Sven Hassel
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Sven Hassel (born April 19, 1917) is a Danish-born soldier and writer who has written pseudo-autobiographical novels based on his experiences in World War II.
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Biography
Hassel's biography is disputed (see below). He claims that he was born as Sven Pedersen at Frederiksborg, Zealand, Denmark. He later adopted his mother's maiden name Hassel. At the age of 14 he joined a merchant navy as a cabin boy and worked in ship until his military service in 1936. In 1937, to escape the Great Depression, the unemployed Hassel moved to Germany to join the army. In an interview in 1990, he said, "Germany happened to be closer than England, I went to a Wehrmacht recruiting office to enlist, but it wasn't as easy as I had thought. Only German citizens could serve. After six months of trying to join up, the Seventh Cavalry Regiment finally accepted me on the condition that I became a naturalized German." Later he served with the second Panzer Division stationed at Eisenach and in 1939 was a tank driver during the invasion of Poland.
A year later he attempted to escape. ". . .I was quite simply exhausted. I did not return to my unit after a short leave. Desertion they called it. I was transferred to a sonderabteilung, a penal unit manned by criminals and dissidents."
He served with the 2nd Cavalry Regiment and later the 11th and 27th Panzer Regiments (6th Panzer Division) on all fronts except North Africa and was wounded several times. Eventually he reached the rank of lieutenant and received an Iron Cross 1st and 2nd class. He surrendered to Soviet troops in Berlin in 1945 and spent following years in various POW camps. He began to write his first book, Legion of the Damned while he was interred.
He was released in 1949, and was planning to join the French Foreign Legion when he met Dorthe Jensen, whom he married in 1951. He went to work in a car factory, but his wife encouraged him to write about his experiences. De Fordometes Legion (Legion of the Damned) was published in 1953.
In 1957 Sven Hassel suffered from an attack of a sickness caught during the war and was paralyzed for almost two years. After recovery, he began to write more books. In 1964 he moved to Barcelona, Spain, where, as of 2004, he still lives. In total he has published fourteen novels which have been translated into eighteen languages. In 1987 his book Wheels of Terror was made into a film with the title The Misfit Brigade [1] (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093546)
In his books, Hassel describes the war through a first-person narrator with the same name. The books describe the exploits of a 27th (Penal) Panzer Regiment composed of expendable soldiers - sentenced criminals, court-martialed soldiers and political undesirables. In addition to Sven, they include Legionnaire (ex-member of French Foreign Legion); an giant of a man ironically named Tiny; barracks fixer Porta; older sergeant Old One; and Barcelona, a veteran of both sides of the Spanish Civil War. They serve on most fronts from Northern Finland to the Russian Front (more than once) and to Normandy during the Normandy Invasion. A quick chronological analysis of the activities described in the books appears to show that the regiment depicted in the books fought in several places, hundreds of miles apart, at the same time. Hassel states that the characters are based on real people and events are related to historical events.
Hassel's view of war is brutal: Soldiers fight only to survive, the Geneva Convention is a dead letter to all sides. People are killed by chance or with very little reason. Occasional pleasant events and peaceful meetings are brutally cut short. Unsympathetic Prussian officers constantly threaten their men with court martials and execute them with little provocation. Disgruntled soldiers occasionally kill their own officers to get rid of them.
Critics
A Danish journalist, Erik Haaest, has spent many years trying to debunk Hassel's claims. Haaest argues that the author spent the majority of World War II in occupied Denmark and that his knowledge of warfare comes second-hand from other Danish SS veterans whom he met after the end of the war. Haaest also alleges that Hassel's first novel was ghostwritten and when it became a success, he employed his wife to write the rest of his books. Although these allegations are not generally accepted, they have focused attention on Hassel's description of his own past and provoked much discussion, particularly on Internet newsgroups and discussion forums, on the validity of Hassel's claims.
Works
(English names)
- The Legion Of The Damned (1953)
- Wheels Of Terror (1958)
- Comrades of War (1960)
- Assignment Gestapo (1963)
- Monte Cassino (The Beast Regiment) (1963)
- Liquidate Paris (1967)
- March Battalion (1962)
- SS-General (1969)
- Reign of Hell (1971)
- Blitzfreeze (1976)
- The Bloody Road to Death
- Court Martial
- OGPU Prison (1981)
- The Commissar
External links
- Porta’s Kitchen (http://www.svenhassel.info) (a fan site with a large amount of information)
- Sven Hassel web site (http://www.svenhassel.net) (Author's site)
- Erik Haaest's site (http://home.tiscali.dk/haaest/Hassel-Hazel/Texts/English/00table.htm) (opposition site challenging Hassel's claims)fr:Sven Hassel