Orgasms of Death

"Hitler’s" Science Fiction

Book Cover

Spoilers Ahead!

You have been Warned!!

Of course Hitler never wrote any Science Fiction in the real world. At best he was a mildly talented painter, and it is such a pity for the world that he did not remain a painter. Hitler died far too late in 1945 after tens of millions had paid for with their lives for his existence. But what would Hitler have written if he had lived and moved to the USA and written Science Fiction?

Well the Science Fiction writer Norman Spinrad, (1940-), as endeavoured to write a novel that claims to be a novel written by Adolf Hitler. In this alternative Earth Hitler moved to the USA in 1919, became an illustrator of Fantasy and Science Fiction magazines and wrote various Science Fiction novels.

Norman Spinrad, specializes in Science Fiction that breaks the rules, he also loves parodying the genre.1 Among his effort is A World Between,2 which is a long extended parody of the war between the sexes complete with parodies of Feminism and Male Chauvinism. His Hitler novel is called The Iron Dream, and within the novel, a novel within a novel so to speak, is Hitler’s novel The Lord of the Swastika. Norman Spinrad decorates his novel with a mock preface about Hitler a list of Hitler’s books3 and an academic after word by a Prof. Whipple. (The name of the Prof. should alert any reader that this is parody.)

We learn in the novel that Hitler started writing novels by 1935 and was a frequent guest at Sci-Fi conventions and that he had a reputation of being a really fun guy. We also learn that Hitler died of syphilitic pareis in 1953.4

In this alternative world we learn that a greater Soviet Union rules the old world and is a huge threat to the remainder of the world aside from committing many crimes, including murdering c. 5 million Jews.5 Anti-Communist sentiment is obviously rife in this world.

The result is a book that is an exercise in wish fulfillment and whose anti-communist aspects are obvious.

The plot of the novel is fairly straight forward. It is c. 1000 years after a nuclear war and most of the human race has mutated into various forms due to the radiation. “True” humanity lives in the country of Heldon. A certain Feric Jagger, who is a genetically “pure” human, is seeking to gain admission to Heldon the last bastion of “genetically pure” humanity. Not only is Feric an absolutely pure specimen of pure humanity he is also, purely courageous, always right, determined and wise.6

Feric leads a movement that includes absolutely intoxicating speeches and outdoor rallies. This is against the weak leadership of Heldon which has allowed the dread doctrine of Universalism (In other words Marxism / Communism / Liberalism), to infiltrate and corrupt Heldon by allowing the biological mutant inferiors to come into Helder. During all of this Feric proves himself to be infallible, and unbeatable, wielding as he does a massive steel rod shaped like a penis which his devoted followers have to kiss the head of.

The opposition aside from those weak willed liberal types, who shrink from war and bloodshed, are the mutants who are led and controlled by the evil Doms who by means of telepathy control the mongrel hordes and seek to corrupt and destroy “true” humanity.

There is an enormous amount of violence in this novel, but of course no sex. Well after a series of coups and purges Feric launches his war against the neighbouring mongrel nations and defeats them. He then launches his campaign of purging the countries of mutant inferiors and using a genetic test to screen out and then gas all Doms.

After all this purging and mass murder Feric launches his war against Zind, the huge country dominated by the Doms and having huge hordes of mutants. After an interminable amount of slaughter Zind is conquered and its capital destroyed by bombers and the population eradicated. The last surviving Dom, in Feric’s presence sets off a doomsday device that irradiates the whole planet and threatens to end “true” humanity. Feric then sterilizes the surviving “true” human population and of course continues until completion the physical extermination of all mutants and non-pure humans. So a crash program is launched to create a cloning technology that will allow the creation of a “pure” “true” human who are of course a Nazi Aryan fantasy of blond, blue eyed perfection.  And after their creation space ships are built to send ship after ship of those supermen to the stars, each led by a clone of Feric. Thus through cloning the Aryan superman will rule the earth and eventually the stars forever led of course for all eternity by clones of Feric.

