Gunnar Kopperud

The time is 1994, and violence has broken out between Armenia and Azerbaijan. During this nine day war, Markus, a German soldier who was captured at the Battle of Stalingrad during World War II, and who never returned to Germany, discusses war with an Armenian priest as he contemplates his role in the Nazi invasion of Russia, and particularly his role in the widespread desecration and murder of civilians: women, children and the elderly. He has been tormented since the end of World War II, struggling with guilt over his actions.

Kopperud is a wonderful and lyrical writer, and an astute commentator on war. For example:

"The people who said the least were those who had fought in the previous war; they merely looked at each other, and in their eyes lay trenches and barbed wire and no-man's land and bodies and defeat. Most of them were middle-aged and didn't figure on being called up, but they had sons of draft age and they gave their sons that look that fathers have always given their sons when war breaks out: a look torn between sorrow over a history that no one can stop, and pride at their being called upon by history.
"The people who said a little more were those who had lived through the previous war. They straightened their backs as if rising up from the rationing and the sound of hammers when casualty lists were posted in the marketplace, the telegram from the defense department, the medal hung on the son's photograph, the defeat, and finally the humiliation and the sound of crutches everywhere. Those who had lived through the previous war looked toward the new war with a kind of hope.
"The people who said the most were the new ones, those who didn't know what war was; they had merely assimilated the humiliation. They greeted the war with a mixture of pride and excitement; convinced they were right, they carried banners and beat drums and paraded through the streets the way people always do before going to war.
"Later a time would come when historians would discuss the cause and judges would discuss the blame, but at that time, neither of these words existed. The country went to war because it had to, and if there was anyone who could have stopped the war, they spoke so softly that their voices were drowned out by the noise from the mass rallies. The country went to war because it wanted to, in warm sunshine and a lush play of colours, and people lifted their faces toward the beautiful weather and thought: what a magnificent day to go to war...."

While large portions of the book take place on the battlefield, the book is primarily cerebral and contemplative. Kopperud's descriptions of the war are a mixture of the graphic and the lyrical. His description of a young man's feelings and thoughts as he has his first real combat experience seemed very real and visceral to me. Then, in another episode, Kopperud describes the shots exchanged between two enemy snipers in musical terms, focusing on rhythm, counterpoint and form, rather than the deadly excercise the battle really was.

I would not describe the book as compelling reading. Much of it consists of the philosophical arguments and discussions between Markus and the priest, and despite this being a "war" novel it is not an action novel. It is, however, an intricate examination of the inner conflicts tormenting a former German soldier.… (mere)

Powerful, deeply moving and superbly written, this novel is a reflection on war, exile, and redemption. Is it possible to atone for war? This is the question that Kopperud attempts to answer in this thought-provoking novel.

Framed by the nine-day Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan in 1994, a former German soldier, Markus, now living in exile in the region, revisits his haunted past by recounting his story to an Armenian priest. While they speak, the present war unfolds its own atrocities triggering in Markus memories of his own horrific deeds 50 years ago during the Battle of Stalingrad. Tormented by guilt all this time, he seeks atonement for his actions.

Their conversation (confession on his part) transports us to the time before he is drafted into the German army, to his military service, up to his capture by the Russians. We meet him with his 2 friends, also drafted into service, and witness the depths bereft of moral code to which they easily descended in the name of obedience to a cause they would later realize to be a lie. As they neared Stalingrad, they looted, raped, pillaged, as barbaric as any marauding army. Kopperud describes in vivid, almost cinematic, unforgettable detail the hunting down of partisans and extermination of villages sympathetic to the enemy. Later, in their captivity, the soldiers begin to think about what brought them here, ask themselves questions nobody had the answer to, until finally they are forced to confront the futility of war, and their broken selves. Upon their release, in their own individual ways, they try to make amends, try to make things right, try to relieve their conscience, to make sense of their lives again. In references throughout the novel made about the question of Jews and the role of the Catholic Church during the war, and Palestine today, the themes of guilt and atonement likewise recurs.

Unlike most WWII novels which focus on victims of war, here the involvement in war is told from the invaders/perpetrators point of view, specifically from the point of view of ordinary soldiers who made up the most hated and feared of armies then. We realize that war exacts its toll on both the victim and the perpetrator. And in the end, what exactly is attained by war?

This book ranks among my best reads in war fiction.… (mere)