Det är tidigt 1920-tal. Första världskriget är över och nätterna i den unga Weimarrepubliken fylls av odåd och illegalt spelande. I München har allmänne åklagaren Norbert von Wenk beslutat sig för att röja upp bland stadens spelhålor.
Men där ute i natten finns en dold makt. Wenk får höra talas om hur hasardspelare till synes mot sin vilja spelar helt huvudlöst och förlorar stora summor pengar. När han undersöker saken kommer den allmänne åklagaren en dunkelt anad mästarförbrytare på spåret. Eller rör det sig i själva verket om flera personer? Är förbrytaren över huvud taget mänsklig?
Den makt Wenk tar upp kampen mot verkar kunna dyka upp var som helst utan att bli igenkänd. Den förfogar av allt att döma över såväl ljusskygga förmågor som ett knivskarpt intellekt och den drivs av en svart eld som är som sprungen ur det traumatiserade Efterkrigseuropas själva ruiner. Spelet med dr Mabuse har tagit sin början.
Dr Mabuse, spelaren gavs ursprungligen ut 1921–22 och ligger till grund för Fritz Langs stumfilmsklassiker Dr. Mabuse, der Spieler. Detta är den första svenska versionen någonsin av Norbert Jacques roman. Med efterord av översättaren Peter Handberg.
Luxembourgish German languaged novelist, journalist and screenwriter.
He is mostly known for creating the horror character Dr. Mabuse and his work for German cinema. He is credited with writing the scripts for 16 films made between 1922 and 1990. In 1922 he received German citizenship.
good grief! Pulp, pulp, and more pulp featuring a criminal genius who out-Svengalis Svengali. Not great literature, to be sure, but Mabuse is a great villain. I don't quite know how to rate this book -- I had a lot of fun with it, reading it in one long sitting without moving a muscle. So for the book itself, probably like 3.5 stars, my enjoyment of it and my softness for old pulp adventure fiction counts for more, so averaged together, let's settle on 3.5 on the four side so 4 is my rating. Gah.
I'd recommend it to serious pulp readers who aren't looking for fine literature but rather a good time. I can only imagine reading this book in its original serialized form -- I would have had a field day as each episode came to some sort of cliffhanger and I eagerly awaited the next installment.
This highly influential (and historically difficult to find) novel was something of a precursor to many major pop culture developments, including supervillains, the pulp novels of the '30s and '40s, and modern crime fiction and spy-thrillers.
The titular Dr. Mabuse shares many similarities to The Shadow (and the cover image seems to highlight this by showing him with a handkerchief hiding his lower face) except that, instead of a force of good, he is a force of evil. The characters in the novel are broad archetypes and it is a rather binary tale of good vs. evil though it would have been extremely exciting for its time.
The parallels of Dr. Mabuse and the rise of the Nazi party in Germany are often debated though it isn't difficult to draw comparisons between Mabuse and Hitler as they were both egomaniacs who had a sort of hypnotic power over the masses. The added historical context does add an extra layer of intrigue to an otherwise straightforward yarn.
Overall, I really enjoyed reading this. It's easy to see how Dr. Mabuse and Fantomas et al. paved the way for the likes of Bond villains, comic book mad scientists and super criminals, and other generally evil and over-the-top characters. Maybe Dr. Mabuse is unfairly judged in comparison to the film counterparts, but for a pulp novel this is as good as it gets. Lots of action and melodrama. Never boring.
It's a credit to Fritz Lang and Thea von Harbou that they saw the potential in this rather unthrilling thriller to transform it into one of the masterpieces of silent cinema. Where Lang's epic film takes the story from scandal and card cheating to dizzying heights of criminality, the book remains mostly concerned with the antics of a master villain content to use his disguises and hypnotic super powers to win at the gambling table. The film and the book use the plot as a commentary on the perilous state of Weimar finance and the period detail is perhaps the strongest element here for a modern reader.
Still, I'm very happy to have had the chance to read the novel -- the film being a favorite -- and will be checking out some of the other offerings of the Bruin Asylum press. This one is recommended, with reservations, to Lang fans and afficianados of pulp action published between the first two world wars.
Nun habe ich den ersten der beiden in diesem Buch enthaltenen Romane gelesen und muss sagen, dass ich relativ enttäuscht bin. Nach den sich überschlagenden Vorrezensionen und dem, was ich so ein bisschen aus dem Lang-Film über Dr. Mabuse noch im Kopf hatte, hatte ich erwartet, einen deutschen Dr Fu Manchu zu finden. Leider hat sich das nicht bewahrheitet. Der Plot ist meines Erachtens ziemlich wirr und planlos (vielleicht ist das auch Absicht, wie ein Vorrezensent anmerkte, dann ist es sehr gut gelungen...), die Charaktere stereotyp und so etwas wie Atmosphäre baut sich überhaupt nicht auf. Die Sprache des Autors ist abgehackt und ziemlich prosaisch, viele kurze Sätze, die einen richtigen Lesefluss nicht aufkommen lassen, abgewechselt mit einer Art "stream-of-consciousness"-Technik, wenn Dr Mabuse seine irren Fantasien runterbetet.
