Die Tagebuchaufzeichnungen von Ernst Jünger

Do you know Ernst Jüngers book "In Stahlgewittern"? Is was sort of a collection of memories and one of the first graphic account of the war. Now they published his original diaries. He wrote these down right in the trenches and always carried his booklet with him. These texts were not edited nor ever intended to be handed on by him, and are written in the original language of the then teenaged soldier. By the way, Jünger was wounded heavily 14 times and received the Pour le Merite.
 
Thanks for the link! Don't expect an anti-war book like "All Quiet on the Western Front" though, he often writes in a rather glorifying way. Even more than "In Stahlgewittern" his diaries are a straight personal account, sometimes focusing on trivialities and horrific incidences with the same emotionally involvement. From historic view, you can see the change in tactics well and the subjective effects of trench warfare are quite apparent.

Considering his spectacular raiding operations and his involvement in so many large battles he was quite a lucky camper. Once he was among only a handful of survivors of his entire company. He reached an age of 102 years.
 
Robert said:
Thanks for the link! Don't expect an anti-war book like "All Quiet on the Western Front" though, he often writes in a rather glorifying way.
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Exactly! It contains several parts, which are pretty hard to read.

One example: he saw an english soldier behind the english trench, maybe 600m from his position. He grabbed the rifle of one of his men, aimed and shot that soldier. Reading between the lines you can find the pride of his shooting skills!

On the other hand quite "funny" how he tells about german soldiers who sneaked to the french lines and fixed a long rope to the barbed wire. Then they went back to the german trench, pulled heavily on the rope and laughed about the french firing their rifles and throwing handgrenades to the supposed enemy.

Although a great book. I read it in one night...
 
I like it because it has one major point to it - it is authentic, the (sometimes confused or immature) thoughts of a 19-year old caught amidst a terrible war. His Stahlgewitter was edited for publication and of course one needs to take the national flurry after the war into account. That is the reason why I like his original dictionaries so much, they are even a step further into the every-day situation of the young men in the trenches and are also written in soldier's slang rather than literary language.
 
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