Walter Flex

Writer, born in Eisenach, C Germany. After serving as tutor to the Bismarcks, he volunteered for service in World War 1, where he met the leader of the ‘Wandervogel’ youth movement, Ernst Wurche, whose motto ‘Rein bleiben und reif werden’ (‘stay pure, become mature’) inspired Flex to his 1917 war novel Der Wanderer zwischen beiden Welten. This work exercised a profound influence on the post-war younger generation, who viewed Flex as their ideal and spokesman, although after 1945 it was long rejected as nationalistic. Generally neo-Romantic in tone, his other works include the tragedy Klaus von Bismarck (1913), the poems Vom großen Abendmahl (1915), and the novella Wallensteins Antlitz (1918).

Walter Flex, 1887-1917, was a German author responsible for Wanderer zwischen beiden Welten (The Wanderer between Two Worlds), a stunning war novel dealing with themes of humanity, friendship and suffering in the trenches of World War I.

Born in Eisenach to a secondary school teacher, he went to the University of Erlangen where he studied German, thanks to the award of a bursary. In his brief life prior to the outbreak of war he worked as a teacher, publishing, amongst other works, Das Volk in Eisen and Sonne und Schild, a series of well received nationalist works.

After World War II his reputation sadly faded almost entirely.