Mystery? What Mystery?

 

Traven is the classic mysterious unknown author of the 20th century. About 1980 the BBC producer Will Wyatt took on the project of deciphering this mystery. It took him far longer and took him in far deeper than he imagined, but he traced a name to its birth and writes a very convincing detective tale with a satisfying ending. The endings are always the hardest part of any story.

But whether Wyatt did not answer all the questions, or the experts fascinated by Traven simply cannot bear to give up the mystery, leading lights of travenania did not fully accept his solution. There is a newish book, in German, the author Jan Christoph Hauschild says - " I prove that Wyatt was right, and I can close the gap between Otto Feige and Ret Marut. The missing link was Feige's work for the worker's union in Germany 1904-1907".

B-Traven-Die-Unbekannten-Jahre

I believe he is right, and we can put to bed speculation that Marut is anyone other than Feige.

It does not strictly follow that the disappointing Hal Croves is also the great author B. Traven, but the evidence seems to lead to no other conclusion. Feige turned himself into Marut, then Torsvan, Traven and Croves. Traven was as Wyatt said, a paper lion. There was never a real B. Traven anymore than a real Tarzan. There was probably a guy who could spend all day in a library and write for days on end.