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Hell on Earth

Hell on Earth first appeared in Hebrew published in installments in Ha’aretz during the 1920s, like its prequel The Great Madness and in book form in 1932. Both novels are memoir-fiction and revised diaries of Avigdor Hameiri (Feuerstein, 1890–1970) documenting his life as a Jewish officer in the Austro-Hungarian army during the Great War. The Great Madness, which follows Hameiri from the nationalist patriotic outburst on the eve of the war, through military training to the battlefield was translated into English twice, in 1952 by Jacob Friedman and again in 1984 by Yael Lotan, but unfortunately these translations are no longer in print and hard to find. Peter Appelbaum offers the first English translation of Hell on Earth, carefully and beautifully rendered, despite the many difficulties this text poses. About halfway into the novel, Hameiri writes: “Morning dawns. I’m sure that bad things are going to happen to us today” (The opening lines of chapter 27, 203). This juxtaposition of descriptive factual pseudo-documentary diction with a constant sense of foreboding, is the recurring tone of the novel. The writer, and the readers, know and feel that things can only get worse, and they do. This is not an easy book to read. Hameiri’s experience as a prisoner-of-war in Russia is horrific, and he documents it all in detail: the violence, the hunger, the extreme cold, the lice and the constant presence of death and fear. And in the latter part of the book, the “us” from the citation above is gone too, as Hameiri’s companions die miserably and he has no one to share the inhuman daily life until his release. A prisoner, Hameiri is taken across Russia and the novel traces his journey and encounter with a vast land and itsmany faces, the encounter with the Jewish population beingmost significant. Thewriter remains hopeful that one day the war and its torment will end and he will be able to live life anew, and it is this hope that keeps himwriting and keeps him alive. In his introduction to thefirstHebrew edition,Hameiri wants his book to be read as awarning;