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As Far as My Feet Will Carry Me
Originally published in 1955, this must be one of the most dramatic adventures of our time. Clemens Forell, a German soldier, was sentenced to 25 years of forced labour in a Siberian lead mine after the Second World War. Rebelling against the brutality of the camp, Forell staged a daring escape, enduring an 8000-mile journey across the trackless wastes of Siberia, in some of the most treacherous and inhospitable conditions on earth.Bauer's writing brilliantly evokes Forell's desperation in the prison camp, and his struggle for survival and terror of recapture as he makes his way towards the Persian frontier and freedom.
289 pages, Kindle Edition
First published April 3, 1955
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August 9, 2017
بالاخره برای انسان روزی میرسد که به هرچیزی عادت میکند، حتی مردن - برداشت آزاد از کتاب
وطن من کجاست؟
به گذشتهام که نگاه میکنم، از جایی به بعد تنها کاری که به جد و جهد کردهام فرار کردن است، تصمیمهایی که همگی بویی از تسلیم شدن میدهند. حتی در کابوسهای بیشمارم، بدون حتی یک مورد استثنا، همیشه در حال فرار کردن از موقعیتی، چیزی یا کسی بودهام. این کتاب هم از عنوانش مشخص است که حول چه محوری میچرخد : فرار. اما فرار افسر آلمانی، بورل از نقطهای دور افتاده در سیبری از جنسی دیگر است. مقاومت و امید تا آخرین نفس به سوی زندگی، تا آنجا که پاها توان همراهی دارند و همین موضوع باعث شده کتابی که فیلمش را قبلا دیدم و از پایانش مطلع بودم تا این اندازه برایم جذاب و هیجان انگیز باشد. کتاب، روایت واقعی فرار یک افسر آلمانی از اردوگاه کار اجباری در منتهیالیه شمال شرقی قاره آسیا تا خاورمیانه، در سرزمینی یخ زده، بدون غذا و سرپناه است. سفری باورنکردنی و از نگاه دیگران غیرممکن. فورل در طول این سه سال سفر، هزاران کیلومتر را میپیماید، آنجا که توان راه رفتن را از دست میدهد، با استخوانهایی شکسته و سست روی سینه میخزد تا شاید روزی به وطنش برسد. امید به زندگی و انگیزهی ماندن، تنها قوت او در این مبارزه با طبعیت خشن، قوانین سخت حکومت کمونیستی شوروی و تمام دنیایش است. حین خواندن شرح این مبارزه، بارها یاد دیالوگی از فیلم در جستجوی خوشبختی موچینو افتادم، آنجا که کریس گاردنر مفلس به کودکش میگوید هرگز به کسی اجازه نده بهت بگه نمیتونی کاری رو انجام بدی، حتی من
#کتابخوانی_در_پادگان
September 1, 2019
تاب در قالب داستان ، روایت خاطرات 'یک افسر آلمانی' در جنگ جهانی دوم است. او ساکن مونیخ بود، که در زمان خدمت در ارتش هیتلر به جبهههای شرق اعزام میشود و عاقبت، به اسارت ارتش شوروی درمیآید. اما او به هنگام اسارت نقشهی فرار را طراحی میکند و سرانجام موفق میشود مسافت میان دماغهی شرقی تا سراسر سیبری را در طول سه سال درنوردد و به کشور خود بازگردد.
البته بعد از کشیدن سختی ها و خطرات فراوان به سمت جنوب امد و وارد کشور ایران شد و در شهر تبریز توسط نیروهای امنیتی بازداشت گردید و خواستار دیدار با سفیر المان شد و بعد از گذشت مدت زیادی که معلوم شد جاسوس نیست برایش قرار ملاقات با سفیر را فراهم نمودند و از همینجا مقدمات ازادی واقعی هم شروع شد
البته بعد از کشیدن سختی ها و خطرات فراوان به سمت جنوب امد و وارد کشور ایران شد و در شهر تبریز توسط نیروهای امنیتی بازداشت گردید و خواستار دیدار با سفیر المان شد و بعد از گذشت مدت زیادی که معلوم شد جاسوس نیست برایش قرار ملاقات با سفیر را فراهم نمودند و از همینجا مقدمات ازادی واقعی هم شروع شد
January 21, 2022
I had mixed feelings bout this book. While it was always interesting, it was not a book that I could not put down. Still, it caused me to think a lot about the human condition. Not that I had any new thoughts about it.
A German was being held as a prisoner of war in a Russian mining camp. All prisoners lived in the mines where they mined lead, and they contacted lead poisoning and knew it. Even their prisoners knew that this was happening, but the cruelty was not just hte lad poisoning. I thought back to the book, "The Iron Rooster," and how in the 80s the Chinese shot those who had committed crimes, and it didn't matter how little the crime was. They were getting rid of those who were bad for society. Yet, in both of these cases, the Russians and the Chinese, those in charge were far more evil than those in prison. It happens everywhere; it is the human condition. It is the desire to see people punished to a greater extent than deserved. It is like those who believe in hellfire or karma because, well, they too, desire people to be punished. Even those in America are becoming more brutal than in the past, or is the past just catching up with us?
So, this man in this book, had done very little to be imprisoned. And when he escaped, I felt cheerful.
The people on theoutside of the priSon were much more kind towards him, even inviging him into their homes, often knowing that he was an escaped prisoner.
Do the the hospitality of the Russians, it took hm three years to get to the boarder. The warmth and kindness of strangers made this book remember-able and pleasant to read.
A German was being held as a prisoner of war in a Russian mining camp. All prisoners lived in the mines where they mined lead, and they contacted lead poisoning and knew it. Even their prisoners knew that this was happening, but the cruelty was not just hte lad poisoning. I thought back to the book, "The Iron Rooster," and how in the 80s the Chinese shot those who had committed crimes, and it didn't matter how little the crime was. They were getting rid of those who were bad for society. Yet, in both of these cases, the Russians and the Chinese, those in charge were far more evil than those in prison. It happens everywhere; it is the human condition. It is the desire to see people punished to a greater extent than deserved. It is like those who believe in hellfire or karma because, well, they too, desire people to be punished. Even those in America are becoming more brutal than in the past, or is the past just catching up with us?
