The protagonist is Lieutenant Apostol Bologa, who was born and raised in
Parva - then Párva,
Beszterce-Naszód County,
Transylvania,
Kingdom of Hungary. Although he was enrolled in the Philosophy Faculty of the
University of Budapest, and he had not been conscripted into the army since he was a widow's son, Bologa volunteers into the
Austro-Hungarian Army at the start of
World War I. He does that both from a youthful ambition to prove his bravery in front of his fiancée, Marta Domșa, who was enchanted by the military uniforms of the Hungarian officers, as well as from the social views he had acquired in Hungarian schools. After attending artillery school, he is sent to the front. He fights valiantly in
Italy and
Galicia; wounded twice in the next two years, he is promoted to the rank of lieutenant and decorated three times. Bologa contributes (by his vote in court) at the sentencing to death of a Czech officer, second lieutenant Svoboda, who had deserted the Austro-Hungarian army.
The novel follows his soul metamorphosis, under the influence of the Czech captain Otto Klapka, who seeds in his heart the hatred against the Austrian empire and the love for the Romanian nation. Sent on the Romanian front, in the
Eastern Carpathians, the thought of desertion becomes an obsession for him. Being forced again to take part in a military tribunal, to judge a Romanian peasant for espionage, Apostol Bologa starts in the night towards the Romanian lines, to get to his blood brothers. He is caught and hanged, in much the same way as the Czech that he had helped condemn. At the gallows, his confessor recites, "Receive, o Lord, the soul of Thy servant Apostol".
Cezar Apreotesei, "Date noi despre prototipul lui Apostol Bologa", Orizont, vol. XV, nr. 7, July 1964.
Gheorghe Bogdan-Duică, "Discuții literare. "Pădurea spânzuraților" de Liviu Rebreanu”, Societatea de mâine, revistă săptămânală pentru probleme sociale și economice, Cluj, vol. I, nr. 4, 4 May 1924, p. 92.