It really is like seeing a film negative compared to the original printed image. Where Wolfgang Faust is glorifying in the gore and lurid descriptions of Soviet atrocities, Rudel is explaining orders, regimental movements, relative speeds between aircraft and the minutae of a combat pilot. Where Hank Chinaski is a worthless bar-fly who will call a day successful if he merely avoids shitting himself, Rudel is leading a bomber command and often destroys ten Soviet T-34 tanks a day. Where Bukowski is a masterful writer, Rudel is dull and factual. Ladies, I present to you Hans Ulrich Rudel’s Stuka Pilot memoir of his experiences throughout WW2. Now, would I be able to find a book that represented the opposite of these two? The last two books I reviewed were, respectively, a beautifully written pseudo-memoir about a degenerate alcoholic who achieved nothing in life, and a trashy pseudo-memoir full of blood’n’guts on the WW2 Eastern Front.
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