So, this man in this book, had done very little to be imprisoned. And when he escaped, I felt cheerful.
The people on theoutside of the priSon were much more kind towards him, even inviging him into their homes, often knowing that he was an escaped prisoner.
Do the the hospitality of the Russians, it took hm three years to get to the boarder. The warmth and kindness of strangers made this book remember-able and pleasant to read.
July 21, 2023
La letteratura e il cinema hollywoodiano ci hanno raccontato le rocambolesche fughe dei soldati alleati dai lager nazisti della seconda guerra mondiale, ma stavolta un libro racconta l'impossibile fuga di un soldato tedesco, prigioniero dei Russi in una sperduta e micidiale miniera di uranio che, alla morte certa, preferisce l'avventurarsi in una terra sconosciuta, munito solo dell'essenziale per non morire subito e della sua caparbia volontà di sopravvivere e di cercare l'ovest, la patria, la libertà. Una storia avventurosa che lascia senza parole, bella da leggere, da consigliare e da ricordare negli anni
February 4, 2015
This book had been sitting awhile in my bookcase, when after recently watching the Polish film (fictional) “The Way Back” (2010), I was reminded of Bauer’s book.
There is a b/w photograph on the back cover, showing the back of the principal protagonist, Clemens Forell (an alias), who faces the author and his publisher. To modern eyes the image appears stiff, staged and ill at ease; but taking a moment to consider 1940s and 1950s film technology, that may just be normal for the period.
Descriptive writing such as “… walking skeletons. Their skins were blotched and yellow with jaundice, their legs and feet perpetually swollen…” (p.160) left me assessing fundamental questions about mind and muscle, the sharpening of the senses, and the ability to think quickly (or not), to assess probabilities, and about the nature of what we call ‘luck’. This book describes, in varying detail, such an extraordinarily long journey through such dauntingly hostile terrain. I have no remotely comparable personal experience to relate it to.
Wikipedia [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/As_Far_a...] casts doubt on the veracity of the “As Far As My Feet Will Carry Me”; whereas the New York Times review of the 2001 film [http://www.nytimes.com/movies/movie/2...] is more subtle in planting the idea that perhaps a story can grow into the role of an epic of war. After all, I pondered, surely no-one reads ”Beowulf as true fact?
Laying aside the niggling question of fact or fiction, or whether a knit & purl of both, I had picked up the book late one evening, started to read … and pretty much immediately wished for a map showing the route of the escape. However, it wasn’t until pages 80-81 that I found what I sought!
There being no chapters in this book (just periodic “ * * * ” type line breaks), I had earlier raged that the publisher (Andre Deutsch) had deemed it unnecessary to include anything as useful as an index! Yet in not knowing what comes next, the lack of formal division into chapters curiously acts to deepen the almost unimaginable sense of the sheer length of ‘Clemens Forell’s’ highly dangerous three year and 8.000 mile journey. That sense is reinforced by that very absence of division. But I found it discombobulating to have read through four-fifths of this book, only to find that a mere quarter of the map had been traversed!
On occasion the translator charmed me: “He blew his nose and then began to gesticulate with his bare hands, conveying his meaning with such skill that when he paused now and then to reflect, it seemed to be his fingers that were thinking what they should say next.” (p.104). Survival is not only a matter of knowledge and some luck; it becomes a matter of heightened senses, and ultimately of instinct. Throughout, the action fully held my attention. There are no dull edges here; even if on the odd occasion my mind insisted returning to question what had filled those later gaps in the timeline of this very long walk. Sheer boredom? Hallucination? Illness? Nothing new to say?
Page 168 caught me out. Recently I read and very much enjoyed a British children’s book, “The Grange at High Force”
[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2... which contains very funny descriptions of the difficulties of walking in snowshoes! The stark contrast of the necessity of rapidly learning to use snowshoes, so as to survive a Siberian winter, was almost too much. I had to close “As Far As…" & lay it aside until I had ‘sobered’ up.
To say that I ‘enjoyed’ this book wouldn’t sound right. I don’t 'enjoy' man's inhumanity to man. I’ll keep it; despite my initial irritation over the publisher’s disinclination to declare upfront honestly whether the narrative is fact or fiction, or both. It’s a salutary reminder that war is not ended by generals.
There is a b/w photograph on the back cover, showing the back of the principal protagonist, Clemens Forell (an alias), who faces the author and his publisher. To modern eyes the image appears stiff, staged and ill at ease; but taking a moment to consider 1940s and 1950s film technology, that may just be normal for the period.
Descriptive writing such as “… walking skeletons. Their skins were blotched and yellow with jaundice, their legs and feet perpetually swollen…” (p.160) left me assessing fundamental questions about mind and muscle, the sharpening of the senses, and the ability to think quickly (or not), to assess probabilities, and about the nature of what we call ‘luck’. This book describes, in varying detail, such an extraordinarily long journey through such dauntingly hostile terrain. I have no remotely comparable personal experience to relate it to.
Wikipedia [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/As_Far_a...] casts doubt on the veracity of the “As Far As My Feet Will Carry Me”; whereas the New York Times review of the 2001 film [http://www.nytimes.com/movies/movie/2...] is more subtle in planting the idea that perhaps a story can grow into the role of an epic of war. After all, I pondered, surely no-one reads ”Beowulf as true fact?
Laying aside the niggling question of fact or fiction, or whether a knit & purl of both, I had picked up the book late one evening, started to read … and pretty much immediately wished for a map showing the route of the escape. However, it wasn’t until pages 80-81 that I found what I sought!
There being no chapters in this book (just periodic “ * * * ” type line breaks), I had earlier raged that the publisher (Andre Deutsch) had deemed it unnecessary to include anything as useful as an index! Yet in not knowing what comes next, the lack of formal division into chapters curiously acts to deepen the almost unimaginable sense of the sheer length of ‘Clemens Forell’s’ highly dangerous three year and 8.000 mile journey. That sense is reinforced by that very absence of division. But I found it discombobulating to have read through four-fifths of this book, only to find that a mere quarter of the map had been traversed!