Irgendwie fehlt mir an dem Roman was - der "größte Verbrecherring Deutschlands" beschäftigt sich nur mit Schmuggeln. Vielleicht ist man inzwischen, beeinflusst durch die wirklich großen Schurken wie Blofeld, Fu Manchu, Dr Doom oder Hannibal Lecter, zu abgehärtet in dieser Beziehung. Mabuse spielt definitiv nicht in dieser Liga, er ist eigentlich ein billiger Kleinkrimineller, der Leuten beim Bakkarat das Geld aus der Tasche zieht. Auch die eigentlich interessante Prämisse des Hypnotiseurs und Manipulierers kommt überhaupt nicht rüber, er nutzt seine Fähigkeit wie gesagt eigentlich nur zum Tricksen beim Kartenspiel. Auch seine Gegner, insbesondere Staatsanwalt Wenk, wirken eher provinziell und nicht wirklich geeignet für die große Leinwand.
Im Gegensatz zum bereits angesprochenen Fu Manchu von Sax Rohmer, übrigens zeitlich relativ nahe angesiedelt an dieses Buch, wirkt halt alles irgendwie kleiner, possierlicher und provinzieller. Mir hats nicht gefallen, insbesondere, da man sich über viele Seiten relativ quälen muss, das Buch NICHT aus der Hand zu legen, gerade wenn die sehr bemüht wirkenden Emotionen von Protagonisten beschrieben werden.
Für Fans von kriminellen Meistergehirnen empfehle ich lieber Sax Rohmer oder Ian Fleming.
This is a classic piece of work that gave us a criminal mastermind with global ambitions long before any of the James Bond baddies came along. Enter the world in between the world wars, the Germany of the 20s, a time of poverty, lawlessness and lust for life ... the perfect scene for someone of Mabuse's genius to work his magic.
Exhibit II in what may be an ongoing series: No, The Book ISN'T Better Than the Movie (see my review of Strangers on a Train).
So, apparently the Germans lost a big war shortly before this novel was published? Something about a treaty in Versailles? They weren't very happy about it?
There's a lot of pontificating about WWI in this book, as well as a lot of phony psychobabble, some very poor attempts at free indirect discourse, and its just generally poorly written.
Fritz Lang took the basics of the plot, discarded most of the chaff and made a really excellent 4-hour silent movie out of it. But probably the more obvious reason that this belongs in the NTBIBTTM casefiles is that when using the same character and basic premise in a sequel not based on a book (The Testament of Dr. Mabuse), Lang made an even better movie. In other words, as great as the film Dr. Mabuse is, the book was really holding it back, holding it down to a basic crime thriller with some silly plot contrivances.
[#109 Luxembourg] This is a thriller set in the immediate post-WWI era Germany, where a hypnotist and master of disguise is stealing enormous amounts of money from gamblers. It's a supervillain story, well-written and gripping. The male protagonists are interesting, especially the good guys such as the police officer in charge of the investigation. The female characters, however, are so over the top that it became funny. Overall, I really like this book - mostly because it lines up with my tastes.
Set in 1920s Germany, Dr. Mabuse is a greedy anarchist who assumes many guises and controls a legion of henchmen (both willingly and unwillingly) through money, power, and telepathic hypnosis. State prosecutor Norbert von Wenk gets put on Dr. Mabuse’s trail after strange things happen at gambling halls and so begins a game of cat and mouse.
Dr. Mabuse is a great villain. He’s truly evil and is a power-hungry master-manipulator. He can hypnotise people to do what he wills, whether it’s cheating at a game of cards or even taking their own life. The way the hypnotism is described by one of he’s victims is very unsettling and uncomfortable, especially when he’s forcing his will upon a woman. It is for all intents and purposes rape of the mind and body. He’s also great at disguises and putting on different personas so at times von Wenk and Dr. Mabuse are in the same room and may even be talking to one another but von Wenk has no idea that it’s the man he’s after until later.
The writing style of Dr. Mabuse is that typical late nineteenth century style. The language, the mystery, and the action reminded me both of Sherlock Holmes and Raffles at times. If you like stories about those characters – though they’re both far more heroic than Dr. Mabuse – then you might like this one too.
Dr. Mabuse is a fun, pulpy, mystery. It’s full of twists and turns and though some of them are unbelievable – how this man manages to evade capture at some points incredible – but it just goes to show how Dr. Mabuse is the kind of criminal mastermind that’s always a few steps ahead. Though it goes to great lengths to show how smart Dr. Mabuse is, it doesn’t do so at the detriment of von Wenk. He’s a pretty smart and capable man himself, and has enough pull with the law to get police officers (and a lot of them) where he needs them quickly. It is fun seeing von Wenk put things together and try and solve the case. There’s a lot of surprises and when some of Dr. Mabuse’s accomplices would rather die than say anything about him, von Wenk faces a lot of dead ends.
