Hitler Youth Quex - The Novel

The Novel

The novel Der Hitlerjunge Quex was written by Karl Aloys Schenzinger between May and September 1932. It was first published in Nazi party outlet Völkischer Beobachter, and as a book in December 1932. A required reading for Hitler Youth members, more than 190,000 copies were sold within the first two years, and more than 500,000 copies until 1945.

In Schenzinger's novel, Herbert Norkus is named Heini Völker. With a völkisch undertone, the opening chapters describe the hardships of Norkus' youth in a working-class neighborhood of Berlin, characterized by the Great Depression, the unemployment of his father and the suicide of his mother. The contemporary communist youth (Rote Jungfront, "Red Young Front") is portrayed as a disorderly gang devoted primarily to alcohol, tobacco and sex. In contrast, the Nazi youth (Hitlerjugend, "Hitler Youth") is portrayed as an orderly organization, superior in morals. Schenzinger lets Heini Völker's father force his son to attend a camping weekend organized by a communist youth group, North Star Moabit. Heini is disgusted and flees the camp, only to encounter a Hitler Youth group in the woods. Deeply impressed, and in an atmosphere of nationalistic pathos, Heini learns of the Nazi movement, Führerprinzip ("leader principle"), comradeship and Volksgemeinschaft ("the people's community"). On "the happiest day of his life", Heini joins the Hitler Youth, and Schenzinger has the Bannführer (group leader) symbolize Nazi ideology when he handed over Heini's uniform to him: " is the clothing of the community, of comradeship, of our ideology, of our unified organization! It makes us all equal, and gives the same to all and demands the same from all. He who wears such a uniform doesn't have desires of his own anymore, he has only to obey."

The following chapters deal with Heini's life as a Hitler Youth. Obedience and equality as understood by the Nazis are portrayed in a very positive light. They turn out to be beneficial not only for Heini, but also for his comrades, for example, his best friend Fritz Dörries, the son of a wealthy merchant. Emphasis is put on the vision of self-sacrifice, the abolition of social barriers, and racial purity, and Heini learns from Fritz that "with us Hitler Youth, there are no classes. There are only those who get the job done and parasites, and those we'll throw out." The haven Heini found in the Hitler Youth is symbolized by his group's hang-out, "Castle Beusselkietz" - Norkus' group was Schar 2, Hitlerjugend Beusselkietz-Hansa. His comrades nicknamed him Quex because "he carried out orders faster than quicksilver" (German: Quecksilber).

The last part of the novel is devoted to the circumstances of Norkus' (or Heini Völker's) death. According to Baird (1992), Schenzinger's version is a "thinly veiled parallel to Resurrection": When his comrades were gathered around his death bed and wonder whether he is still alive, there "suddenly is a scream. Heini is sitting up in bed, his eyes wide open. He is singing. They don't recognize the words, but they know the melody. It's the song they sing every day, every evening together, on every march. Everyone knows what it means - death is singing here."