In this thread I will post quotations from Mars by Fritz Zorn,

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OP here. I have posted this thread previously, but I assumed it would die through lack of interest before people started bumping.

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On Fritz's family

>"My family is somewhat degenerate, and I assume that I am suffering not only from the influences of my environment but also from some genetic damage. And of course I have cancer. That follows logically enough from what I have just said about myself."

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On young Fritz's home life

>"The world I'll begin with, then, is the one I knew as a small boy. This was a world so harmonious that it is difficult to conceive of such harmony. I grew up in a world so completely harmonious that it would make even the most dyed-in-the-wool harmonist's hair stand on end. [...] The consequences of this were horrendous."

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On Fritz's family's guiding principle

>"I would describe my family's situation like this: We did nothing and said nothing and fought for nothing and had no opinions and spent our time being amused by other people who were ridiculous enough to do, say, or thing something. [...] The less you do the less ridiculous you will be. We adhered to this principle, and it contributed greatly to making me respectable and miserable."

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On young Fritz's isolation in highschool

>"At the opening ceremony for new students, the rector of the Gymnasium told us, after he had explained the basic structure and curriculum of the school, that the best thing about our Gymnasium years would be that we would form true friendships there, many of which would last all our lives. I had no idea, as the rector was saying this, just how thoroughly prepared I was to prevent this prophecy from coming true."

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On young Fritz's vulnerability

>"I was so vulnerable and so afraid of being wounded because I had not been taught how to be vulnerable. All I had been prepared for was to remain eternally inviolate and pure."

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On young Fritz's relationship with classmates

>"Despite the fact that I was generally regarded as an outsider and a weakling, my classmates still accepted me. They didn't particularly enjoy me, nor did they find my particularly offensive. My place among them was quite clear: I was not a spoilsport, but it was taken as granted that I would not participate in my schoolmates' activities. I wasn't excluded from what they did, I just didn't take part. I got along well with everyone and didn't have any enemies, but I didn't have any friends, either. I was a rather nondescript entity that evoked neither strong sympathy nor antipathy from others."

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On young Fritz's occupation with "higher things"

>"In one respect, my existence as an outsider had certain advantages. It was clear that I occupied myself with "higher things." This was primarily evident in the fact that I was more boring than my classmates. But on the other hand it must have given me a certain air of distinction. My classmates found it not only ridiculous but also curious that I never swore, that i kept away from anything gross or impure, and that I remained excessively well-mannered in all circumstances."

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On young Fritz's shyness and sensitivity

>"Like all shy people, I was horribly ashamed of the fact that I blushed so much and thus revealed my inner state for everyone to see. Because I was afraid of blushing, I fought fire with fire by deliberately inducing it. Whenever I realized, either in conversation or in class, that a topic that would make me blush was coming up, I staged a desperate diversionary action with my handkerchief, wiping away imaginary sweat or simulating a sneezing fit. Hypersensitive as I was, these painful incidents could only become more frequent, and I began to blush in situations that needn't have been embarrassing to someone of my excessive shyness."

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On young Fritz's distaste for the physical world

>"My body was alien to me, and I didn't know what in the world to do with it. I was quite at home in that dubious world of the "higher things," but I was afraid of the brutality and primitiveness I sensed lurking in the physical world. I didn't enjoy physical activity; I thought myself ugly; and I was ashamed of my body. [...] It bothered me that I felt no tie between my body and the rest of the physical world, and the outward form this uneasiness took was excessive modesty. Not only did I avoid all physical contact, but I even avoided using words that referred to the body and its sexuality."

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On remaining an observer in life

>"It was fun to watch life pass by. But that is just the point. Life passed by in front of us. It took me years to realize that the streets were interesting. All I knew about them was that they were picturesque and that you could see striking types there. It never occurred to me that when I was on the street I was a type, too. I've often looked at the streets as though it were a stage set, and taken in all the people going about their business. But I had no business there besides watching other people go about their business."