On occasion the translator charmed me: “He blew his nose and then began to gesticulate with his bare hands, conveying his meaning with such skill that when he paused now and then to reflect, it seemed to be his fingers that were thinking what they should say next.” (p.104). Survival is not only a matter of knowledge and some luck; it becomes a matter of heightened senses, and ultimately of instinct. Throughout, the action fully held my attention. There are no dull edges here; even if on the odd occasion my mind insisted returning to question what had filled those later gaps in the timeline of this very long walk. Sheer boredom? Hallucination? Illness? Nothing new to say?
Page 168 caught me out. Recently I read and very much enjoyed a British children’s book, “The Grange at High Force”
[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2... which contains very funny descriptions of the difficulties of walking in snowshoes! The stark contrast of the necessity of rapidly learning to use snowshoes, so as to survive a Siberian winter, was almost too much. I had to close “As Far As…" & lay it aside until I had ‘sobered’ up.
To say that I ‘enjoyed’ this book wouldn’t sound right. I don’t 'enjoy' man's inhumanity to man. I’ll keep it; despite my initial irritation over the publisher’s disinclination to declare upfront honestly whether the narrative is fact or fiction, or both. It’s a salutary reminder that war is not ended by generals.
March 11, 2020
و اما كتابي عالي و براساس واقعيت
زندگي يك سرباز الماني كه در روسيه اسير گرفته مي شود و به اردوگاه كار اجباري فرستاده و مدتها انجا كار مي كند سپس اقدام به فرار و تلاش برا برگشتن به وطنش مي كند و سه سال تمام اين سفر طول مي كشد .
براي كساني كه به خواندن زندگي نامه علاقه مندند بسيار توصبه مي كنم .
و ادم چه انگيزه اي قوي اي بايد داشته باشد تا ٣ سال تمام در حال فرار براي رسيدن به وطنش داشته باشد . خواندن زندگي چنين انسان هايي واجب است
زندگي يك سرباز الماني كه در روسيه اسير گرفته مي شود و به اردوگاه كار اجباري فرستاده و مدتها انجا كار مي كند سپس اقدام به فرار و تلاش برا برگشتن به وطنش مي كند و سه سال تمام اين سفر طول مي كشد .
براي كساني كه به خواندن زندگي نامه علاقه مندند بسيار توصبه مي كنم .
و ادم چه انگيزه اي قوي اي بايد داشته باشد تا ٣ سال تمام در حال فرار براي رسيدن به وطنش داشته باشد . خواندن زندگي چنين انسان هايي واجب است
February 28, 2014
You know those really good story tellers. The ones where you can listen to anything they're talking about. They can make the most banal story interesting. Well that is what this story is missing. The author is pretty lame. It feels like somebody droning on and on with the same voice of the guy who says "Bueller." There is probably around 50 or so pages that is actually enjoyable. The rest of it is just not that good. The 50 pages that I liked were when the escaped prisoner joins up with 3 other escaped convicts and their adventures together. Those pages were filled with adventure and were gripping. The thing I like least about the book is the writing. It is pretty bad. This could have been a much better book if someone else had written it. There was no build up. There was no urgency. I mean a German prisoner of war escapes from the far eastern portion of Siberia and makes it thousands and thousands of miles to Europe. That really happened. That's freaking epic. The whole escape story is epic...but this book doesn't do his story justice.
January 23, 2014
I am not one to criticize the authors experience or willingness to share his escape. I was engrossed in the book and constantly referring to encounters with the map. I grew alarmed as 4/5 of the book had been covered and approx half of the Soviet Union had been crossed. This left me disappointed in that I was given the impression that half of that journey was 'boring' for the lack of a better word. When he returned ragged and starving to the Jew that eventually helped him escape, it seemed to me an interesting segment of history could have been revealed. My guess is that at this stage the author was so traumatized from his experience that the last half of the map covered in hos travels simply did not register as firmly as the first. In this respect, he has every right to be accorded whatever latitude he needed in recalling the epic of his lifetime.
October 26, 2010
The best adventure story I have ever read. Need some courage? Read this book.
November 6, 2011
Pretty gripping. Basically a German prisoner of war escapes from the Siberian lead mines and walks halfway across Russia, with all the adventure that that entails: wolves, bears, outlaws, reindeer men, etc. And better written than I expected, though that's probably because I didn't know that Josef Bauer was a real writer. But at times I wondered whether everything I was reading was true. For instance, at one point the main character falls in with some Russian outlaws, and together they basically re-enact the plot of The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, right down to the little baggies of alluvial gold, betraying and murdering each other out of greed. And it was just so incongruous with the rest of the plot that I had to wonder.
February 17, 2019
Toto je knižní verze písně od Jana Kalouska, ve kterým zpívá že šel, šel dál bejby. Víc k tomu asi není co dodat.
6/10 - nacistický zajatec, v mé hlavě ho hrál Martin Dejdar - v Německu známy jako Martin Gibgeschenk - uteče po konci druhý světový z lágru na Sibiři a tři roky jde více méně pěšky domů do Bavorska. Cestou toho spoustu zažije, ale nic až tak zásadního, že bych to zde chtěl uvést. Čtení to bylo úděsně dlouhý a jestli to mělo symbolizovat monotónní cestu, tak se to velmi povedlo. Gratulki.
Jdu se zeptat po sousedství jestli to není něčí děda. Kdyžtak hodím selfíčko. Hešteg Johny Walker.
6/10 - nacistický zajatec, v mé hlavě ho hrál Martin Dejdar - v Německu známy jako Martin Gibgeschenk - uteče po konci druhý světový z lágru na Sibiři a tři roky jde více méně pěšky domů do Bavorska. Cestou toho spoustu zažije, ale nic až tak zásadního, že bych to zde chtěl uvést. Čtení to bylo úděsně dlouhý a jestli to mělo symbolizovat monotónní cestu, tak se to velmi povedlo. Gratulki.
Jdu se zeptat po sousedství jestli to není něčí děda. Kdyžtak hodím selfíčko. Hešteg Johny Walker.
January 19, 2017
Entretenida y muy sufrida, la odisea del oficial Forell como prisionero de guerra y una huida que le obligará a cruzar toda Siberia si quiere llegar a su Alemania natal.