Dr. Mabuse is a pretty enjoyable read and being set in 1920s Germany it’s interesting to see the effects of the First World War on the German citizens and society. They were often only passing mentions but it helped make me understand the place that Dr. Mabuse was operating in.
This is very much a product of its time in terms of the setting: Germany after WW1 was a mess, torn between the post-war economic collapse and the excesses of Weimar. The rich live fabulous lives while the poor struggle to survive: the rich indulge in nefarious business schemes, while the poor resort to smuggling. They're all criminals, but in different ways. At the same time, there was an immense fear of the new science of psychoanalysis, and the idea that the unscrupulous could use it to manipulate people to do their will. This is the world of Mabuse: a Svengali-esque Moriarty, pursued by a policeman who's out of his depth. It was a huge success at the time.
I knew what to expect going into this: all the reviews said that Lang had taken a mediocre novel and turned it into a cinematic masterpiece. They weren't wrong. The novel is labored, convoluted and full of unnecessary rambling. Structurally, it's like one of those Saturday morning serials where the hero almost catches the villain time after time, but the bad guy always gets away to thwart him again.
I was surprised to find that this story was set in Munich. Occasionally recognising street names (and complaints about the Föhn) made me happy, lol. Dr Mabuse was an interesting character, able to hypnotise in a (to a certain degree) supernatural manner. Though a psychologist/Psycho-Analytiker, he is the mastermind behind a criminal network that stretches from Bavaria to Switzerland, with the ultimate goal of founding an utopian city in Brazil. The criminality is mostly centred on gambling, which is where Dr Mabuse meets his antagonists of this novel, Staatsanwalt von Wenk and Hull. The plot focuses on the gambling, followed by a police chase to hunt down Mabuse and his lackey Georch (no, not Georg. Georch! 😂) and is decently interesting, involving two murders and a good amount of cat-and-mouse antics. But Mabuse is the truly interesting part. Can he shapeshift? Can he possess different people? Can he actually hypnotise or is it a supernatural ability? Who knows, not me, cos I’m not reading the second book, sorry. It did read like pulp fiction from time to time, though the German writing style occasionally reminded me of Erich Kästner.
Das wahre Babylon Berlin. Basierend auf diesem Buch drehte Fritz Lang seinen ikonischen Film. Dies ist einer der seltenen Fälle, in denen der Film besser abschneidet als das Buch. Aber literarische Arbeit hat ihren Wert. Es wurde 1921 verfasst und befasst sich mit Aspekten der Zeit nach dem Ersten Weltkrieg, die einen starken Einfluss auf Deutschland hatten. Das Buch ist eine Art Schundliteratur seiner Zeit. Dr. Mabuse ist ein Mesmerist, der in der Lage ist, zahlreiche Verkleidungen anzunehmen und Kartenspiele zu spielen, um Vermögen für seine kriminelle Organisation zu sammeln, um erstaunlicherweise mitten in den Wäldern des Südens ein Königreich namens Eitopomar zu errichten Brasilien. Fantastisch!
The setting of post-war Germany adds interest to this melodramatic thriller about a detective attempting to catch a supervillain who is a hypnotist and a master of disguise. It's quite well-written in an old-fashioned kind of way, although it sometimes goes over the top - especially in scenes involving female characters. Maybe Jacques hadn't met any real females before! In comparison to other authors writing similar books, this is better than Sax Rohmer but not as good as Conan Doyle. A welcome reprint, but there are a fair few typos throughout!
To be frank, not my cup of tea. A mix of egomania by the good Dr and post-ww1 corruption and smuggling, with an insight into how the 1% of the time lead their pointless lives. Not bad at all, but I can't see myself rereading.
I read this book because I was curious to see how Thea von Harbou and Fritz Lang had adapted it for their 1922 silent film. Their other adaptations have been fairly free, but their film follows this book fairly closely--with a few interpolations. I am not a big fan of the film, but one of the reasons is that I find the film hard to follow, and the book explained many things that I did not previously understand.
As a mystery/thriller, this book is fairly tepid. Apparently, the author, Norbert Jacques, was appalled by the excesses of Weimar Germany, particulary what he saw as the German public fascination with gambling, so he set off to write a sort of cautionary tale and seems to creak and wheeze today. The translation by Lillian A. Clare is serviceable, but if you have any interest in these sort of late Victorian potboilers, I would say that this is only for the real hard-core fan.
It was a fun quick read, but I may honestly prefer the film in this case, because of how expansive it is. The book is quite light, though maybe perhaps too light. It plays out much the same way (same except for the ending) but I think with Fritz Lang's artistic touch it just made things a whole lot more fun.