Ernst Jünger requires two translations. One from German to English, the second from English to understandable English. I mean this literally. E.J. was without a doubt one of the most brilliant literary minds of the 20th century (which he lived through in its entirety): he was capable not only of compressing enormously complex thoughts and ideas into arresting single sentences, but occasionally of writing prose so beautiful it took on the quality of poetry. However, he was also frequently turgid, opaque, digressive and vague, so that reading his works often required great concentration and patience, not to mention a willingness to sift through those flaws to find what might be called the ores of his meaning. It is possible to read a Jünger book through without actually grasping just what the author wanted to say (Aladdin's Problem confounds me to this day), and this explains partially why "On Pain", a 47 page essay, has 47 pages of forwards and introductions in its vanguard. It is a great and important read, but it is not an easy one.
I say "partially explains" because the other reason Jünger's essays are always prefaced with massive introductions by academics is that he is considered one of the most dangerous writers ever to pick up a pen. His reputation as "the intellectual Godfather of Fascism" demands that legions of scholars feel obligated to hurl their twopenny bits of disclaimer before he is allowed to speak. Jünger's works are presumed, by those who presume to be smarter than you, to be something unreadable unless you've been told how to feel about them beforehand. I remember reading a forward to On the Marble Cliffs which violently attacked E.J. because he admittedly "lacked the capacity for hatred", by far the strangest criticism I've ever heard. It is precisely Jünger's incapacity for ordinary human emotions which allowed him to write the way he did...but I guess that's the problem. His ideas, his conclusions about existence, his particular way of viewing the world, are regarded by a great many people as simply too dangerous to be tolerated, which goes a long way to explaining why most of his works have never been translated, and why the few that have are always so unreasonably expensive or hard to lay ahold of.
"On Pain" is a deceptive title, and here again we come to the issue of translation, which is noted by the translator himself in his forward. This is not a book about the sensation of physical pain, but rather a metaphysical analysis of the changing relationship between human beings and suffering in the broadest sense of that word. In "On Pain", Jünger, who was writing in 1934, and whose outlook was shaped by his combat experiences as a storm trooper in the First World War, posits that mankind is turning away from the values of burgeois morality - saftey, security, ease, comfort, individualism - and becoming harder, more disciplined, and less individual. The new man defines himself via struggle, self-sacrifice, and the ability to withstand pain in all its forms, physical, emotional and otherwise. Jünger likens this evolving consciousness of man to a photographic lens, which gazes upon the most gut-wrenching horror in total objectivity, unmoved by pity or emotion of any kind. He also maintains that his mentality, the conservative mentality, is born out of an acceptance that pain is unavoidable and, in certain mediums, beneficial. Discipline, for example, is "the way man maintains contact with pain." He notes that during the "enlightened" i.e. liberal era, a "good" face was "nervois, pliant, changing, and open to the most diverse kind of influences and impulses." In '34, however (with the Nazis in power in Germany, Communists in Russia, Fasicts in Italy, etc.) the human face is undergoing a "hardening" which brings to mind soldiers of the old Prussian Army, that "stronghold of heroic virtues." What causes this physical manifestation of the inner hardening of the human soul, Jünger writes, is "the imposition of firm and impersonal rules and regulations." Humanity, he believes, has galvanized itself in imitation of the unfeeling, destructive machines he has created, and thus taken a step to become more machine than man.
At the heart of "On Pain" is Jünger's rejection of what we today would call "Western values." America is the stronghold of the pleasure-loving super-individual, who no longer feels much in the way of responsibility, and whose main purpose in life, other than experiencing pleasure, is in the acquisition of money and objects. But it is not the only country to hold these "values", and they are precisely what Jünger wanted to destroy. "On Pain" is, in essence, a gleeful ringing-in of what he thought was a new era, one which shovels dirt over the corpse of bourgeois liberalism. And indeed, as an indictment of "moderate" and "liberal" thinking it is devastating, the moreso because Jünger was not a Nazi. (Indeed, he saw with remarkable prescience that a society founded on the values of the machine could lead to ruin. "One graps how an enormous organizational capacity can exist alongside a complete blindness vis-à-vis values, belief without meaning, discipline without legitimacy.") Rather, it he is simply unwilling to accept that a fat belly, a full wallet and a silk cushion are the highest ideals of human existence. Just as The Storm of Steel committed the ultimate academic sin in refusing to view war as an unqualified evil, finding in it "an incomparable schooling of the heart", "On Pain" compounds that sin by maintaining that the measure of a man lays in his capacity to withstand pain.
Viewed as prophecy, "On Pain" is faulty as of now, but one can already see in certain places in the world a deep-seated rejection of "Western values" and a desire to define life in terms of the acceptance of suffering rather than in its avoidance. Radical Islam, for example, views the individual as of no consequence except in his relation to the struggle, the struggle itself as waged without mercy or restraint, and death as simply the price of devotion to the faith. Terrorism is a cult of pain as Jünger defines the word, and if we see it in those terms the magnitude of the task of defeating it becomes clear: one of many reasons why "On Pain" remains relevant after 76 years.
Loading your book clubs
There was a problem loading your book clubs. Please try again.
Not in a club? Learn more
Join or create book clubs
Choose books together
Track your books
Bring your club to Amazon Book Clubs, start a new book club and invite your friends to join, or find a club that’s right for you for free.
Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required. Learn more
Read instantly on your browser with Kindle Cloud Reader.
Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.
Flip to back Flip to front
Follow the Author
Something went wrong. Please try your request again later.
Customers who viewed this item also viewed
Page 1 of 1 Start overPage 1 of 1
About the author
Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.
Customer reviews
A boring stream of consciousness about everything between 1918 and 1934
Reviewed in the United States on July 17, 2020
An excruciatingly boring short book from the excellent author of “The storm of steel”. Where is the energy and wit and power of his first novel? Here you are hearing the voice of the most boring, disengaged social philosopher you can imagine. And he was not yet even 40 when he wrote it!You can say that the book briefly touches everything that can be somehow related to the European zeitgeist between the end of WW1 and 1934 (when the book was published). It speaks very little about the subject of the book - pain - and when it does it is at best unoriginal and at times contradictory: he says that the level of tolerance to pain is mostly in your genes (to use a modern word), and the best way to train the resistance to pain is through formal discipline, but using only self-will for the same purpose is futile. He also says that modern man is sensitive to pain because he lives in a world where the body is of the highest value and thus must be protected against pain at all costs (pp. 16-17 attached). But at a different place he says that his contemporary men had higher tolerance to pain compared to the previous generations because of “the progressive objectification of life” (p. 41).I am attaching a page from the middle where his main ideas on pain are written, and also the last two pages of the book. See for yourself if you’d like to read more of it.
Reviewed in the United States on July 17, 2020
Images in this review
Top reviews from other countries
Amazon Customer
Interesting because contemporary
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on April 13, 2020