Muy bien escrita y con unos pasajes realmente increíbles, descripciones que te ponen los pelos de punta. Además de contarte la situación en la que estaban los presos alemanes trabajando en las minas de plomo, también cuenta como era la vida de las gentes siberianas y lo duro que era vivir en condiciones extremas donde la mayor preocupación era la supervivencia misma.
Totalmente recomendable.
Muy bien escrita y con unos pasajes realmente increíbles, descripciones que te ponen los pelos de punta. Además de contarte la situación en la que estaban los presos alemanes trabajando en las minas de plomo, también cuenta como era la vida de las gentes siberianas y lo duro que era vivir en condiciones extremas donde la mayor preocupación era la supervivencia misma.
Totalmente recomendable.
July 3, 2011
A really good survival book. A German prisoner is brought to the very east of Siberia together with many other prisoners of war to be a slave. He gets help from a doctor to escape and then the story gets really interesting. All the struggles he had to endure, it is hard to comprehend even after reading this book.
I really enjoyed reading it. Loved his dog. Wished that the end had been a bit more prolonged though.
I really enjoyed reading it. Loved his dog. Wished that the end had been a bit more prolonged though.
September 19, 2014
This was a great book! Perhaps I liked it because it was so similar to one of my all time favorites, The Long Walk, by Slavomir Rawicz. When I finished, I was left wishing it were longer, with more details about the last year of the journey, and what happened after he returned home. But these limitations made it more intriguing.
January 16, 2019
The truth often wilder than fiction
The book describes the long journey of a war prisoner to freedom. From the East end of Siberia to Tehran. The author paints the events with details and dialogues helping the narrative of the underlying story. The events taking place in the journey and the devine Providence or Deus ex machina often saves the day via simple persons coming on the way. It made me admire the patience and strength a man can have when he wants to survive. I also found very interesting the way of living of tribesmen and village People in the vast Siberian land where time and space is different to the Western understanding.
The book describes the long journey of a war prisoner to freedom. From the East end of Siberia to Tehran. The author paints the events with details and dialogues helping the narrative of the underlying story. The events taking place in the journey and the devine Providence or Deus ex machina often saves the day via simple persons coming on the way. It made me admire the patience and strength a man can have when he wants to survive. I also found very interesting the way of living of tribesmen and village People in the vast Siberian land where time and space is different to the Western understanding.
August 20, 2025
i guess this is a complete fabrication. of course, i didn’t expect it to be 100% accurate since it’s someone else’s retelling of someone’s memories, this is a normal limitation of the genre. and based on the authors note, i knew it might be less accurate than the survival literature im used to (for example polar expeditions based on journals). i decided to enjoy the story anyways. i did enjoy it a lot and i enjoyed the writing. but after doing some research after the fact i guess it’s basically a work of fiction.
December 30, 2019
Fantastic story of enduring hardship and a seemingly improbable escape. As others have, I found myself wanting more information at the end of the story. It was somewhat troubling to discover that the accuracy of the story is in question, but still a great read.
September 16, 2024
Un libro que conocí por su película homónima. Me ha costado seguir la historia sobre todo la primera mitad del libro porque pensaba que iba a estar narrado en primera persona como el título de la novela. Creo que hubiese sido más comprensivo de leer si fuese contado por el propio protagonista.
April 23, 2022
Ich habe mich noch nie mit dem realen Schicksal von Kriegsgefangenen auseinandergesetzt. Sehr ergreifend!
December 1, 2020
A very compelling story. I enjoyed the writing, though a few parts were disjointed. I would have liked a little more of an ending.
June 17, 2025
As Far as My Feet Will Carry Me: The Extraordinary True Story of One Man's Escape from a Siberian Labour Camp and His 3-Year Trek to Freedom by Josef Martin Bauer
9 out of 10
This is as impressive as a story could get, seeing as it is true, the title makes it clear, albeit we live in an age when you see the Pope wearing a fancy Balenciaga outfit, and then you learn that it was in fcat generated by Artificial Intelligence beanos, so the claim could have been just a Trumpian one, but it is genuine
After World War II, we find Clemens Forell in a Siberian Gulag, enduring the atrocities that the Soviets could inflict on people; however, the Russians that follow the Putin line (and they seem to be alas a majority, notwithstnding the unreliable nature of polls, data coming out of the new would be czarist empire ) have the same techniques and gruesome penchant for torture and extrajudicila killings.
They have used what was called a ‚nuclear mini bomb’ to assasinate an opponent of the short czar, wsuffering from the Napoleonic Syndrome-by the way, i have just read in A Short History of Islam by fabulous Karen Armstrong http://realini.blogspot.com/2023/09/f... about the origin of the name, which comes from fellows that were supposed to use hashish, but it looks like a myth
British citizen Alexander Litvinenko had been a KGB agent and had tried to tell Putin that there is corruption in the agency and they kill people, as a result of this, the honest man was ejected and then, once he found refuge in London, he was killed using...Polonium, a highly radiocative lement, extremely expensive, which left traces throughout Britain, the plane used, and in Germany, where the executioners transfered
Mexcian cartel memebrs, others in the world are involved in gruesome exections, torture, but the Soviet and now Putin state appear to be singularly abhorent as ‚official,elected’ organs of the ‚people’ that commit such crimes against humanity, with impunity, regularly and with not just equanimity, but falunting it
The Plutonium execution in London was followed by the use of Novichok in Salsbury, against another former agent, and then more recently, placed in the underwear of Alexey Navalny, leader of the opposition, now interned in similar conditions to the ones imposed on Clemens Forell, becasue these monsters have no humanity, limit, and they only care for themselves, just as it is made clear by what we can see
Last night, they have aired an episode from a new docuseries, Tycoons, looking in this segment at the oligarchs of Russia, and what is most likely the richest ruffian on the planet, think if you can guess it...it is Innocent the First, czar Vladymir, who is reported to have gathered the rich of the new CCCP and told them what to do
Chili Palmer is the hero aka anti-hero of Get Shorty http://realini.blogspot.com/2020/04/g... by Elmore Leonard, adapted for the big screen, with dazzling John Travolta in the leading role, and just like Chili Palmer, Vladymir is the one ‚telling you the way it is’, for the oligarchs it is fifty percent of your fortune, or else it is the cage (litearlly, you must have seen those horrfying images, whenever they cage opposition figures, journalists, foreigners they want to exchange or just eliminate)
Mikhail Khodorkovsky used to be the richest Russian, made the mistake of talking against Putin, funded some opposition movements and ergo, he ended up in the infamous cage, then prison for ten years, and the message after that was for all to surrender half their wealth, or it is jail...Navalny and his team have investigated and found a palace that Putin has, ‚which puts Versailles to shame’, as brilliant Fiona Hill says
The American Congress has passed - in the good old days, when they could agree on anything, now you have the Republican lunatics that want to shut down the goverment, which will happen in a matter in a matter of days...actually, if you are still hear and read this, for some pecualiar reason, it would have been closed, becasue i have a pipeline of some seventeen notes to publish, and they each have to wait their turn, so this could be online by the middle of October, or the tenth- the Magnitsky Act.
