In Germany, lawsuits are currently being filed like rarely before. But if you look back a hundred years, it quickly becomes apparent that the world has probably always been a haven of misery. The conditions in which the little people once eked out their existence were unimaginable, the personal notes of Josefa Halbinger, Maria Hartl and Max Bauer, to name just a few, are hard to bear in their harsh realism.
The situation is similar with the autobiographical writings of the Fürth anarchist Fritz Oerter (1869-1935), which are now available in book form for the first time (“Lebenslinien”, Verbrecher Verlag, edited by Leonhard F. Seidl). They show that such a life is like a tiny sheet of paper drifting along in the current of history, but which does not perish and provides insights that help one to better understand the course of the world.
At the beginning of the 20th century, Oerter was in lively contact with prominent representatives of the anarchist movement such as Emma Goldmann, Gustav Landauer, Ernst Toller and Erich Mühsam. So it’s no wonder that Oerter’s memoirs are a sophisticated literary document that relentlessly describes his own reality of life, but also the lurching of German history in turbulent times. As an activist, he was involved in the four-day Fürth Soviet Republic. Oerter, who worked as a lithographer and bookseller, had been enthusiastic about nonviolent anarchism from an early age. He later directed the magazine The Syndicalist, in which he promoted the idea of nonviolence in many editorials. There he wrote: “Under the pressure of working life, I soon became an enthusiastic supporter of social democracy. The independence movement of the early 1890s then led me into the camp of anarchism.”
His writings are still worth reading
Oerter also gives open information about his interpersonal relationships. His partner Nanni stayed by his side throughout his life, although as a libertarian socialist he was an advocate of free love. Because of his critical attitude toward National Socialism and his contacts with the resistance, he was repeatedly arrested. He was tortured in prison and died in 1935 as a result of the abuse.
Most of Oerter’s texts that are still worth reading have fallen into oblivion, and his books can only be found in antiquarian bookshops. The “Life Lines” published by the writer and journalist Leonhard F. Seidl bring this man and his rich work to light again. Since Oerter’s memories end around 1902, Seidl describes Oerter’s further life and thinking in the 1920s and 1930s, referring to numerous articles, letters and diaries.
The fact that Oerter’s situation was often precarious is shown by the fact that he could not even afford a typewriter. To save paper, he wrote his texts tightly packed in delicate handwriting. And yet his problems are often similar to those of today, a small consolation when the current world-weariness gets too big. On his way home from the ice rink, he asked his companion for a kiss, writes Oerter, “but she behaved as coolly as the ice we had skated on and just said: You fool!”