The Forgotten Soldier
Ratings5
Average rating4.4
15
Ratings5
Average rating4.4
This book recounts the horror of World War II on the eastern front, as seen through the eyes of a teenaged German soldier. At first an exciting adventure, young Guy Sajer's war becomes, as the German invasion falters in the icy vastness of the Ukraine, a simple, desperate struggle for survival against cold, hunger, and above all the terrifying Soviet artillery. As a member of the elite Gross Deutschland Division, he fought in all the great battles from Kursk to Kharkov. His German footsoldier's perspective makes The Forgotten Soldier a unique war memoir, the book that the Christian Science Monitor said "may well be the book about World War II which has been so long awaited." Now it has been handsomely republished as a hardcover containing fifty rare German combat photos of life and death at the eastern front. The photos of troops battling through snow, mud, burned villages, and rubble-strewn cities depict the hardships and destructiveness of war. Many are originally from the private collections of German soldiers and have never been published before. This volume is a deluxe edition of a true classic.
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In late 1942 Guy Sajer, a French boy, was drafted into the German army. His mother being German, the conquerors considered him German and therefore good canon fodder. Truthfully, he went willingly as the war seemed a great adventure to a teenage boy. He didn't realize until he found himself in a nightmare reality that he was going to something closely resembling hell.
Starting in a transport unit and later transferring to a famous attack division (Großdeutschland), he got to experience that terrible war up close and personal. He somehow survived while most of his mates died.
After the war he decided to tell his story. This memoir, one of the best books I have read about the Ostfront, is the result. It is a story of terror, of horror, of depravation, of hunger. It is also a story of resolute courage, of friendship, of joy in victory, of despair in defeat, and of absolute trust in one's comrades.
Be aware that the subject matter is quite disturbing in places and is told in great detail. (I had to take it a little bit at a time.)
Probably the best ww2 Eastern Front memoirs I've ever read (I have read many real, non-fiction, from Germans, Romanians, Russians).
It succesfully and uniquely combines Remarque (All quiet on the western front) style sensibility and introspection with Sven Hassel style combat scenes (some better than Hassel but also way harder, since there s no “funny” relief here).
Also the hardest and most traumatic ww2 memoirs I've ever read - it requires the reader to take often breaks, so as not to literally burst into tears.
Also probably the best in describing ongoing Ptsd (i mean during the war, not after) and the impossibility to interact with civilians.
Memorable book, but terrible to read (in the traumatic sense, in the literary one it's really writer - not soldier - level, mostly reminding of Remarque).
