The Prince of Darkness By Erika Mitterer

The Prince of Darkness, written around 1941 by Erika Mitterer (1906-2001) was meant to show how evil can rise and take hold of people who are not intrinsically bad but are carried away because of their indifference.
The novel offers an extraordinary panoramic tapestry of early 16th century life in pre-Reformation Germany. It was the time of decline for the nobility, of peasant revolts, of the rise of mercantile capitalism, of free-thinking scholars, artists and scientists, and of the Inquisition. The reader experiences and comes to understand how the winds of mass hysteria and frustration can sway a solid citizenry to vicious gossip and acts of madness, of revenge by denunciation, of denunciation for reward, splitting lovers and families, as the one intellectual in the novel stands by helplessly.
So striking was this element of the book in its implicit association with the Hitler regime in Germany that, after its publication in Norway, a sudden absence of paper prevented it from being republished in Germany.