Max Barthel (born 17 November 1893 in

Loschwitz Loschwitz is a borough (''Stadtbezirk'') of Dresden, Germany, incorporated in 1921. It consists of ten quarters (''Stadtteile''): Loschwitz is a villa quarter located at the slopes north of the Elbe river. At the top of the hillside is the qu ...

, Dresden — died 17 June 1975 in Waldbröl) was a German writer. A factory worker, Barthel was a member of the socialist youth movement; he was a World War I frontline soldier from 1914 to 1918.

Trip to Russia

In 1920 he accepted a personal invitation from

Karl Radek Karl Berngardovich Radek (russian: Карл Бернгардович Радек; 31 October 1885 – 19 May 1939) was a Russian revolutionary and a Marxist active in the Polish and German social democratic movements before World War I and a C ...

to travel to Moscow and attend the

2nd World Congress of the Comintern The 2nd World Congress of the Communist International was a gathering of approximately 220 voting and non-voting representatives of Communist and revolutionary socialist political parties from around the world, held in Petrograd and Moscow from J ...

in 1920. He travelled as a

stowaway A stowaway or clandestine traveller is a person who secretly boards a vehicle, such as a ship, an aircraft, a train, cargo truck or bus. Sometimes, the purpose is to get from one place to another without paying for transportation. In other cas ...

to Estonia. Once here he mingled with Russian

prisoners of war A prisoner of war (POW) is a person who is held Captivity, captive by a belligerent power during or immediately after an armed conflict. The earliest recorded usage of the phrase "prisoner of war" dates back to 1610. Belligerents hold priso ...

and thus was able to cross the border. Whilst in Russia, he also attended the International Conference of the Young Communist International and met Vladimir Lenin. He attended the Kultintern, where he joined the Provisional International Bureau. In 1923 Barthel moved from the KPD (

Communist Party of Germany The Communist Party of Germany (german: Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands, , KPD ) was a major political party in the Weimar Republic between 1918 and 1933, an underground resistance movement in Nazi Germany, and a minor party in West German ...

) to the

Social Democratic Party of Germany The Social Democratic Party of Germany (german: Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands, ; SPD, ) is a centre-left social democratic political party in Germany. It is one of the major parties of contemporary Germany. Saskia Esken has been the ...

. He drew closer to Nazism after the

seizure of power An epileptic seizure, informally known as a seizure, is a period of symptoms due to abnormally excessive or synchronous neuronal activity in the brain. Outward effects vary from uncontrolled shaking movements involving much of the body with los ...

; he was a reporter on Strength Through Joy trips, and a press correspondent during the war. In 1922 he had worked Communist ideas into the poem "Arbeiterseele" (The Worker's Soul), but in 1934 his novel ''Das unsterbliche Volk'' (The Immortal ''Volk'') described "the transformation of a German worker imselffrom a Communist to a follower of the Führer". In a tone of resignation, Barthel titled his postwar autobiography ''Kein Bedarf an Weltgeschichte'' (No Need for World History; 1950).

Works

* ''Vom roten Moskau bis zum schwarzen Meer'' (From Red Moscow to the Black Sea, 1921) Berlin: Internationaler Jugendverlag * ''Der Mensch am Kreuz. Roman nach dem Tagebuch eines katholischen Pfarrers'' (The Man on the Cross. A Novel based on the Diary of a Catholic Pastor, 1929) Berlin: Der Bücherkreis

Bibliography

* Christian Zentner, Friedemann Bedürftig (1991). '' The Encyclopedia of the Third Reich''. Macmillan, New York.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Barthel, Max 1893 births 1975 deaths Writers from Dresden People from the Kingdom of Saxony Communist Party of Germany politicians Social Democratic Party of Germany politicians German Army personnel of World War I German male writers Politicians from Dresden