The red fighter plane
Event ID: 584
Categories:
20 May 1917
Source ID: 22
‘Now I have written a book. It has been published by Ullstein and is called ’Der rote Kampfflieger” (The Red Fighter Pilot).
Every day I receive letters and cards from people who tell me how much they enjoyed ‘Der rote Kampfflieger’. That makes me very happy. I read all the letters, and even though I can’t answer half of them, I try very hard to write back to at least most of the people.
It is very amusing to see how different the impressions are that the book makes on readers. For example, a comrade who is probably a great gourmet and did not quite get his money’s worth during the war writes to me: ‘Dear comrade, please write to me immediately and tell me where you usually buy your oysters. I want to eat oysters too.’
When I received this letter, I first clutched my head, then I had to laugh terribly, because I vaguely remembered that my book mentioned oysters. And indeed, my book says: ‘We celebrated a test in a cosy atmosphere, ate oysters and drank champagne.’
So this comrade had taken this oyster affair as the quintessence of the book.
A student sent me a toilet mirror and remarked that he had gathered from the book that I lacked such a tool in my red aeroplane.
I received an extraordinary number of letters from the cadet corps. The cadets wrote to me that they agreed with me completely regarding their Bauker, and that they, like me, would endeavour to learn only what was absolutely necessary in order to be transferred.
My youngest brother Bolko sent a long letter of complaint about me to the family. He is a cadet in Wahlstatt and complains that I disparaged the teachers of the cadet corps in my book. He says he is now experiencing so much unpleasantness in the corps that it is unbearable. He asks the family to ensure that, should I ever publish any more manuscripts, I must first submit them to him for review. I think he is asking a lot of me, dear Bolko; moreover, he accuses me of lying. In my book, I recounted how I once climbed the church tower in Wahlstatt and hung a handkerchief there. Bolko now claims to have established beyond doubt that the handkerchief is no longer hanging there, and that I therefore cannot possibly have been telling the truth. I think it is too much to expect a handkerchief to adorn a church tower for fifteen years.
Someone sent me the London Times. The newspaper published a review of The Red Fighter Pilot. I find it quite delightful to be reviewed by the enemy during the war. I come off quite well in the review. So if I ever end up in English captivity, the lords will surely treat me with respect.
But sometimes a book like this can have a devastating effect on the emotional lives of our fellow human beings. One poor person wrote to me saying that she adored me and had read my book seven times. Poor child! But then something happened that really astonished me. A young lady wrote to me who, as she herself says, comes from a good family. This lady is a convent pupil and wants to become a nun. She has hung my picture, which she bought somewhere, in her convent cell. And then one day disaster struck: an abbess came into the cell and saw the picture. The convent pupil received a severe reprimand and was told that even prospective nuns were not allowed to hang pictures of men in their rooms, not even if these men were famous fighter pilots. So the pupil had to remove the picture. But what did the clever child do? She did something that might have flattered me if I didn’t think the whole thing was too twisted. She wrote to a friend who was already a nun and asked her to send her a large photograph of herself. The friend did so. Then the poor girl went and cut out the face from the photograph and stuck my face under the nun’s hood. When this came out, the student herself assumed a resemblance to me. She flew, you see. Probably rightly so.
Incidentally, I heard the following wonderful story: Two English publishers want to publish ‘The Red Fighter Pilot’ in England. Both went before the London Patent Court because the publication of the book constitutes a violation of internationally protected copyrights in England. The representative of the responsible English supervisory authority did me a great honour. He explained that my book was certainly of great general and professional interest and that its publication in English would be useful, as it described the methods of the best German fighter pilot, who had also shot down the most famous English pilot, Captain Ball. So, once the two publishers have reached an agreement, ‘Der rote Kampfflieger’ will be published in England. God save the King!”
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