It is called this becasue an honest man of that name died at the hands of the ghastly Russian Mafia State, when he told the authroities about corruption and illegal activities, he was the one taken in, tortured and killed, within the walls of their official premises, and then he was taken to court, buit as evidence of how absurd, sadistic, disturbed, montrous these creatures are, they would not stop the case.
In other words, if you stand agaisnt Putin and His Mob, you are in for the closest Hell teratement that you can get on earth, it is either Polonium, Novichok or you pursue you after the grave, perhaps a couple of the above, and this is not the age of burning witches (however much another Man of the Apocalypse, Trump, might whine about the ‚withc hunt’) the middle ages, or the ra of the cave men...or wait a minute, maybe it is
You know the armageddon of The Planet of The Apes http://realini.blogspot.com/2018/01/p... wherein at the end, Charlton Heston (once a liberal, then perplexingly head of the...NRA) is aghst at the discovery of the Statue of Liberty on this Planet of the Apes, where the apes are the humans that have self-destructed...as for the German POW, he has a hell of a time until, he may (let us not give spoliers here, right at the end of the note) reach some friendlier shore that the USSR...
Now for a question, and invitation – maybe you have a good idea on how we could make more than a million dollars with this http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/u... – as it is, this is a unique technique, which we could promote, sell, open the Oscars show with or something and then make lots of money together, if you have the how, I have the product, I just do not know how to get the befits from it, other than the exercise per se
As for my role in the Revolution that killed Ceausescu, a smaller Mao, there it is http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/03/r...
From To The Heritage:
‘Fiction is infinitely preferable to real life. As long as you avoid the books of Kafka or Beckett, the everlasting plot of fiction has fewer futile experiences than the careless plot of reality. Fiction's people are fuller, deeper, cleverer, more moving than those in real life…Its actions are more intricate, illuminating, noble, profound…There are many more dramas, climaxes, romantic fulfillment, twists, turns, gratified resolutions…Unlike reality, all of this you can experience without leaving the house or even getting out of bed…What's more, books are a form of intelligent human greatness, as stories are a higher order of sense…As random life is to destiny, so stories are to great authors, who provided us with some of the highest pleasures and the most wonderful mystifications we can find…Few stories are greater than Anna Karenina, that wise epic by an often foolish author…’
9 out of 10
This is as impressive as a story could get, seeing as it is true, the title makes it clear, albeit we live in an age when you see the Pope wearing a fancy Balenciaga outfit, and then you learn that it was in fcat generated by Artificial Intelligence beanos, so the claim could have been just a Trumpian one, but it is genuine
After World War II, we find Clemens Forell in a Siberian Gulag, enduring the atrocities that the Soviets could inflict on people; however, the Russians that follow the Putin line (and they seem to be alas a majority, notwithstnding the unreliable nature of polls, data coming out of the new would be czarist empire ) have the same techniques and gruesome penchant for torture and extrajudicila killings.
They have used what was called a ‚nuclear mini bomb’ to assasinate an opponent of the short czar, wsuffering from the Napoleonic Syndrome-by the way, i have just read in A Short History of Islam by fabulous Karen Armstrong http://realini.blogspot.com/2023/09/f... about the origin of the name, which comes from fellows that were supposed to use hashish, but it looks like a myth
British citizen Alexander Litvinenko had been a KGB agent and had tried to tell Putin that there is corruption in the agency and they kill people, as a result of this, the honest man was ejected and then, once he found refuge in London, he was killed using...Polonium, a highly radiocative lement, extremely expensive, which left traces throughout Britain, the plane used, and in Germany, where the executioners transfered
Mexcian cartel memebrs, others in the world are involved in gruesome exections, torture, but the Soviet and now Putin state appear to be singularly abhorent as ‚official,elected’ organs of the ‚people’ that commit such crimes against humanity, with impunity, regularly and with not just equanimity, but falunting it
The Plutonium execution in London was followed by the use of Novichok in Salsbury, against another former agent, and then more recently, placed in the underwear of Alexey Navalny, leader of the opposition, now interned in similar conditions to the ones imposed on Clemens Forell, becasue these monsters have no humanity, limit, and they only care for themselves, just as it is made clear by what we can see
Last night, they have aired an episode from a new docuseries, Tycoons, looking in this segment at the oligarchs of Russia, and what is most likely the richest ruffian on the planet, think if you can guess it...it is Innocent the First, czar Vladymir, who is reported to have gathered the rich of the new CCCP and told them what to do
Chili Palmer is the hero aka anti-hero of Get Shorty http://realini.blogspot.com/2020/04/g... by Elmore Leonard, adapted for the big screen, with dazzling John Travolta in the leading role, and just like Chili Palmer, Vladymir is the one ‚telling you the way it is’, for the oligarchs it is fifty percent of your fortune, or else it is the cage (litearlly, you must have seen those horrfying images, whenever they cage opposition figures, journalists, foreigners they want to exchange or just eliminate)
Mikhail Khodorkovsky used to be the richest Russian, made the mistake of talking against Putin, funded some opposition movements and ergo, he ended up in the infamous cage, then prison for ten years, and the message after that was for all to surrender half their wealth, or it is jail...Navalny and his team have investigated and found a palace that Putin has, ‚which puts Versailles to shame’, as brilliant Fiona Hill says
The American Congress has passed - in the good old days, when they could agree on anything, now you have the Republican lunatics that want to shut down the goverment, which will happen in a matter in a matter of days...actually, if you are still hear and read this, for some pecualiar reason, it would have been closed, becasue i have a pipeline of some seventeen notes to publish, and they each have to wait their turn, so this could be online by the middle of October, or the tenth- the Magnitsky Act.