Sounds rather sick doesn’t it?

Norman Spinrad also considered his novel a satire of aspects of Science Fiction, especially pulp Science Fiction that glorified authoritarianism, violence and genocidal struggle, along with misogyny and an obsession with sexualized violence to say nothing of phallic symbolism. That much of this had a distinct Fascistic ethos is to Norman Spinrad rather obvious. The most obvious novel that Norman Spinrad is satirizing is Heinlein’s Starship Troopers, with its sanctification of violence, and glorification of said violence as a way to settle problems and its celebration of authoritarianism, along with a rejection of and contempt for diplomacy and debate.7

As an exploration of the mind of Adolf Hitler the book is relentless in depicting a mind fixated on issues of poison, defecation, and pollution, and a mind with a singular distaste for sex. Although violence is described graphically and over and over again. Sex is not even alluded to. It is also utterly remarkable that NO female characters exist in the novel and at the end women are dispensed with and the human race is reproduced through cloning and only males are cloned and sent to the stars. Yep an endless human future without women!

Further The joy with which our “author” describes the destruction of other humans is positively creepy and horrible. Added to this is that the prose, quite deliberately, is turgid and just plain dreadful and obviously modeled after Hitler’s prose in Mein Kampf.

Here is an example of the truly drekish style of the novel.

Then, as a single man, these two hundred thousand tall blond SS clones snapped their arms out in the greatest massed Party salute in history and held them in this outstretched position as the chant of "Hail Jaggar!" continued to rise toward the heavens from millions of fervent throats.

Faster and faster the marching troops whirled around Feric, kicking their heels skyward with ever increasing vigor and force, as if attempting to smash through the vault in the sky with the steel soles of their boots while the massed chanting merged with the rhythm of the falling boots, a staccato thunder that filled and shook the universe and pounded with the blood racing in Feric's skull.

Feric felt the sound and the glory permeate every cell of his body with an incredible joyous fire; his blood pounded like racial thunder through his veins, faster and faster. It seemed finally as if he must fly apart and burst in a million pieces with ecstasy.

At this climactic moment, when he could bear the preternatural joy no longer, he threw a small switch.

With a deafening bellow, a magnificent billow of orange flame spurted out of the rocket. Every throat in Heldon joined with Feric's in a wordless cry of joyous triumph as the seed of the Swastika rose on a pillar of fire to fecundate the stars.8

Aside from the truly turgid nature of the writing above the other obvious attribute of the writing are its truly sick sexualized imagery, and the association of such imagery with conquest and extreme violence. What is also clear is the intense orgasm that Feric / Hitler feels at the “release” of his phallic urge to crush and dominate.

Our “Hero” Feric is basically a psychopath whose chief pleasure is killing and mass murder. He is also very much a wish fulfillment, for the made-up author of the book. Everything thing that Feric does is right. He is hard ruthless and decisive, everything is sacrificed to his earnest desire to spread death and destruction.

Despite the fact that Feric, over and over again, claims that his motive is to save humanity it is obvious that his motive is to spread death. What Feric enjoys and wishes to spread is death and more death. In fact such is Feric’s psychopathology it calls into question just what the novel is really about.

The novel is from Feric’s point of view  which means that everything about the novel is questionable. Can we take as even remotely accurate, even in terms of the novel’s world Feric’s descriptions and perceptions of places, peoples and events? No we cannot because Feric obviously sees things in a psychopathic, psychotic and paranoid view of the world. In other words Feric is insane. Of course Feric is a standing for our supposed author Hitler and the psychotic, paranoid psychopath is Hitler.

