Otto Paust

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Otto Paust (born May 27, 1897 in Einsiedel , Saxony , today in Chemnitz , † November 20, 1975 in Waiblingen near Stuttgart ) was a German National Socialist journalist and writer . Paust also wrote under the pseudonym Herbert Herbesthal .

Life

1914-1945

Paust took part in the First World War as a war volunteer from 1914 and in 1919/20 joined the Freikorps von Klewitz and the Guard Cavalry Rifle Division . After participating in the Kapp Putsch , he worked as a journalist in Berlin. From 1927 to 1934 he was editor of the Berliner Nachtausgabe , in 1930 editor of the NSDAP organ, The Attack, founded and published by Goebbels (1930-1935). Paust joined the NSDAP and the SA in 1930 and was appointed Sturmbannführer the following year.

One of his texts is the poem SA comrade from 1933 on the subject of the so-called "March fallen", who only joined the SA after the "fighting time": "You are like someone from the battlefield / We are completely connected. / The standard shaft - / It grew in your heart. You blow over / The storms flags that tighten loyalty. " Due to their suitability for everyday propaganda, his texts have also been included in the daily press.

From 1935 he worked as chief editor of Reclams Universum (until 1939) and the NS monthly magazine Das neue Deutschland . From 1937 he headed the "Comradeship of Front Poets in the NSDAP". In this position he presented Hitler with a present on his birthday in 1937. In 1938 Paust was promoted to SA Standartenführer and, together with Hans Zöberlein, received the culture prize for poetry and literature donated by the SA Chief of Staff for his writing Land in the Light (1937), the third volume of his German trilogy . The German trilogy with the novels Volk im Feuer (1935), Nation in Not (1936) and Land im Licht , which was published by the central publishing house of the NSDAP (Eher-Verlag, Munich) due to its propaganda content, is considered to be Paust's main work. The literary scholar Jay W. Baird qualified the author as one of "Hitler's war poets". In 1938 the entire trilogy was awarded the highest NSDAP funding note:

“This script becomes the NSDAP. [!], its branches and affiliated associations as well as non-partisan organizations and corporations recommended for acquisition and funding [...]. It is listed in the NS bibliography [...] and is included in the directory of books and publications suitable for procurement for school libraries (teachers' and school libraries). There are also hundreds of judgments from the party, the state, the Wehrmacht, the press and radio, who recommend the work. "

Paust's trilogy received a lot of attention from the Nazi regime because "with its help [...] an allegedly long tradition and historical continuity of National Socialism could be constructed". In addition, the fact that Paust used his own experiences in the three novels strengthened the credibility of these propaganda texts. Due to the "autobiographical references and the claim to truth in his texts, his literary participation in the establishment and consolidation of the dictatorship seems all the more important, especially since he addressed a mass audience and in particular the trilogy could be used as an allegedly authentic testimony to ideological manipulation." The trilogy reached one Total circulation of over 300,000 copies.

Paust was a leading member of the Berlin SA culture group.

At the World War II P discharge participated as a war correspondent in part. His achievements in the propaganda and military sector as well as his leadership qualities were the reason for a rapid rise in the military: in 1943 Paust was promoted to major.

1945-1975

After Paust was arrested by the American occupation authorities on July 26, 1945 and sent to the Moosburg civilian internment camp (Bavaria), he was arrested on July 17/18. June 1947 released before his trial for “incapacity to imprison” (probably for health reasons). Paust then went into hiding, which is why the denazification proceedings against him were finally discontinued in March 1948. It is not clear where he stayed until 1955 (Paust is now listed in Waiblingen's address book).

With the end of National Socialism, Paust's writing career ended. He was now the local editor of a provincial newspaper in Waiblingen, then as a provincial editor in the Landau local reaction of the daily newspaper Pfälzer Tageblatt . His literary endeavors continued in the right-wing extremist milieu, for example in the magazine Das Deutsche Wort . Except in the historical context of "Literature in National Socialism" it was not noticed any further.

Paust died on November 20, 1975 at the age of 78 in Waiblingen.

Others

In the Soviet zone of occupation and in the GDR, his writings were placed on the list of literature to be segregated as contaminated by the Nazis .

Fonts

  • Way in the morning, Berlin: Bloch 1933
  • People in Fire, Berlin: Eher-Verlag 1934
  • Nation in Need, Berlin: Limpert 1936
  • German Verses, Berlin: Limpert 1936
  • That was a summer, Dresden: Limpert, 1936
  • Land in Licht, Berlin: Limpert 1937
  • Eight brass buttons for a pair of boots, Rather, 1937
  • People under the hammer, Berlin: Limpert 1939
  • The instruction hour, Munich: Rather, 1940, 10th edition 1944
  • Kleine Frau Frühwaldt, Wilhelm Limpert-Verlag Berlin 1940
  • His Majesty the Recruit, Munich: More like 1941
  • Our reporting dog is a non-smoker, Munich: More like 1943
  • Comradeship is stronger than death, Berlin: Limpert 1943

