"Stranger, Bear Word to the Spartans We..." (German: Wanderer, kommst du nach Spa...) is a short story by the German author Heinrich Böll (1917–1985). It tells the story of a seriously wounded soldier during World War II being carried on a stretcher through the school which he left three months earlier, because the school is being used as a makeshift military hospital. The narrator slowly notices details confirming where he is, but ignores and explains them away in an internal monologue. At the end of the story, in the art room, he sees unmistakable confirmation that he is indeed in his old school: his own handwriting in chalk on the blackboard: Stranger, bear word to the Spartans we... The story was first published by Verlag Friedrich Middelhauve in 1950 as the title story in a short story collection. Today, Stranger, Bear Word to the Spartans We... is one of Böll's most famous stories and is one of the best known of examples of Trümmerliteratur ("Rubble literature"). Source: Wikipedia (en)