The Wehrwolf by Alma Katsu

Published by ‎ Amazon Original Stories on September 27, 2022

“The Wehrwolf” is a long short story but probably too short to be called a novella. The story is set in the German forest where the Brothers Grimm collected folklore to weave into their fairy tales. While the stories were later sanitized to appeal to the delicate sensibilities of city kids, Alma Katsu suggests that sturdy Germans of the forest were accustomed to seeing their children mauled in the woods and prepared their kids for the agony of life by terrorizing them with gruesome stories. Perhaps the Grimms unwittingly prepared Germans to accept Hitler and the Nazi Party.

Hans Sauer has returned from the front at the war’s end. Perhaps he is a deserter, although he claims he returned to protect his village from approaching allies. His return coincides with the gruesome death of a Roma in the woods, a man apparently torn apart by animals. Hans wants Uwe Fuchs to join his band of villagers in protecting the village. The Nazis have encouraged such local militias to defend the Homeland.

Uwe is uncertain about joining Hans, but he’s curious when Hans claims to have killed Russian soldiers. The bodies seem to have been attacked by animals. Uwe refuses to listen to the entreaties of his wife because he wears the pants in the family. The importance of marital equality, or maybe just "listen to your wife," might be one of the tale's intended lessons.

To be initiated into the band, Uwe is locked into a cellar with Jurgen Jäger, about whom dark stories are told. When Jurgen ties an old leather belt around his waist, he becomes a monster. A myth associates the belt with the devil, but to Uwe, it looks like an ordinary belt that might be found hanging in any barn. “A simple thing can turn you into a monster,” Uwe thinks, a thought that is presumably another of the story’s lessons. After Uwe is initiated, Hans can turn him into a werewolf simply by donning the belt.

Uwe’s disregard of his wife’s advice leads to an ending that is worthy of one of Grimm’s uncensored stories. Suffice it to say that Uwe learns and then teaches a lesson.

Like a fairy tale, the story invites the reader to draw obvious conclusions. While Uwe doesn’t want to accept the fact that he’s a monster, a reader might conclude that Uwe’s decision to join a militia to fight in support of a Nazi government is what makes him a monster. Not surprisingly, a willingness to kill Russian who are fighting Germany easily translates into a willingness to kill Germans who do not meet a standard of normalcy demanded by the werewolves. Apart from the irony of Aryan werewolves judging others for being abnormal, the story teaches another lesson: Those who give themselves the power to condemn others will inevitably misuse that power to enforce shared bigotry.

There are other lessons here about resisting the temptation of evil even if it makes us feel strong, the triumph of empathy over supremacy, and the immorality of vigilantism and unregulated militias. If this is a modern fairy tale, I’m not sure I would want a small child to read it, but it would have value for older kids and adults with weak minds who are attracted to authoritarian militias. I’m recommending it to everyone else for the polished prose.

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