Dietrich Hessling, arguably one of the most disgusting protagonists in literature, is the prime example of a cowardly opportunist, a 'nazi prefigure,' as Heinrich Mann later put it. Humiliated by his father as the child of a paper manufacturer from the small town of Netzig, Hessling found his place in the beer-loving collective of a fraternity. As a wealthy factory heir, he makes it to the respectable citizen who humps up and kicks down. The story of the prototype of the Wilhelmine philistine is both a satirical portrait and a portrait of late Wilhelmine society. - With a compact biography of the author.