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On the consequences of detachment from life

>"My sense of the street as my own private theater had one horribly consequence for me. Because all I did was look people over on the street, not with sympathy but critically and condescendingly, I automatically assumed that they looked at me the same way. Whenever anyone glanced at me on the street, I took for granted that the glance was critical and that the person had seen something objectionable about me. And since I interpreted every glance this way, I began to fear that people must be finding a great deal wrong with me. I was afraid that y clothes were dirty or mussed or that, unbeknownst to me, I was carrying about some kind of public nuisance with me."

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On Fritz's anxiety around girls

>"I found it particularly painful when girls glanced at me. Since it had never occurred to me to look at girls admiring and since I had always kept a lookout only for what was ridiculous in women, I assumed that they did the same with me. [...] I was incapable of interpreting even friendly glances as anything but expressions of criticism and displeasure. Every smile struck me as sarcastic and derisive. I hardly need say that I didn't smile back."

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On young Fritz's failure to find a girlfriend

>"Many of my friends had girl friends. I, of course, did not. That it was perfectly natural for me not to have one could be explained by the fact that, in this respect, too, I was not as far along as my friends. I thought that in time I would have one. Now a long-term struggle between two opposing views began to take place in me: either I did not have a girlfriend *yet* or I was *incapable* of having a girl friend. As long as I possible could, I clung to the hypothesis that I was just not far enough along to have one. But this view became increasingly difficult to maintain. I saw that for a long time now it was not just my classmates and immediate contemporaries who had girl friends but also much younger and smaller boys. With each passing year, younger and younger students in our Gymnasium were successful with girls. Time was advancing, but I, instead of advancing with it, was standing still. The moment had long since come and gone when everyone else had a girl friend and when I should have had one, too. And suddenly I saw that the opportunity I regarded as "not yet come" had in reality "long since passed." I could no longer regard what should have happened long ago as something that might yet happen in the future. No vague possibility of fulfilment lay ahead before me. A past in which I had failed lay behind me. For the first time in my life, I realized that I was guilty, guilty of not having done what I ought to have done."

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On young Fritz attending dance class

>"Dancing class was clearly the place to meet girl friends. As long as I didn't attend dancing classes, I had a good excuse for not having a girl friend. [...] Once there, I quickly realized that there were boys who knew what to do when they were with girls but that I didn't know what to do, and spent my time sitting around feeling inhibited and embarrassed. Once again, the others were knowledgeable, and I was ignorant. [...] While I stood by as a tongue-tied observer, girls who had been anonymous creatures to us all at the beginning of the class evolved into my friends' dancing-class girl friends.[...] I enrolled in a different dancing class in the vain hope that it would be much better and would give me what I wanted. I didn't have the courage to admit to myself that the fault was all mine when I failed, that neither the dancing class nor any other institution was to blame, if I fell behind."

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On young Fritz's pseudo-religious upbringing

>"My parents hoped that I, too, would turn out to be un-Christian, but they lacked the courage to express this wish openly. [...] I was taught all the common Christian virtues like abstinence, renunciation, docility, patience, and, most important of all, a clear denial of almost all aspects of life. In other words, I was taught not to enjoy life but to bear it without complaint, not to be sinful but to be frustrated. This leads us directly to that second major topic that was never mentioned during my childhood and youth: to sex."

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On sexuality

>"our sexuality is at the heart of our being. It is the most vital thing in us, the focal point of our energies. It means business. But all these things were in disfavour at our house. We detested the essence of things; we never wanted to get to the hear of a matter and always preferred to declare it "difficult," We never wanted to do anything ourselves. We preferred to smile at what other people did."

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On Fritz attending Sex Ed class

>"Sex education at our school consisted primarily of a medical lecture designed to scare already quite mature students away from sexual intercourse. Using a slide projector, the school doctor showed us several schematic drawings of the human sexual organs, then topped the whole show off with a huge and grotesquely colored picture of the female organs. In a voice betraying deep emotion he said: "Just look at that, boys. That's what a woman really looks like. None of you would want to get into something like that, now, would you?" Next, he showed us photos of syphilitics in various stages of degeneration. Such, clearly, were the consequences of love."

