregs Of the intellectual pro-
letariat, he had cut himself off from
human solidarity, and killed out of
win to power-to prove that he was
absolutely Independent of all morality,
which triumph is the pinnacle OF the
spirit OF dominion.
Won Unruh's Hitler Is a gigantic
Raskolnikov. an almost anonymous
spirit OF the evil which is reflected
even in the faces Of his opponents and
enemiesin all of them except Uhle,
the unclassable emigre and the figure
Of the Unknown Soldier Of World War I.
He, having survived 20 years In quarry
near verdun, Is brought forth by Uhle
on the eve Of this last war to bring the
message that life is faith, devotion and.
love. or Is un-life thence. death. :
Through Uhle the author expresses
the philosophy which has never deserted
him since, as a young Prussian officer,
he saw a vision of truth and reality in
the slaughterhouse of verdun in 1916.
Saved by General.
Scion Of all aristocratic, military
Prussian family, educated with Hohen-
zollern princes, he was commissioned
as an officer to write a propaganda
drama to keep up the morale of Ger
man troops. Instead. in The Way OF
Sacrifice" he produced . flaming de-
nunciation OF the witchcraft of blood
sacrifice Of youth and call to brother
hood. He was court-martialed, and
saved only by the Intervention Of his
general who secretly shared his views.
Won Unruh went home to call for .
new Germany based on the revelations
that had come to front-f1ghters. The
people heard, but not the ruling pow-
ers. His last appearance In Berlin was
before $1,000 persons on the eve Of
Hitler's triumph, when he uttered the
awful prophecy that Hitler would mean
the end OF the Reich.
Then he left Germany for Il years
Of lonely exile. In France, interned as
an enemy alien, he was rescued from
German armies by President Roosevelt
on the Intervention of Albert Einstein.
Here he has lived in solitude, Stunned
by organized emigre groups. The revolu-
tion for which he waits has not come. He
cannot save himself from the awful soli-
tude OF man from man, which he sees
as the source OF despairing evil. Yet,
this novel, at times unbearable, is so
diffused with pity and so lightened
with the splendor OF love that 1t sends
out the ray Of mans unquenchable
hope.
released by the Bell Syndicate. Inc.)