I moved in with Hannibal
I moved in with Hannibal is a 1960 youth novel by Hans Baumann . It is about the procession of the Carthaginian general Hannibal and his 37 elephants across the Alps with the aim of conquering Rome .
content
The Deutsche Taschenbuchverlag (dtv-junior) describes the book as follows:
“More than 2000 years ago, Hannibal crossed the Alps with a huge army of mercenaries. He wants to conquer and destroy Rome. Hannibal's greatest trump card are 37 elephants, which terrify the Romans. A young driver rides one of these elephants, on Suru. From his perspective, we experience the gripping, adventurous drama of this campaign and the fate of the general Hannibal between triumph and defeat. The historical tragedy, however, is outshone by the naive friendship that the young driver has with his elephant Suru. "
I moved with Hannibal is divided into an introduction ( The Treasure Digger ), a main part with 34 chapters and a final part ( The Treasure ).
The main part is the story of the aged elephant driver, who tells his experiences of the campaign to two children who live in the middle of the ruins of Sagunto , the home of the driver, which was destroyed by Hannibal . The novel changes into this narrative perspective in the introductory and concluding part.
The driver tells the story of his own life. After the destruction of his hometown Sagunto, the little boy joins the Carthaginian army as a driver. Over time he not only wins the trust of Karthalo and the affection of the elephant Suru . Soon he will be no less respected and valued by Hannibal. The army and its 37 elephants set off from New Carthage towards Rome. A large part of the Carthaginian army and a number of war elephants perished on the march, especially when conquering the Alps. Nevertheless, Hannibal manages to beat the Romans several times. When, ultimately, Suru, the last living elephant and fatally injured, is killed by Hannibal, the young driver breaks up with the general. He feels that the struggle against Rome and the Romans is driven by hatred, retribution and breaking one's word. After Suru's death, he leaves the army, is picked up by Roman soldiers and brought to Rome. There he is tortured as Hannibal's elephant driver and presented to the people as an attraction. In the Roman service he follows the fate of Hannibal from afar, flees after the battle for Carthage and returns to the ruins of Sagunt aged.
The novel and the seductive power of Hannibal can certainly be seen as Baumann's autobiographical processing during the Nazi era, as he said about the motivation of the novel:
“ It's not a historical book. I was trying to describe what I was experiencing and I took a past scene to make it clearer. "
expenditure
I moved in with Hannibal first appeared in Ensslin & Laiblin Verlag, later (from 1972) in the program dtv-Junior of the German paperback publishing house , where it reached the 27th edition in 2006. The book has been translated into several languages such as English, Russian, Danish, Swedish, Dutch, Japanese, Portuguese. An audio book was published by Hörverlag in 2002, read by Achim Höppner .
Individual evidence
- ^ Deutscher Taschenbuchverlag: Author Hans Baumann Accessed: (October 18, 2010)