The Forgotten Soldier

I recently read online about some controversy surrounding the authenticity
of Guy Sajer's 'The Forgotten Soldier'. This really surprised me because I was carried along so well by it, I didn't think for a minute it wasn't a true account. But I am not knowlegeable enough to form an strong opinion and wondered if other Lounge members have read this book and what they thought of it. Mr.Sajer is apparently alive and well, living in Paris and works as a cartoonist/illustrator.
My opinion insofar as I can tell - it's impossible to imagine writing with that passion and candour without having lived the experience. But how can you tell?

Wow. A retired Marine Lt. Col. was recommending his book to me just yesterday... Fascinating.

I just looked him up on Lambiek.net for his comic work (apparently his artist nom du guerre was Guy Mouminoux). NSFW, btw.

Interesting controversy. He wouldn't be the first to fake it. I'm withholding judgment until there's conclusive evidence. Kind of like a reverse Gunter Grass situation.

Edit: Now you've got me hooked on this controversy.
Here is a compilation of articles debating the veracity of the book:
http://members.shaw.ca/grossdeutschland/sajer.htm

One of my favourite reads.

As is Devil's Guard by George Robert Elfort (New English Library), but sadly is hard to get hold of.

I'd be very disappointed if 'Forgotten Soldier' isn't a true autobiographical story. But whatever the background, it is a GREAT read and totally captures the feel and essence of that period of time as one individual involved in conflict saw and felt it.

Personally, I wouldn't knock it. Just 'read' it.

When I first read this book I placed it in the category of military 'faction' - in my opinion a rather large section of the library of military 'history'.

Much of the genre is written by people who were actually 'there', but who for a variety of reasons (some of them understandable, others less so) give a different version of events.

It is difficult to place some famous works by notable 'first person' authors (e.g. TE Lawrence, Andy MacNab) anywhere but in the 'grey area' of fact and fiction. Other 'third person' authors (e.g. David Irving) have produced apparently well-researched works that differ significantly from 'received history'.

WRT 'The Forgotten Soldier', I think that there is at least a case for saying that there is an attempt here to deceive (it is often called novel) as it is apparently based on 'invented' facts. Comparisons with 'The Hitler Diaries' are inevitably drawn.
<added later> What I'm trying to say, is that attempts to prove that the book is a true account of personal experience are no more convincing (IMO) than attempts to refute it. In any event, provoig that M. Sajer was present at the places and times stated does not prove that he played the roles described or was involved in the incidents he says actually took place.

There is at least one world-famous University Professor whose PhD thesis has been shown convincingly to be fiction! His university did not take away his PhD...

As someone asked..what is truth?

Alan

>>As someone asked..what is truth?

Anything that isn't nonsense, fabrication or embellishment.

Factual or no, autobiographical or no, it seems to me that quite a few people find the book entertaining and engrossing. Writers are essentially storytellers, and many embellish or distort; even misrepresent.

Farley Mowat was a very successful writer who never let the truth get in the way of a good story, for example. If a number of German vets (or other vets, for that matter) read the book and claim that it was accurate, then that either makes it true or a pretty damn good bit of creative writing. Stephen Crane's bood "Red Badge Of Courage" was so well written that a couple of Civil War vets even claimed to have served with Crane, even though Crane never did.

The writer is either a skillful storyteller who wishes he was there, or a veteran who was there and wrote things as he remembered them. Given that memory is fallible, I don't see a clear case of outright fraud on his part.

Either way, enjoy the book for what it is.

Chas said:

>>As someone asked..what is truth?

Anything that isn't nonsense, fabrication or embellishment.

Factual or no, autobiographical or no, it seems to me that quite a few people find the book entertaining and engrossing. Writers are essentially storytellers, and many embellish or distort; even misrepresent.

The writer is either a skillful storyteller who wishes he was there, or a veteran who was there and wrote things as he remembered them. Given that memory is fallible, I don't see a clear case of outright fraud on his part.

Either way, enjoy the book for what it is.

Click to expand...

Fair enough, most of us enjoy a good story, well written. However, some of us don't enjoy being misled, 'ripped off' or otherwise defrauded by authors who boost sales by claiming that personal experience is 'the truth', when in fact what is on sale is a novel. Others no doubt feel that history has to be protected by 'ring fencing' it from fiction. And if we are to 'enjoy the book for what it is', we surely need to know what it is. Fact or fiction?

