Story summary
Краткое содержание: Верноподданный
- Чтение: 8 мин.
- 9 parts
- Аудио скоро
A frightened boy who loves the cane grows into a mustached nationalist who shouts for his Kaiser.
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Верноподданный in short
The Subject follows Diederich Heßling from a nursery of fear to the head of a factory and the front of a town. He learns early that safety lies in joining the strong and pressing on the weak. The fraternity and the Kaiser's processions teach him to love orders, and love and kindness come second to his career.
What Верноподданный is about
Picture a boy who claps his hands when his father falls down the stairs, then runs away in fear. That is Diederich Heßling on the first pages of The Subject, a novel that follows him from a paper mill nursery to the top of his provincial town.
Heinrich Mann finished it in July 1914, just before the First World War. It paints Imperial Germany under Kaiser Wilhelm the Second as a country of men who love to be commanded. Mann gives you no monster, only a nervous man who learns that the safest place in life is just behind someone strong.
Для кого. You will enjoy this if you like sharp satire, stories of social climbing, and portraits of how ordinary people drift into loud nationalism. It also suits anyone who loves a comic villain studied with a clear eye.
The story in 9 parts
Key idea 1 · free to read
A frightened child learns to love power
Diederich Heßling grows up in Netzig as a soft child who dreams over fairy tales and fears almost everything. A toad on the garden bench can make him jump. His father, a stern paper maker with a cane on the wall, frightens him more than any toad. Diederich is expected to love him, and he does.
Each small crime teaches the same lesson. He trades buttons stolen from the rag room for candy, then prays in terror and confesses it himself. When his father falls down the stairs, Diederich claps his hands and runs away in panic. Love and fear are so tangled in him that he cannot tell them apart.
The world outside is a chain of powers, and he is happy to belong to it. At home he rages at his little sisters' mistakes with red ink. He reports classmates to the head teacher, and he forces the only Jewish boy in class to kneel before a cross of building blocks. The cheering crowd makes him feel strong.
Diederich learns in childhood that safety means standing behind power and pushing down on those below.
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Berlin and the fraternity give him a uniform self
Diederich goes to Berlin to study chemistry and is lost at once.
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Soldiering fails him, but the Kaiser thrills him
When his father dies, Diederich goes home, weeps at the bed and kisses the hand that once beat him.
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He abandons Agnes to protect his career
Back in Berlin, Diederich meets Agnes Göppel again on a wet path, and she is thinner and sadder.
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Netzig meets its new master
Diederich arrives home and jokes with a plump girl eating a sausage in the train.
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A trial shows who holds the real power
Diederich stirs up trouble for Mr. Lauer, the factory owner who shares profits with his workers and is the son-in-law of old Buck.
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A rumor wins him a wife and a medal
One evening in the factory Diederich shows Guste around the machines.
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Power is a pleasure of submission and a business
Mann keeps returning to one idea.
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How Mann tells it with satire and repeated signs
Mann writes in a fast, comic style full of exaggeration.
Read all 9 key ideas now
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Characters, plot and themes
Main characters
- Diederich Heßling A timid paper maker's son who learns to love power, bully the weak and rise in Netzig by shouting for the Kaiser.
- Guste Daimchen A plump, shrewd heiress from Netzig who wants a husband and a position, and who is engaged to Wolfgang Buck.
- Old Mr. Buck The gentle liberal great man of Netzig, once sentenced to death in 1848, who believes in the human spirit.
- Wolfgang Buck The old man's clever, ironic youngest son, a lawyer who dreams of the stage and sees through Diederich.
- Napoleon Fischer The Social Democrat foreman at Diederich's mill, who smiles calmly and wants a union hall and a seat in parliament.
- Regierungspräsident von Wulckow A loud, brutal regional president who rewards loyal men and crushes those he does not trust.
- Assessor Jadassohn A fraternity friend and ambitious prosecutor with large ears, who hunts for insults to the Kaiser.
- Agnes Göppel A fragile Berlin girl who loves Diederich for years and hopes he will marry her.
How it ends (spoiler)
Diederich is about to be introduced and decorated at the monument unveiling when the heavens burst open. Soaked but proud, he walks home through the town and finds old Mr. Buck's house open, with the old man dead inside. Diederich, who now holds the mortgage, enters as the owner. Nothing in him changes. His loyalty, his medals and his position remain safe, and power still rewards him.
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Вопросы о книге Верноподданный
What is The Subject by Heinrich Mann about?
It follows Diederich Heßling, a timid paper maker's son who rises from a fraternity student to a powerful factory owner in the German town of Netzig. The book satirizes loud loyalty to the Kaiser and the pleasure of obeying authority.
What does the title The Subject mean?
The German title Der Untertan means a person who is subject to a ruler. Mann uses it for a man who loves to obey those above him and to command those below, and who finds comfort in both roles.
When was The Subject written and what period does it cover?
Mann finished it in July 1914. The story is invented, but it is set in Imperial Germany under Kaiser Wilhelm the Second, and it follows one man's life from childhood through the 1890s and beyond.
Who are the main characters in The Subject?
The main figures are Diederich Heßling, his wife Guste Daimchen, the liberal old Mr. Buck and his son Wolfgang, the Social Democratic foreman Napoleon Fischer, the regional president Wulckow, and the prosecutor Jadassohn.
Is The Subject worth reading today?
Yes, readers value its quick scenes, comic characters and clear picture of how fear and ambition feed loud nationalism. Mann's humor is lively, and its portrait of a man who bullies down and bows up still feels familiar.
Как сослаться на это издание
Mann, Heinrich. The Subject. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-subject.
Mann, H. (2026). The subject. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-subject (Original work published 1918)
Mann, Heinrich. The Subject. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-subject.
@book{mann2026subject,
author = {Mann, Heinrich},
title = {The Subject},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-subject},
note = {First published 1918}
}
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