II. ‘It’s all come back to me…’ –
Using hypnosis to release locked-away memories
After repeatedly touching upon questions of the depiction of war in connection with my work on the literary canon and censorship, on the formation of literary groups and on the publications of the proceedings of the second and third writers’ congresses held in the GDR in 1950 and 1952, it was only in the spring of 2007, while working on the topic of ‘literature and memory’ with my fellow researcher, Norman Ächtler, that I encountered Heinrich Gerlach’s Stalingrad novel once more. When we studied the book more closely, we quickly recognized that the story of Gerlach’s novel is unique in German literature. Our investigation led us inevitably to a sensational report published in the magazine Quick on 26 August 1951. The banner headline ran: ‘It’s All Come Back To Me…’ The subtitle then went on to reveal the sensational secret: ‘Returnee from Russia regains his memory through hypnosis.’ The report began with a summary of Gerlach’s capture at Stalingrad, his odyssey through POW camps and the amnesia brought on by these traumatic events:
Finally, eight years after being taken prisoner at Stalingrad, and with many long, demoralizing years in Soviet POW camps behind him, he returns to his home town on the River Weser. The years of captivity are like a grey veil to him, with the images blurring and growing ever more indistinct. All the events and years and landscapes begin to merge into one. And then dissolve. What was it really like? He doesn’t know any more. Then, out of the blue, he gets a letter from an old army mate telling him about a manuscript that Gerlach had handed to him when he, the friend, was released. In the event, he continued, he hadn’t been able to hand it over to Gerlach’s wife. At the border, the novel – a package containing several hundred handwritten pages – had been confiscated. Now it all starts coming back to Gerlach. That’s right – a manuscript about his time in Stalingrad, which he’d got off his chest during his time as a POW. But what on earth had he written?
Granted, this was something of an exaggeration; Gerlach hadn’t forgotten his years in captivity or even the existence of his Stalingrad novel. But what he could no longer recall was the structure of his novel and the chronology of events. It was in this situation that Gerlach came across an article in Quick on 13 October 1950. It was written by a Munich physician called Dr Karl Schmitz and was entitled ‘The Unconscious Assignment’. In it, Schmitz described the possibility of retrieving repressed memories through hypnosis. The article raised Gerlach’s hopes that he might, after all, be able to remember his lost war novel. The manuscript had been confiscated by the Soviet secret services in 1949, shortly before his own release in April 1950. Accordingly, in January 1951 Gerlach wrote to Dr Schmitz, asking him if he could help him reconstruct his novel. He went on to describe what happened whenever he tried to recall what he’d written:
I’ve tried reconstructing it, but failed. At each attempt, a mist seems to descend. I just can’t do it! The only thing I’ve managed to retrieve is a section that was particularly important to me – my description of Christmas 1942. Over Christmas last year (1950), in a state of high emotion, I was able to get this down on paper in just half an hour, and with no corrections.
Heinrich Gerlach now asked Schmitz if he thought it might be possible ‘to summon up through hypnosis a “content of consciousness” like the one he’d just described so vividly that it could be written down’. Schmitz showed an immediate interest in treating Gerlach. He was just about to publish his book Hypnosis – Its Nature, Scope, and Purpose, and saw an opportunity to generate publicity for hypnosis as a cure – and naturally also for himself – by conducting a high-profile experiment. After Sigmund Freud had ultimately distanced himself somewhat from hypnosis as a therapeutic method, it was only just beginning to gain in popularity once more in Germany at the start of the 1950s. Even so, Schmitz cautioned Gerlach not to invest too much hope in the procedure. This would, after all, be a ‘hypnotic experiment on a grand scale’. All the same, he continued, he still thought it quite possible that he might be able to get Gerlach ‘to relive the events, perhaps even in their entirety’, and hence was keen to chance the experiment. But because Gerlach did not have the necessary funds to pay for the procedure at the time, he was forced to shelve the plan. Initially, Gerlach was very disappointed, but then – at Dr Schmitz’s instigation – he hit upon a new scheme. On 6 July 1951, he wrote to seven leading news magazines, offering them exclusive rights to the story if they would agree to fund the experiment. Within just a few days he received a reply from Quick, inviting him to come to Munich. Gerlach arrived in the city on 15 July, went straight to the magazine’s offices and signed a contract that had been drawn up in advance. It contained the following clause:
You are undergoing a course of treatment by the Munich physician Dr K. Schmitz of No. 20 Jahnstraße with the aim of being able to reconstruct the manuscript you have mentioned… The extent of our obligation to Dr Schmitz shall be entirely at our discretion…
Years later, Heinrich Gerlach recalled that he had regarded the offer by Quick in 1951 as a unique opportunity for everyone involved:
All in all I considered this contract as very fair and advantageous to those concerned. The magazine could be sure of a good story come what may. Dr Schmitz would receive what would surely be a handsome fee for his treatment and his subsequent report [he got 1,750 Deutschmarks from the magazine], and besides he also had the possibility of having the experiment scientifically evaluated. As for me, this procedure gave me the hope that I might soon retrieve my lost manuscript.
So, a classic ‘win–win’ situation, from which all parties could only benefit. The plan was set in motion and the result of the experiment duly appeared in the 26 August 1951 issue of Quick:
At the invitation of Quick, he [Heinrich Gerlach] travels to Munich, and in a course of treatment lasting three weeks, the miracle actually happens: all the years that have been sunk in the abyss of oblivion rise to the surface once more. In agitated outbursts, recorded by the doctor or his assistant, as well as in the notes that Gerlach himself scribbles down while under hypnosis, his experiences come flooding back, and the individual scenes and chapters of the book are brought to life for a second time. Once again, the bridge of consciousness spans the dark chasm of those lost years. After three weeks Heinrich Gerlach returns home and get all his experiences from Stalingrad off his chest and down on paper once more.