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on young Fritz's imaginary girlfriend

>"I remained pure, never got dirty, touched nothing, and had no contact with anything or anyone. I had no friends, and I had no love affairs. I was totally incapable of contact with girls, and I was just as incapable of talking about my difficulties in making contact with them An additional problem cropped up here. Everyone automatically assumed that after a certain age boys will have girl friends; and people often asked me whether I had a girl friend, too. Since I knew that I had to answer yes if I didn't want to look ridiculous, I consistently lied and claimed I did have a girl firend."

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>>38041716
>Time was advancing, but I, instead of advancing with it, was standing still.

Keep it up it s great, i might even buy the book

>>38041883
is it over ? or do you have more quotes from him ? It s very interesting

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On Fritz summarizing his school years

>"So there I was: a moderately good but also a moderetaly uninterested student. I had the world's best manners and never gave cause for offence or censure at school. The only subject in which I was inadequate beyond all belief was physical education. My schoolmates neither hated me nor tormented me, but I did not have any friends. I attended several dancing classes to learn how to get along with girls, but I couldn't learn how to dance at all and I learned how to get along with girls even less. I was intelligent, but I didn't know how to do anything. Outwardly, I seemed to be almost repulsively normal, but I was anything but a normal, healthy young man. To the rest of the world, I was known as someone who busied himself with the "higher things," but inwardly I realized that I fallen way behind and really belonged among the very youngest boys in our school. I had no problems, and I sensed that it was better that I had non because I wouldn't have been able to cope with any of I had had them. In short, I had all the prerequisites for becoming a very unhappy person."

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>>38042524
>>38042774
OP here. I figured the thread had died (again). I'll keep posting.

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On teenage Fritz's depression

>"I got sick. I didn't know at the time that I had a disease, nor did I even know the name of the disease. It's one of the most widespread diseases of our time. It's called depression. I would guess now that it began with I was about seventeen or eighteen. It hasn't left me since. I'm thirty-two now, and if I want to take the trouble to calculate the duration of my illness, I come up with fifteen years. [...] Everything seems so gray and empty. Nothing gives you any pleasure, and everything painful is felt to be excessively painful. You have no hope left and can't see beyond an unhappy and meaningless present. All the so-called delights of life inspire no delight. The company of others only aggravates your sense of aloneness. All amusements leave you cold. Vacations provide no real change and weigh more heavily on you than the rest of the year. All the plans you make to get out of your depression you eventually abandon "because nothing does any good anyhow." The two most prominent features of depression are hopelessness and loneliness."

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Give me a quick rundown on this man
Without quotes

bumping for interest
this is an original comment

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>>38043016
OP here. Fritz Zorn grew up in an upper-middle class family in Zurich, Switzerland. He was diagnosed with cancer at the age of around 30 and was convinced his illness was the consequence of a life of anger and frustration. He wrote the book Mars in which he criticises his parents and upbringing, recalls his lonely youth, regrets his virginity and lack of friendship and details his symbolic struggle against cancer.

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On young Fritz's fashion sense

>"I was a very dapper student. I always wore black slacks, a white shirt, a dark blue jacket, and a black tie. My outfit was very dignified and looked like an elegant uniform. But I knew even then that these clothes, absurdly inappropriate as they were for a young man, were the visible signs of my depression. My inner self insisted in my displaying these symbols of mourning."

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On Fritz attending university

>"The university was not populated solely by attractive young women and fiery young men. There were also large numbers of dried-up old maids and wizened bachelors who busied themselves with one obscure faced of scholarship or another and shuffled around in shabby old gray clothes. They didn't have any lovers. If, in my own mind, I wanted to belong to some existing group or another, I would have to make do with this professorial army of erudite and infertile scarecrows. Before, I had been too "little" to be myself". Now I was too "old" to be myself. I was unable to be the age that I in fact was. And one again I found a way to rationalize this: I must be completely normal - or at least fall within the limits of normality - because there were other students at the university like me."

