‘Der Kopflohn’ (‘A Price on His Head’) by Anna Seghers (Review)

I was hoping to find more books by female writers for German Literature Month, so I decided to browse online (as you do), eventually stumbling across a novel by Anna Seghers, the author of Transit and The Seventh Cross.  It was an interesting-sounding early work, so I snapped it up, and luckily enough, it arrived in time for me to review it for your pleasure today.  This post sees us heading out into the country, but if you’re expecting idyllic scenes of life on the land, I’m afraid I’ll have to disappoint you.  You see, this is summer 1932 in Germany, and it seems that happiness comes with a hefty price…

*****
Der Kopflohn (A Price on His Head)* begins with poor farmer Andreas Bastian and his family sitting down to eat in their ramshackle hut in the village of Oberweilerbach.  Suddenly, there’s a knock at the door, heralding an unexpected visitor.  Johann Schulz, a relative of the wife’s dead first husband, has for some reason decided to pay them a visit, and he’s invited to supper, and then to stay a while, despite initial reservations on the part of farmer Bastian.

He’s right to be suspicious of a taciturn traveller with very few belongings as it turns out that Johann is a man on the run, accused of the murder of a policeman during a demonstration.  Having fled his home town, he’s keeping his head down in the country, hoping the outcry will dissipate before too long.  Unfortunately, though, there are wanted posters splashed all over the neighbouring town, and in an area where new faces are a rarity, it’s only a matter of time before someone recognises him, and turns him in.

All of the above may make Der Kopflohn sound like a tense thriller, in the vein of The Seventh Cross, but in fact, it’s nothing of the sort.  The blurb focusing on Johann’s plight is rather deceptive as his arrival is merely our introduction into the world of the villagers and their struggles in the summer of 1932.  There’s a rather slow start to the novel as Seghers gradually introduces a sizeable cast, yet the pace eventually picks up as we see how the characters are connected, and learn of their many woes.

The period the novel is set in is, of course, pivotal.  We’re coming up to the elections of July 1932, the first in which the Nazis will come out on top, and in her excellent afterword, Sonja Hilzinger outlines Seghers’ aim in the book, one that entailed a change of focus:

Mit dem Anwachsen des faschistischen Potentials und schießlich der Installierung des nationalsozialistischen Regimes in ihrem eigenen Land wandte sich Anna Segers einem nationalem Stoff zu: Im Kopflohn interessierte sie nicht mehr die politische Avantgarde, sondern die Frage, wieso die Nationalsozialisten sich im bäuerlichen Lebensumfeld so nachhaltig verankern konnten.
p.184 (Aufbau Taschenbuch, 2009)

With the growth of the potential for fascism and eventually the installation of the national-socialist regime in her own land, Anna Segers turned towards national material: in A Price on His Head, she no longer concerned herself with the political avant-garde, but with the question of how the National Socialists had been able to anchor themselves so deeply in the lives of the farming classes. ***
(my translation)

The writer uses the setting of a typical small village in the middle of Germany to show us just how Hitler’s men were able to rise to power in spite of their rather unpalatable aims.

One of the reasons for their success is the poverty experienced by farmers after the war years, the sting of reparations and the after-effects of hyperinflation.  We see how the poorer farmers struggle to make ends meet, scrambling for every pfennig, exploited by those better off and at risk of losing everything if they miss payments on equipment they need for their livelihoods.  Given these circumstances, you can see how it would have been tempting to at least turn a blind eye to the aggressive nature of the new party, in the hope that there was something in these loud proclamations of a better future.

The younger generation, too, are easily seduced by the slogans.  With no opportunities or bright future to look forward to, they’re only too eager to grasp the chance to be part of something bigger than themselves.  The views of Kunkel, one of the village’s leading SA recruits, are a prime example:

Denn Kunkel war vor allem ein Mensch, der fragte, was ihm nützlich sei.  Bei der Zucht von Tomaten, Blumenkohl, Radieschen, Salat fragte er sich nach dem Nutzen.  Wenn ihm Leute Fahnen, Hemden, Armbinden und Aufnahmescheine anboten, fragte er sich, ob ihm diese Leute und Dinge nützlich seien. (p.23)

For, above all, Kunkel was a man who asked what might be of use to him.  When growing tomatoes, cauliflower, radishes and lettuce, he thought about the benefits.  When people offered him flags, shirts, arm-bands and enrolment forms, he asked himself whether these people and things were of use. ***

There’s a lot to be said for being supplied with clean uniforms and a clear enemy in the form of the ‘reds’.  There’s no need to think too hard, just get in the car with your friends and drive around harassing people to join the cause…

Seghers isn’t only focusing on the overtly political, though, and another important theme here is the situation of women.  It’s no secret that the Nazis preferred them to be confined to the home, and several characters here experience this fate, showing that this was already the case out in the country.  Poor Susann Schüchlin is worked to the bone by her husband, who only married her for her inheritance; Sophie Bastian, Andreas’ niece, is married off to a loutish neighbour without having a say in the matter; Dora, Andreas’ ten-year-old daughter, is forced to work outside the home to help bring in money.  It seems the hope of a better future only really holds true for one gender.

Johann’s story, then, fades into the background at times, coming to the fore only when the wanted posters are seen by villagers visiting the town.  Strangely enough, though several people do recognise the newcomer, there’s often a strange reluctance to act, as shown in the thoughts of Herr Naphtel, the only Jewish character in the novel:

Dennoch glimmte in seinem Herzen, im Erlöschen vielleicht schon oder erst im Glühen, ein Fünkchen von Widerwillen; heftiger als vor Mord oder vor Raub oder Lüge oder sonst einem Laster, uralter, dem unverfälschten Menschenherzen eingeglühter Widerwille, einen Verfolgten der Staatsgewalt auszuliefern. (pp.147/8)

And yet there glimmered in his heart, perhaps dying out or maybe just beginning to glow, a spark of reluctance; stronger than the aversion to murder or theft or lying, or to any other vice, more primal, the human heart’s pure reluctance to deliver someone being pursued up to the power of the state. ***

Of course, there are others with no such scruples, who are just waiting for the right time to pounce, meaning it’s rather unlikely that Johann will leave the village unscathed.

Der Kopflohn comes to a climax with two important events for the village, the election and a double wedding on the property of one of the wealthier landowners.  It’s here that Seghers’ careful planning comes to fruit as we have a polyphonic description of events, with a multitude of revellers sitting around the same tables, each with their own feelings and hopes for the future.  With the hindsight of ninety years of history, we know what’s around the corner, but the author, writing this in self-imposed exile in 1933 after the Nazi rise to power, was prescient in foreseeing just how her country would be split and damaged, and to what extent her compatriots would allow themselves to be manipulated in exchange for a chance of some modest prosperity.

Slow to start and a little clumsy in places, Der Kopflohn is nevertheless an intriguing early work from a major writer, a story showing how the climate of the time allowed Nazism to flourish even when few really passionately believed in it.  The literal meaning of the title is ‘the bounty’, the price on Johann’s head, but it’s an idea it’s tempting to expand upon, to regard it as the price the ordinary German folk paid for betraying their consciences.  Yes, there may have been short-term gain in the Nazi era, but as we know only too well, the long-term effects of taking the money were devastating…

* One translation I’ve found of the book is in a joint edition, dating from 1960: Revolt of the Fishermen of Santa Barbara and A Price on His Head, translated by Jack and Renate Mitchell, and Eva Whiff, respectively, published by Seven Seas Publishers.