It is called this becasue an honest man of that name died at the hands of the ghastly Russian Mafia State, when he told the authroities about corruption and illegal activities, he was the one taken in, tortured and killed, within the walls of their official premises, and then he was taken to court, buit as evidence of how absurd, sadistic, disturbed, montrous these creatures are, they would not stop the case.
In other words, if you stand agaisnt Putin and His Mob, you are in for the closest Hell teratement that you can get on earth, it is either Polonium, Novichok or you pursue you after the grave, perhaps a couple of the above, and this is not the age of burning witches (however much another Man of the Apocalypse, Trump, might whine about the ‚withc hunt’) the middle ages, or the ra of the cave men...or wait a minute, maybe it is
You know the armageddon of The Planet of The Apes http://realini.blogspot.com/2018/01/p... wherein at the end, Charlton Heston (once a liberal, then perplexingly head of the...NRA) is aghst at the discovery of the Statue of Liberty on this Planet of the Apes, where the apes are the humans that have self-destructed...as for the German POW, he has a hell of a time until, he may (let us not give spoliers here, right at the end of the note) reach some friendlier shore that the USSR...
Now for a question, and invitation – maybe you have a good idea on how we could make more than a million dollars with this http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/u... – as it is, this is a unique technique, which we could promote, sell, open the Oscars show with or something and then make lots of money together, if you have the how, I have the product, I just do not know how to get the befits from it, other than the exercise per se
As for my role in the Revolution that killed Ceausescu, a smaller Mao, there it is http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/03/r...
From To The Heritage:
‘Fiction is infinitely preferable to real life. As long as you avoid the books of Kafka or Beckett, the everlasting plot of fiction has fewer futile experiences than the careless plot of reality. Fiction's people are fuller, deeper, cleverer, more moving than those in real life…Its actions are more intricate, illuminating, noble, profound…There are many more dramas, climaxes, romantic fulfillment, twists, turns, gratified resolutions…Unlike reality, all of this you can experience without leaving the house or even getting out of bed…What's more, books are a form of intelligent human greatness, as stories are a higher order of sense…As random life is to destiny, so stories are to great authors, who provided us with some of the highest pleasures and the most wonderful mystifications we can find…Few stories are greater than Anna Karenina, that wise epic by an often foolish author…’
January 9, 2012
I read this book many years ago. I think it is excellent, not just for the way it is written but also for the incredible story of one man's triumph over numerous incredible difficulties.
October 26, 2014
A potboiler about a German prisoner of war's escape from Siberia.
March 23, 2017
Boringly average. There may be a good story in there somewhere, but not by this author
September 12, 2018
Ein Buch, was mich seit längerem mal wieder gefangen genommen hat. Die alte Sprache, die Umgebung waren anregend um sich hineinzuversetzen.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 29, 2018
Human endurance and drive can never be over rated.
August 22, 2019
Last week, it was sci-fi catching me off guard (Ender’s Game). Now I’ve found the survival genre to be more than I presumed, too.
In this 60-year-old book, Bauer tells the story of a German prisoner of war sentenced by the Soviets to 25 years of hard labor in a lead mine in the farthest eastern corner of Siberia. The first third or so covers Clemens Forell’s time as a prisoner. The rest is an excruciating three-year journey of 8,000 miles – much of it on foot, in a climate so extreme that fishing was risky in the summer because the ice might be thin enough to crack from your weight.
Bauer doesn’t mince words in his introduction: He found Forell’s story impossible to believe when he first heard it. But he said each time he followed a fact back to its origin, Forrell was vindicated. (Full disclosure: Contemporary research has cast some doubt.) Bauer had to recreate conversations as they must have been, obviously, but he and Forell agreed that the end result captured the journey as Forell remembered it.
There are stolen hours on a train and extended stays in lonely outposts, with native people who don’t ask too many questions or are sympathetic to Forell’s answers. But countless weeks after freezing weeks, Forrell is alone with his meager pack, walking across Siberia, trying to avoid civilization and, with it, re-arrest.
The story is everything. The writing, translated from the original German, is spare and utilitarian. But it feels right for this purpose.
I was disappointed that Bauer wrapped up within a page or two of Forell finally crossing over the border of the USSR. He zips him home on a plane, mentions in one sentence his concerns that his wife will find him changed and the book is over. I wanted a lot more – I was invested in his situation by then. While I was glad for the haircut and new clothes, I had dozens more questions about life after his ordeal. But Bauer’s story was finished.
Forell is not his real name – he insisted Bauer change it before agreeing to tell his story, saying he feared repercussions from the KGB. A few decades later, his real identity was revealed. And later still, the recordings of his original interviews with Bauer were found. Modern research has identified several crucial errors in the story. The most important two, probably, are that no labor camp existed in the location where he said he was at the time he said he was there, and that Russian records report he was released two years before his escape began.
I don’t know. I hate finding things like that out after the fact. Could he have been mistaken about the location of the camp? That one’s easier for me to accept than the matter of his “release” two years before he said he had to escape. But then I’m wondering if he was “released” on paper only to be taken to the labor camp? No one’s ever accused the Soviet Union of scrupulous attention to human rights and/or honesty.
Still, the conflicting details fan my initial this-can’t-possibly-be-true feelings about other aspects of the story. Feelings I tamped down because Bauer told me from the beginning that he felt that way, too, but his research backed up Forell’s account.
As a book, it’s more engaging than I expected. As a record of the past, it’s a frustrating mystery. I don’t like the uncertainty, but I’m still not sorry for the read.
In this 60-year-old book, Bauer tells the story of a German prisoner of war sentenced by the Soviets to 25 years of hard labor in a lead mine in the farthest eastern corner of Siberia. The first third or so covers Clemens Forell’s time as a prisoner. The rest is an excruciating three-year journey of 8,000 miles – much of it on foot, in a climate so extreme that fishing was risky in the summer because the ice might be thin enough to crack from your weight.
