Alfred Andersch rose to literary prominence relatively late in life. At the time of Hitler's assumption of power he was eighteen, too young to think seriously of emigration, and too inexperienced for a career in journalism in exile. But he was an idealistic communist and was unwilling to make any compromise with Nazism. His political and artistic sensibilities developed during the decline of the Weimar Republic; they were decisively shaped by the experience of living under the Third Reich and by his disenchantment with Soviet political strategies. Though he considered his early exposure to the American way of life a liberating experience, he became disillusioned with U.S. policies during the Vietnam war. Refusing to turn anticommunist and unable to believe in the claims of capitalist democracy, Andersch came to represent the dilemma of the disaffected intellectual in an apparently well-functioning "administered world." His skill as a novelist...