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Ernst Jünger's most famous book, In Stahlge-wittern, subtitled From the Diary of a Strike Group Commander, was first published in 1920 at the author's expense and became a bestseller for several years. It is perhaps the most detailed, truthful, and important book about the First World War. The form of the diary proved to be an adequate means of conveying front-line impressions: regular and accurate, albeit fragmentary, notes eventually form a diverse and impressive war mosaic that could not be more convincing.

Junger's book In the Thunderstorms of Steel precedes the most famous German anti-war work, Erich Maria Remarque's novel On the Western Front as It Was (1928/29). For its author, this book was a model, and in an article published in 1928, he praised it for showing the war experience "without any pathos" and with "due objectivity": "precisely, seriously, strongly, and with increasing tension, until it really expressed the harsh face of war, the horrors of material battle, and the immeasurable, all-consuming power of the vitalism of the heart". Today, Remarque would obviously phrase it differently; but what he said then remains unchanged today: that his insightful and merciless, at once suffering and frivolous, shocking as well as impressive depiction of war should be recognised as a literary achievement and documentation of an epochal disposition and experience, even if one is disgusted by war.