Works under the pseudonym Herbert Herbesthal

  • The journey of Baron Francois , Leipzig: E. Keil's successor (A. Scherl), 1925

literature

  • Jay W. Baird: Hitler's was poets. Literature and politics in the Third Reich . Cambridge (USA) 2008.
  • Ernst Klee : The cultural lexicon for the Third Reich. Who was what before and after 1945. Completely revised edition. Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2009, ISBN 978-3-596-17153-8 .
  • Alicia Pfeifer: Otto Paust - the poet of the "fight time" . In: Rolf Düsterberg (Ed.): Poets for the "Third Reich". Biographical studies on the relationship between literature and ideology . Volume 3. Bielefeld: Aisthesis 2015, pp. 181–208.
  • Matthias Sprenger: Landsknechte on the way to the Third Reich? On the genesis and change of the Freikorps myth . Paderborn: Schöningh 2008.
  • Erich Stockhorst: 5000 heads: who was what in the 3rd Reich . Arndt-Verlag , Kiel 2000, p. 318 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Ernst Klee: The culture lexicon for the Third Reich. Who was what before and after 1945. Completely revised edition. Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2009, p. 408.
  2. ↑ Quoted from: Siegener Zeitung, January 29, 1938.
  3. ^ Ernst Klee: The culture lexicon for the Third Reich. Who was what before and after 1945. Completely revised edition. Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2009, p. 408.
  4. ↑ Alicia Pfeifer: Otto Paust - the poet of the "fight time" . In: Rolf Düsterberg (Ed.): Poets for the "Third Reich". Biographical studies on the relationship between literature and ideology . Volume 3. Bielefeld: Aisthesis 2015, p. 199.
  5. ↑ Alicia Pfeifer: Otto Paust - the poet of the "fight time" . In: Rolf Düsterberg (Ed.): Poets for the "Third Reich". Biographical studies on the relationship between literature and ideology . Volume 3. Bielefeld: Aisthesis 2015, p. 200.
  6. ↑ Jay W. Baird, Hitler's war poets. Literature and politics in the Third Reich, Cambridge (USA) 2008.
  7. ↑ Brochure from Wilhelm Limpert-Verlag [approx. 1938]. DLA, Paust, quoted from Pfeifer (2015), 200f.
  8. ↑ Alicia Pfeifer: Otto Paust - the poet of the "fight time" . In: Rolf Düsterberg (Ed.): Poets for the "Third Reich". Biographical studies on the relationship between literature and ideology . Volume 3. Bielefeld: Aisthesis 2015, p. 201; see. Sprenger (2008), p. 55.
  9. ↑ Alicia Pfeifer: Otto Paust - the poet of the "fight time" . In: Rolf Düsterberg (Ed.): Poets for the "Third Reich". Biographical studies on the relationship between literature and ideology . Volume 3. Bielefeld: Aisthesis 2015, pp. 201f.
  10. ↑ a b Alicia Pfeifer: Otto Paust - the poet of the "fight time" . In: Rolf Düsterberg (Ed.): Poets for the "Third Reich". Biographical studies on the relationship between literature and ideology . Volume 3. Bielefeld: Aisthesis 2015, p. 181.
  11. ↑ Alicia Pfeifer: Otto Paust - the poet of the "fight time" . In: Rolf Düsterberg (Ed.): Poets for the "Third Reich". Biographical studies on the relationship between literature and ideology . Volume 3. Bielefeld: Aisthesis 2015, p. 202.
  12. ↑ Alicia Pfeifer: Otto Paust - the poet of the "fight time" . In: Rolf Düsterberg (Ed.): Poets for the "Third Reich". Biographical studies on the relationship between literature and ideology . Volume 3. Bielefeld: Aisthesis 2015, pp. 204f.
  13. ↑ a b Alicia Pfeifer: Otto Paust - the poet of the "fight time" . In: Rolf Düsterberg (Ed.): Poets for the "Third Reich". Biographical studies on the relationship between literature and ideology . Volume 3. Bielefeld: Aisthesis 2015, p. 205.
  14. ^ Ernst Klee: The culture lexicon for the Third Reich. Who was what before and after 1945. Completely revised edition. Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2009, p. 408.
  15. ↑ Gert Loschütz, From book to book. Günter Grass in the Critique, Neuwied / Berlin 1968, p. 8.
  16. ↑ Alicia Pfeifer: Otto Paust - the poet of the "fight time" . In: Rolf Düsterberg (Ed.): Poets for the "Third Reich". Biographical studies on the relationship between literature and ideology . Volume 3. Bielefeld: Aisthesis 2015, p. 206.
  17. ↑ http://www.polunbi.de/bibliothek/1946-nslit-p.html
  18. ↑ http://www.polunbi.de/bibliothek/1946-nslit-k.html
personal data
SURNAME Paust, Otto
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German National Socialist writer
DATE OF BIRTH May 27, 1897
PLACE OF BIRTH Einsiedel , Saxony (now part of Chemnitz)
DATE OF DEATH 20th November 1975
Place of death Waiblingen