The case for or against 'The Forgotten Soldier' being true is still in the balance, as once was the case for both of the following books, which have been definitively debunked. 'Fragments' by 'Binjamin Wilkomirski' (exposed in 'A Life in Pieces: The Making and Unmaking of Binjamin Wilkomirski' by Blake Eskin) and 'Misha: A Mémoire of the Holocaust Years' by Misha DeFonseca. The latter case was exposed by the book's original publisher who apparently became suspicious and withheld royalty payments. The author sued and won, even though she admitted that the book was not 'of the normal reality' (a concept which is foreign to most of us, I think) saying,
“I always felt different. It's true that, since forever, I felt Jewish and later in life could come to terms with myself by being welcomed by part of this community...There are times when I find it difficult to differentiate between reality and my inner world. The story in the book is mine. It is not the actual reality - it was my reality, my way of surviving".

The main difference, then, between these works of fiction and 'The Forgotten Soldier' is that they exploit the plight of Jews at the hands of the Nazis in order to sell copies. If 'Holocaust denial' is a valid accusation of moral terpitude, then why isn't 'Holocaust exploitation'? Readers will have their own opinions of this as a marketing tactic and of the authors' motives. The following articles are anlightening:

http://www.slate.com/id/2185493/

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/foreign/brunowaterfield/march2008/wolfwoman.htm

Both of these books are 'entertaining and engrossing' as you say - so why weren't they published as novels, so that the authors' creative genius could be duly recognised?

Alan

I found this link has an interesting mix of opinion - some of it's quite old, but
still relevant -

http://www.feldgrau.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=6928

Paddy, Chas and Alan, your points are well made and show this is a broad and difficult topic with regard to memoirs. I guess that any author, whatever his motives, will sooner or later be involved with publishing houses, whose raison d'etre is driven by commerce rather than a wish to spread the truth. The Forgotten Soldier seems to be in print constantly, sometimes with the cover bearing the legend that it is a true story. I wonder what criteria was used to make this claim?

I'll have to re-read it one of these days, to see how it sits in my older (but non the wiser) mind. Hope it's as good as I remember it.......

I first read it more than 35 years ago and even then it didn't 'ring true'. I have read it several times since and each time the learning I have gained (although I wouldn't claim to be an expert on the Eastern Front) has enabled me to see more anachronisms and anomalies. People more expert in the area than I feel there are too many of these to be a coincidence.

So, is this a man misremembering events some twenty two years after they took place or does it contain the exaggerations which are only human nature in embroidering our significant or traumatic experiences, or is it something more - complete fiction?

I, for one, don't know, although better historians than I have come down on one side of the fence or the other.

Alan

ethanedwards said:

I found this link has an interesting mix of opinion - some of it's quite old, but
still relevant -

http://www.feldgrau.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=6928

Paddy, Chas and Alan, your points are well made and show this is a broad and difficult topic with regard to memoirs. I guess that any author, whatever his motives, will sooner or later be involved with publishing houses, whose raison d'etre is driven by commerce rather than a wish to spread the truth. The Forgotten Soldier seems to be in print constantly, sometimes with the cover bearing the legend that it is a true story. I wonder what criteria was used to make this claim?

I'll have to re-read it one of these days, to see how it sits in my older (but non the wiser) mind. Hope it's as good as I remember it.......

Click to expand...

You may also wish to familiarise yourself (if you haven't already done so) with the matter of Sven Hassel, whose writings (and their criticisms) bear some similarities to The Forgotten Soldier. There is a realistic entry on Wikipedia.

Alan Eardley said:

You may also wish to familiarise yourself (if you haven't already done so) with the matter of Sven Hassel, whose writings (and their criticisms) bear some similarities to The Forgotten Soldier. There is a realistic entry on Wikipedia.

