The Man Who Came Back, first published in 1958, reads like a modern political thriller. This astonishing – but true – story not only relates the dramatic details of John’s youthful opposition against the Nazis, but also gives a full account of his part in the great German wartime conspiracy and bomb plot against Hitler in July 1944. The description of John’s hair’s-breadth escape to Britain, and his work for the British Black Propaganda organization at The Rookery, Apsley Guise, threw light for the first time on many well-kept war secrets.
Returning to his defeated and divided Fatherland as Chief of West German Intelli¬gence, John was soon involved in the frantic underground warfare of rival espionage organizations; he was also caught up in the East–West conflict of conscience which harassed many of his compatriots. His mysterious “disappearance” from West Germany and emergence in Com¬munist East Germany, his equally baffling return to the West, and his controversial trial, coincided with important stages in Germany's postwar development.
Was Otto John a criminal and a traitor, or a hero and martyr? That is the question which this exciting book probes. It was a question that concerned not only the fate of one man but the future of Germany, Europe, and, perhaps, the peace of the world.
Willi Frischauer, born in Vienna in 1906, became editor of a Vienna newspaper at twenty-three. In the 1930s he helped to reveal the “Schickelgrüber” story of Hitler’s origin, first published in Frischauer’s newspaper. He settled in England in 1935, reporting and writing as an expert on German and European affairs for the Daily Herald, Illustrated magazine, and the Evening Standard. Before The Man Who Came Back, he published Twilight in Vienna (1938), The Nazis at War (1940) and biographies of Goering (1950) and Himmler (1953). He went on to gain a considerable following as an early celebrity biographer, with compelling portraits of such figures as Aristotle Onassis (1968), Otto Preminger (1973), Jacqueline Kennedy (1977) and Princess Margaret (1977). European Commuter (1964) is his account of his own adventures. He died in 1978.
Returning to his defeated and divided Fatherland as Chief of West German Intelli¬gence, John was soon involved in the frantic underground warfare of rival espionage organizations; he was also caught up in the East–West conflict of conscience which harassed many of his compatriots. His mysterious “disappearance” from West Germany and emergence in Com¬munist East Germany, his equally baffling return to the West, and his controversial trial, coincided with important stages in Germany's postwar development.
Was Otto John a criminal and a traitor, or a hero and martyr? That is the question which this exciting book probes. It was a question that concerned not only the fate of one man but the future of Germany, Europe, and, perhaps, the peace of the world.
About the Author
Willi Frischauer, born in Vienna in 1906, became editor of a Vienna newspaper at twenty-three. In the 1930s he helped to reveal the “Schickelgrüber” story of Hitler’s origin, first published in Frischauer’s newspaper. He settled in England in 1935, reporting and writing as an expert on German and European affairs for the Daily Herald, Illustrated magazine, and the Evening Standard. Before The Man Who Came Back, he published Twilight in Vienna (1938), The Nazis at War (1940) and biographies of Goering (1950) and Himmler (1953). He went on to gain a considerable following as an early celebrity biographer, with compelling portraits of such figures as Aristotle Onassis (1968), Otto Preminger (1973), Jacqueline Kennedy (1977) and Princess Margaret (1977). European Commuter (1964) is his account of his own adventures. He died in 1978.
