Historyâs Fool, by Thomas Meaney

On the Marble Cliffs, by Ernst JÃnger, translated from the German by Tess Lewis, is published by New York Review Books.

Thomas Meaney: JÃNGer is the intractable land mine of German literature.

Meaney's biography chronicles the war memoir Storm of Steel.

JÃnger was born in Heidelberg in 1895 and grew up in Hannover in the twilight of German empire.

Packed off to boarding school at 16, used his allowance to buy a six-shot revolver and escaped to Algeria in the ranks of the French Foreign Legion.

For such young men, the First World War came like a gift from heaven.

JÃnger's father suggested that he edit his war notebooks into a volume while he recovered from his wounds.

The result was a series unlike any other.

He made no attempt to provide context for the violence, no attempts to pass judgment.

He was in no doubt that a new type of human was produced by the maelstrom.