Hemingway captured the imagination of German readers both East and West in the decades after World War II for quite different reasons from those that attracted his own countrymen. His German reputation was much greater than that of any other American writer.
Hemingway's works had been banned during the Nazi regime. His fictional heroes after the Nazi collapse, were characters with whom German readers could identify, and who presented a guide for living. He seemed to them, after his close association with European affairs for nearly thirty years, as newspaperman and adventurer and in his disillusionment with two world wars, to be spokesman of an experience they understood. They found in Hemingway a truth and objective to contrast with the propaganda that had led them astray. His style reflected his sincerity as an artist.