Bauer doesn’t mince words in his introduction: He found Forell’s story impossible to believe when he first heard it. But he said each time he followed a fact back to its origin, Forrell was vindicated. (Full disclosure: Contemporary research has cast some doubt.) Bauer had to recreate conversations as they must have been, obviously, but he and Forell agreed that the end result captured the journey as Forell remembered it.
There are stolen hours on a train and extended stays in lonely outposts, with native people who don’t ask too many questions or are sympathetic to Forell’s answers. But countless weeks after freezing weeks, Forrell is alone with his meager pack, walking across Siberia, trying to avoid civilization and, with it, re-arrest.
The story is everything. The writing, translated from the original German, is spare and utilitarian. But it feels right for this purpose.
I was disappointed that Bauer wrapped up within a page or two of Forell finally crossing over the border of the USSR. He zips him home on a plane, mentions in one sentence his concerns that his wife will find him changed and the book is over. I wanted a lot more – I was invested in his situation by then. While I was glad for the haircut and new clothes, I had dozens more questions about life after his ordeal. But Bauer’s story was finished.
Forell is not his real name – he insisted Bauer change it before agreeing to tell his story, saying he feared repercussions from the KGB. A few decades later, his real identity was revealed. And later still, the recordings of his original interviews with Bauer were found. Modern research has identified several crucial errors in the story. The most important two, probably, are that no labor camp existed in the location where he said he was at the time he said he was there, and that Russian records report he was released two years before his escape began.
I don’t know. I hate finding things like that out after the fact. Could he have been mistaken about the location of the camp? That one’s easier for me to accept than the matter of his “release” two years before he said he had to escape. But then I’m wondering if he was “released” on paper only to be taken to the labor camp? No one’s ever accused the Soviet Union of scrupulous attention to human rights and/or honesty.
Still, the conflicting details fan my initial this-can’t-possibly-be-true feelings about other aspects of the story. Feelings I tamped down because Bauer told me from the beginning that he felt that way, too, but his research backed up Forell’s account.
As a book, it’s more engaging than I expected. As a record of the past, it’s a frustrating mystery. I don’t like the uncertainty, but I’m still not sorry for the read.
July 27, 2024
At the end of WWII, a German soldier is captured by the Soviets and sent to a lead mine at the easternmost point of Siberia, where he must survive under the harshest circumstances. Preferring to die free attempting to escape rather than staying for a slow death, he manages to make his way out of the labor camp. For more than 2 years, he travels the whole of Siberia in the direction of the South until he finally makes it to Iran and eventually Germany. It is a story of survival where our man should not have made it out alive, but he did. What he accomplished was, in no small part, thanks to the help of strangers he met on his way, some benevolent, others less so. However, thanks to his grit and his will, he succeeded where few did.
This is an incredible story that makes one wonder about life in general and the fact that our fate is mostly a question of luck or lack of. It also makes us realize how good of a life we have when we compare it to our hero. His story must not make us forget that out of the thousands of Germans who were taken prisoners by the Soviets, few returned home. On his way, our hero met simple people whose compassion and survival skills helped him move forward. What is especially fascinating is that those people should, by all means, have harbored a deep hatred for the German convict. After all, Germany caused more than 20,000,000 Soviet deaths during the war. And yet, they only recognized a human being yearning for freedom.
Reading the book feels like a slap in many ways as it is unfathomable to most of us today that one could survive on his own in the harsh conditions of wild Siberia. It is therefore striking to see that some groups survived and actually thrived. This book reminds us that for the majority of human history, human beings did not live in comfortable houses and did not get their food at the grocery store.
Overall, it is a short and great read to muse about life in general, but especially about the power of will and the luck we have to not live in wild Siberia. It is also a requiem to all prisoners who never made it back home and died in labor camps.
This is an incredible story that makes one wonder about life in general and the fact that our fate is mostly a question of luck or lack of. It also makes us realize how good of a life we have when we compare it to our hero. His story must not make us forget that out of the thousands of Germans who were taken prisoners by the Soviets, few returned home. On his way, our hero met simple people whose compassion and survival skills helped him move forward. What is especially fascinating is that those people should, by all means, have harbored a deep hatred for the German convict. After all, Germany caused more than 20,000,000 Soviet deaths during the war. And yet, they only recognized a human being yearning for freedom.
Reading the book feels like a slap in many ways as it is unfathomable to most of us today that one could survive on his own in the harsh conditions of wild Siberia. It is therefore striking to see that some groups survived and actually thrived. This book reminds us that for the majority of human history, human beings did not live in comfortable houses and did not get their food at the grocery store.
Overall, it is a short and great read to muse about life in general, but especially about the power of will and the luck we have to not live in wild Siberia. It is also a requiem to all prisoners who never made it back home and died in labor camps.
November 24, 2018
Ach ja, deutsche Bewältigungsliteratur ...
Mal ganz abgesehen davon, dass die dereinst Josef Martin Bauer aufgetischte Fluchtgeschichte des Mannschafters Cornelius Rost zu weiten Teilen erstunken und erlogen war, kann die Lektüre dieses Klassikers der deutschen Nachkriegsliteratur über weite Strecken nur als Graus bezeichnet werden. Dies wurzelt jedoch nur oberflächlich im Rassismus, mit welchem alles Russische hier bedacht wird.
