1940 disaster

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Catastrophe 1940 is a science fiction by Karl Ludwig Kossak , which he published under his pseudonym Karl Ludwig Kossak-Raytenau in 1930. It is one of the author's best-known works of the time. Disaster 1940 was published by the Gerhard Stalling publishing house in Oldenburg in Oldenburg . Its subtitle was Down with Versailles! .

content

It is a utopian novel about war and politics in Europe. After the occupation of the Ruhr area by France and the attempt to annex Danzig by Poland, Germany and Russia join forces to prevent this approach.

Real background

France and Belgium occupied the Ruhr area from 1923 to 1925 . From 1923 the Reichswehr and the Soviet Union worked together in secret .

Dedication to Adolf Hitler

In April 1937 Adolf Hitler received a copy of the author's book with his personal dedication "Adolf Hitler the creator of German purity, German freedom, the creator and chancellor of the Third Reich of the Germans in gratitude to Kossak-Raytenau in April 1937".

The book, which had previously sold well, had not been printed since the seizure of power .

effect

After a popular edition was published in 1932 due to its great success after several new editions, the 1940 catastrophe was actually never reprinted during the entire Third Reich or in the post-war period. After 1945 the novel was placed on the list of literature to be discarded.

Robert Hahn counts disaster 1940 to the circle of "pre-fascist" literature. Dina Brandt sees in it possible revanchist tendencies to propagate "a new world war (it) which should undo the 'shame of Versailles' and lead Germany to new glory".

According to Tilmann Ochs, there is evidence of an influence on the work of Wolfgang Koeppen .

expenditure

  • Karl Ludwig Kossak-Raytenau: disaster 1940. Down with Versailles! Stalling, Oldenburg i. O. 1930. Last 20 thousand, 1930.
  • Also as a popular edition in 1932.

Single receipts

  1. ↑ Dina Brandt: The German future novel 1918-1945: genre typology and socio-historical localization , p. 159 [1]
  2. ↑ Ambrus Miskolczy, Hitler's Library, Central European University Press, p. 90, [2]
  3. ↑ No. II-2191 . In: List of literature to be discarded . First supplement based on January 1, 1947. Zentralverlag, Berlin 1947. Accessed June 15, 2017.
  4. ↑ Robert Hahn: The inventor as redeemer - leaders in the volkish science fiction. In: Hans Esselborn (Ed.): Utopia, Anti-Utopia and Science Fiction in the German-language novel of the 20th century. Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 2003, ISBN 3-8260-2416-8 , pp. 43-44. ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  5. ↑ Dina Brandt: "The world saw what the German spirit created" - The German future novel in the Third Reich. In: Carsten Würmann , Ansgar Warner (ed.): In the break room of the “Third Reich”. On popular culture in National Socialist Germany. Lang, Berlin et al. 2008, ISBN 978-3-03-911443-6 , p. 127 ( limited preview in Google book search).
  6. ^ Tilmann Ochs: Cultural criticism in the work of Wolfgang Koeppens , Lit Verlag , Münster 2004, p. 122 [3]