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On Fritz acknowledging his failure

>"This became one of my major problems during my student years. In my heart I knew I was a failure, but I didn't want to admit it to myself. I also knew that the basic reason I was a failure was that I didn't have a woman, for "woman" was the symbol and essence of everything I was lacking. But I hid this knowledge from myself and invented all sorts of other reasons why I was so depressed all the time. [...] I always had a smile on my lips because I wanted to create the impression that I was not frustrated. The more depressed I was in my innermost self, the more I smiled at the outside world. The blacker on the insider, the brighter on the outside."

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On neuroticism

>"If we accept the definition of a neurotic as a person who can never live in the present and always seeks refuge either in the future or in the past, then I fulfilled all the requirements by the time I was a university student. On the one hand, I still saw myself as a "little boy" who had fallen behind and was still not capable of doing anything. On the other hand, I kept hoping constantly that at some far and indeterminate point in the future I would find the fulfilment I could not find in the present."

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This is a good read, OP. Keep it up.

His name literally means "wrath".

Got any more quotes? These are very interesting

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>>38043470
OP here. His real name was Fritz Angst, which is also pretty fitting.

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On Fritz attempting to justify his depression

>"I was psychically ill and didn't want to accept that fact. My way out was to find prototypes of myself in the world around me. If I could establish myself as some kind of typical case, I thought, then I could feel sure that I was like other people and therefore normal. This line of thought was erroneous, of course, because the typical case can be far from normal. [...] The fact that all the patients in a TB sanatorium are suffering from the same disease does not mean they are in a state of normal health. But I still kept a lookout for cases that resembled mine and could provide me with an excuse. I found some cases in literature. Books offered me figure upon figure I could identify with. What happened to a literary figure (and what very likely happened to the author and creator of this figure) could just as easily happen to me, and I took it as a rule and a norm."

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On Fritz's opinion of art

>"I was always convinced that [literary protagonist] Tonio Kroger was nothing but an artist and that his artist's existence was not a blessing but rather a curse that Tonio Kroger had to learn to live with. The primary thing in his life was his inability to be like other people; his artist's career was a secondary factor, proceeding logically from that inability as a by-product of it. Such were my first inklings that art should probably be regarded merely as a symptom for a low level of vitality, and I began to suspect [...] that the impulse behind poetry was quite simple. If a person was only frustrated enough, he could automatically begin to write poems. That was bad news for me, for I realized that my vitality was not in the best of shape, and I also wrote."

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>an actual good and worthwhile thread on /r9k/ for once
>no replies

wow colour me suprised

>>38044562
Poor guy :c It s so hurtful to read

post more stuff about him OP please

>>38041346
i am now going to buy his book or at least download it. because this sounds like a must read thanks op

Bumping this quality thread, I might buy the book after this. I can relate to his stuggle, but it appears he blames himself for things beyond his control. Unfortunately this happens all too often with people suffering from depression....

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>>38041484
OP, kudos for the excellent thread.
>"Like all shy people, I was horribly ashamed of the fact that I blushed so much and thus revealed my inner state for everyone to see. Because I was afraid of blushing, I fought fire with fire by deliberately inducing it."
Man, I grew up relating to that all too well. After years of torment via being forced to endure a bright red blushing face anytime there was social pressure on me, and the ostracism that entails, I finally discovered the cause. Copper toxicity. I had to cut out all supplemental copper and take a great amount of zinc monomethoine. Thank fuck that it cured it, honestly it was a living hell to be in school and fiercely paranoid about blushing every single day.

OP abandoned thred? :(

>>38043131
>convinced his illness was the consequence of a life of anger and frustration.

Probably wasn't in his case, but years of drinking (esophageal cancer) or smoking (lung cancer) can end up killing you.

Bumping this rare gem of a thread.