In erster Linie fällt einem gegen Mitte des Buches auf, dass die erzählte halbwahre Begebenheit rein gar nicht dem entspricht, was man anhand des Titels erwarten würde. Ehrlich, ich war durchaus motiviert, So weit die Füße tragen zu lesen, vor allem da mir der Titel suggerierte, es handele sich um einen Abenteuerroman, der sich mit der Einsamkeit in Sibirien, dem psychologischen Kampf mit der härtesten Natur und folglich mit der Auseinandersetzung des Menschen mit sich selbst beschäftigt. Doch weit gefehlt! Wirklich auf sich allein gestellt ist der deutsche Flüchtling, Clemens Forell, tatsächlich nur kurz nachdem er der Bleimiene entkommen ist. Danach trifft er auf allerhand Weggefährten, seien es Rentierzüchter, Jakuten oder Holzfäller, die ihn zumeist über längere Zeit beherbergen, begleiten oder in irgendeiner Form unterstützen. Einsamkeit? Nix da. Reflexion? Haha, selbstverständlich nicht. Die westlich-saubermännische Arroganz, mit welcher dann auch auf jeden russisch-sibirischen Zeitgenossen heruntergeschaut wird - sind sie nicht verschlagen und feindselig, dann sind sie zurückgeblieben und naiv - unterbindet auch nur jeden Ansatz selbstkritischer Kriegsverarbeitung. Ja, auf diesem Level ist So weit die Füße tragen richtiggehend widerlich.
Diese inhaltlichen wie hintergründlichen Posten einmal ausgeblendet, ist Bauer's Welterfolg gewiss nicht schlecht geschrieben. Unbedingt fesselnd erzählt ist er aber auch nicht. Daher könnte ich So weit die Füße tragen wohl nur deutschen Revisionisten empfehlen - aber, ich glaube, ich kenne keinen, also ist's eigentlich egal.
Mal ganz abgesehen davon, dass die dereinst Josef Martin Bauer aufgetischte Fluchtgeschichte des Mannschafters Cornelius Rost zu weiten Teilen erstunken und erlogen war, kann die Lektüre dieses Klassikers der deutschen Nachkriegsliteratur über weite Strecken nur als Graus bezeichnet werden. Dies wurzelt jedoch nur oberflächlich im Rassismus, mit welchem alles Russische hier bedacht wird.
In erster Linie fällt einem gegen Mitte des Buches auf, dass die erzählte halbwahre Begebenheit rein gar nicht dem entspricht, was man anhand des Titels erwarten würde. Ehrlich, ich war durchaus motiviert, So weit die Füße tragen zu lesen, vor allem da mir der Titel suggerierte, es handele sich um einen Abenteuerroman, der sich mit der Einsamkeit in Sibirien, dem psychologischen Kampf mit der härtesten Natur und folglich mit der Auseinandersetzung des Menschen mit sich selbst beschäftigt. Doch weit gefehlt! Wirklich auf sich allein gestellt ist der deutsche Flüchtling, Clemens Forell, tatsächlich nur kurz nachdem er der Bleimiene entkommen ist. Danach trifft er auf allerhand Weggefährten, seien es Rentierzüchter, Jakuten oder Holzfäller, die ihn zumeist über längere Zeit beherbergen, begleiten oder in irgendeiner Form unterstützen. Einsamkeit? Nix da. Reflexion? Haha, selbstverständlich nicht. Die westlich-saubermännische Arroganz, mit welcher dann auch auf jeden russisch-sibirischen Zeitgenossen heruntergeschaut wird - sind sie nicht verschlagen und feindselig, dann sind sie zurückgeblieben und naiv - unterbindet auch nur jeden Ansatz selbstkritischer Kriegsverarbeitung. Ja, auf diesem Level ist So weit die Füße tragen richtiggehend widerlich.
Diese inhaltlichen wie hintergründlichen Posten einmal ausgeblendet, ist Bauer's Welterfolg gewiss nicht schlecht geschrieben. Unbedingt fesselnd erzählt ist er aber auch nicht. Daher könnte ich So weit die Füße tragen wohl nur deutschen Revisionisten empfehlen - aber, ich glaube, ich kenne keinen, also ist's eigentlich egal.
April 27, 2023
First off, what most of the reviewers have failed to recognize or acknowledge, is that the author did not "write" the book. He transcribed the story from a tape recorder, as told to him by the main character - Clemens Forrell. It was not his place to edit or otherwise change the sentence structure of the story to make the words flow. And we the readers, with no first hand knowledge of the situation, have no right to be questioning a persons' memory. Given the ordeals that he experienced, and often by his admission, was fading in and out of lucidness sometimes for several days at a stretch, it would be difficult to separate fact from wht may have been.
I do not know what is was about this book that had me spell bound, but I could not put it down. I had to keep coming back to find out what the next adventure was going to bring!
Was there gaps? Certainly! Was there some parts that you exclaim as you are reading "THAT CANNOT BE TRUE!!"? Absolutely.
I would say for me, it was reference to weather and time that bothered my more than anything. In one section he says that it is mid to late October, 9:30 p.m and it is only Twilight. Siberia is the 74th parallel. I live on the 53th parallel and by late October it is dark - I mean pitch black long before 9 p.m. So I questioned that part. But maybe he had developed mechanism to calculate an approximate time.
But ultimately it was a story of strength, endurance, resiliency, true grit, deceit, betrayal, finding friends in the most unlikely places, and survival at any cost. A wise person once said, "You do not know how stong you can be, until you have no choice but to be strong!"
I do agree though, that the last 1000 miles or so of the journey became quite rushed. I can only imagine that by this time Clemens was getting tired of being interviewed and talking about his ordeal; perhaps he felt that escape was his destination and he accomplished what he had set out to do.
All in all, a good read.
I do not know what is was about this book that had me spell bound, but I could not put it down. I had to keep coming back to find out what the next adventure was going to bring!
Was there gaps? Certainly! Was there some parts that you exclaim as you are reading "THAT CANNOT BE TRUE!!"? Absolutely.
I would say for me, it was reference to weather and time that bothered my more than anything. In one section he says that it is mid to late October, 9:30 p.m and it is only Twilight. Siberia is the 74th parallel. I live on the 53th parallel and by late October it is dark - I mean pitch black long before 9 p.m. So I questioned that part. But maybe he had developed mechanism to calculate an approximate time.
But ultimately it was a story of strength, endurance, resiliency, true grit, deceit, betrayal, finding friends in the most unlikely places, and survival at any cost. A wise person once said, "You do not know how stong you can be, until you have no choice but to be strong!"
I do agree though, that the last 1000 miles or so of the journey became quite rushed. I can only imagine that by this time Clemens was getting tired of being interviewed and talking about his ordeal; perhaps he felt that escape was his destination and he accomplished what he had set out to do.
All in all, a good read.
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