Colonial Disgust: The Colonial Master’s Emotion of Superiority

In 1911, Richard Küas published a German colonial novel by the title of Vom Baum der Erkenntnis (From the Tree of Knowledge). The story unfolds around the colonial society which took shape in the years of the consolidation of German authority in African Togo. Most striking about this book is its frontispiece (see Figure 9.1). The characters were printed in bold sütterlin script on the cover, promising forbidden fruits. The illustration by Felix Schwormstädt deals allegorically with the alleged dangers of miscegenation.1 It depicts one of the darkest fears that haunted the German colonial project.