Thus Feric’s image of his world is no more to be taken seriously than the real Hitler’s image of his world. The fact that the novel is about the triumph of a death cult, whose aim is to exterminate the great majority of the human race, in other words to inflict death. The “orgasmic” descriptions of slaughter allow for no other interpretation except that our “hero” Feric gets “release” from murder. For example:

Hundreds of tall blond SS heroes emerged through the rent in the Zind ranks, then a dozen Holder tanks, their cannon roaring. Ten of the Zind tanks exploded in great pillars of reddish-orange fire and billowing black smoke. A few of the remaining Zind tanks got off panicked shots. Then a score more Helder tanks poured through the gap with thousands of motorcyclists in their van; three more quick massed fusillades cracked open the rest of the Zind tanks like so many walnuts. Feric waved the Great Truncheon wildly overhead, sending spatters of Warrior blood flying, then led Best and his SS elite guard forward as dozens of humanoid figures in gray uniforms scuttled from the wreckage. Behind came the entire Helder army.

…

An enormous flare of rage burned through Feric's being, instantly breaking the dominance pattern as if it had never existed. He leapt forward swinging the Great Truncheon of Held, and brought the mighty weapon down on the skull of the drooling, cackling Dom, smashing it like a melon, spattering greasy gray brains everywhere, ripping clear through the creature's torso, splitting it in half and spilling pulsing translucent organs all over the dank stone floor. With another swipe, Feric dashed the instrument console to pieces, the force of his enraged blow burying the headpiece of his weapon in the floor below to a depth of nearly a foot.9

The “Great Truncheon of Held" is a large very phallic shaped weapon, which members of Feric’s SS have to, as part of their oath of loyalty kiss the head of. A classic example of violence porn.

That the goal of Feric is not the salvation of “true humanity” but the infliction of death and more death is clear from the following. After killing all the “sub humans” on Earth new victims must be found so as Feric says:

"But my fellow Helder, there is one final glory that I have withheld until now," he finally continued, unable to keep from breaking into a broad grin. "I myself have contributed cells to the cloning vats. This rocket and everyone that follows it out into the trackless reaches of interstellar space for the next ten million years will be commanded by a clone grown from my own flesh and therefore my genetic equivalent, suited by destiny and pedigree to be a leader of men. Thus our colonies shall not fail no matter what manner of hostile aliens they may face under foreign suns, for the troops that will exterminate these sub humans horrors shall be none but the finest SS purebreds, and the leaders shall be created in my own genetic image! Hail Heldon! Hail the Swastika! Hail the Master Race! Hail the conquest of the universe!"10

Thus Feric lets the cat out of the bag. He already knows that any Aliens his “Master Race” encounters are “sub-human horrors”; the fact that Feric as never met an Alien is irrelevant, he as consigned them to death. Thus we learn that the spread of “true humanity” to the stars is in order to spread death after exterminating billions on Earth “true humanity” goes to the stars to kill and kill and keep killing. Feric as spoken his greatest desire which is to kill and keep killing now and forever and the vicarious joy that Feric feels knowing that he will do so, through his clones, forever and ever is a source of great joy to him.

Thus does what can accurately be described as “self-made sub-humans” extend their self appointed task of murder to the entire Universe. It is a variation of Orwell’s vision of history has a boot stamping into a face forever. Unable it seems to enjoy sex with anyone Feric seeks “release” by orgasmic mass murder spread to the entire Universe.

As an insight into one of the sickest political minds in human history and as a parody of sick aspects of Science Fiction this book is remarkable. I strongly recommend it.

Norman Spinrad

1. Wikipedia, Norman Spinrad Here.

2. Spinrad, Norman, A World Between, Bantam Books, New York, 1979.

3.Spinrad, Norman, The Iron Dream, Avon Books, New York, 1972. Among Hitler’s Science Fiction novels listed are The Master Race, The Thousand Year Rule, The Triumph of the Will, Tomorrow the World.

4. Spinrad, 1972, p. 243.

5. IBID, p. 252.

6. In other words he is a Mary Sue character that is basically a fantasy that the author, in this case Hitler, has of himself.

7. Heinlein, Robert A., Starship Troopers, G. P. Putnam’s & Sons, New York, 1959.

8. Spinrad, 1972, pp. 241-242.

9. IBID, pp. 220, 231-232.

10. IBID, p. 240.

Pierre Cloutier