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Alan, I did read some Sven Hassel as a boy, (paradoxically they sat next to my Lobsang Rampa books, who Corgi continued to publish long, long after he was revealed to be a plumber from Devon - I can only offer youth and naivety in my defence - not such a good excuse these days though!)
However, I did not like the Hassel books, they always struck me as bogus, reminiscent of 'Battle Picture Library' only without the drawings. I would not have thought to draw a comparison between Hassel and Sajer, but I do see your point.
What I was hoping when I first posted this was some information which could perhaps help establish TFS's authenticity, one way or another. For example, I read the memoirs of a Luftwaffe fighter pilot, who chivalrously invited a vanquished RAF fighter pilot into their officers mess. If I remember correctly, he was wined and dined until eventually the subject of his Victoria Cross ribbon came into the conversation. As we all know, James Nicholson was Fighter Commands only holder of the VC, he was never captured, so we can surmise that the Luftwaffe pilot was, ahem, not altogether precise in his account and for my money that tears a giant hole in his credibility - I do not remember the author, or the title of his book, but there are not that many Luftwaffe memoirs in print.
To balance this out a little, Peter Spoden's memoir is a terrific and informative read..... it's much too short though!

Minor inaccuracies don't necessarily mean untruth, of course. If you read accounts of an actual (and well documented) event such as Operation Chastise (the 'Dam Busters raid' - which is even wrongly named 'Operation Upkeep' in an official document) you will find many inaccuracies.

In this case W/C Gibson gets the position of one of his gunners wrong in the official record. You'd have expected him to know that. Several versions of the order of attack on the Mohne Dam are given by different participants. That's 'the fog of war'. It wouldn't lead me to conclude that Operation Chastise never took place, because it is correlated and corroborated by a number of different sources and artefacts exist to back them up.

What makes some people suspicous about TFS is the lack of such confirming evidence. I just have to say that it is different from other first-person accounts that I have read, where the actions of participants are often reported in different accounts. They may differ in detail, but agree in principle. Perhaps there are sources in Russian or German that haven't come forward yet, but given the fuss over this matter for the last 40 years, where are they?

To use an analogy, think of an incident in a football game, say the 2007 FA Cup Final. Looking back, a number of spectators may dispute whether a shot crossed the goal line, whether a forward was off-side etc., but they would not doubt that the game took place.

The problem with TFS is the lack of cross-referencing with other sources. There is evidence for and against its authenticity and IMO equal weighting could be given to either. One of Sajer's ex-commanding officers has met him and says that he 'could have served under him' but doesn't definitely say that he did and doesn't seem to remember him. I suspect we will never know.

Alan

Alan Eardley said:

You may also wish to familiarise yourself (if you haven't already done so) with the matter of Sven Hassel, whose writings (and their criticisms) bear some similarities to The Forgotten Soldier. There is a realistic entry on Wikipedia.

Click to expand...

In denmark Sven Hassel is regarded as a nazi, a collaborateur and member of the worst of scum: The HIPO Organisation. Danes tourturing and killing danes.

All his books are regarded as lies, a way to earn easy money and whitewash the truth of himself.
From a murdere and traitor to warhero and veteran in a couple of books!:rage:

Sven Hassel

That is a more extreme view than was taken of the author of TFS in postwar France, but he makes much of the fact that he was ostracised in his home land. People who were there at the time have used this relatively mild reaction to attack the truth of the work, as they say that the actual attitude of French people towards him would have been more extreme.

WRT TFS, I still feel we will never know 'the truth'...

Alan

That's hitting the nail on the head Alan - it's the inability to cross-reference
that is so confounding.
And Spitfire, I had no idea Sven Hassel has this deeply unpleasant history with regard to your countrymen, and I apologise to you for even mentioning him.
I'm in agreement with you though Alan with regards TFS - we shall probably never know!

Exactly...

But some people have cited the lack of references to other historical material - where the author cites other work s/he has used to expand on or check his or her own memories - as a factor that indicates authenticity.

Alan

Ethanedwards, no harm done.
Just felt like telling the truth about this "famous" socalled writer.

Spitfire said:

In denmark Sven Hassel is regarded as a nazi, a collaborateur and member of the worst of scum: The HIPO Organisation. Danes tourturing and killing danes.

All his books are regarded as lies, a way to earn easy money and whitewash the truth of himself.
From a murdere and traitor to warhero and veteran in a couple of books!:rage:

Click to expand...

:eusa_clap :eusa_clap Right on Spitfire !:eusa_clap :eusa_clap