Raw Material (novel)

Raw Material (Rohstoff) is a 1984 autobiographical novel by the German writer Jörg Fauser. Set in the 1960s, it follows the author's alter ego Harry Gelb as he lives as a heroin addict in Istanbul, as an alcoholic, menial worker and struggling writer in a Berlin commune, and as a squatter in Frankfurt. Gelb rejects everything he regards as insipid, hierarchical and doctrinaire, whether it is mainstream culture or left-wing revolutionary groups.

Fauser and Raw Material developed a cult following in Germany. The book has been compared to American beat literature and the works of Charles Bukowski. It was published in Jamie Bulloch's English translation in 2014.