Werner Herzog once said that the trees in the Amazon are in misery. He didn't mean they were dying in a biological sense; he meant they looked like they were suffering under the weight of their own existence. It’s a bleak way to look at a forest. But if you’ve ever read Conquest of the Useless, his diaries from the filming of Fitzcarraldo, you know that bleakness is exactly where Herzog thrives.
He spent years in the jungle trying to move a 320-ton steamship over a mountain. Not a prop. Not a miniature. A real, rusted-out hunk of metal that defied physics and sanity. People died. Actors quit. A local war broke out.
Most directors would have used a green screen or just filmed on a lake and called it a day. Herzog? He chose the hardest possible path for a movie that many people at the time thought was a complete waste of money and life. That is the essence of his "conquest." It is the pursuit of something that has no practical value to the world but becomes a spiritual necessity for the person doing it. Honestly, it's one of the most harrowing accounts of artistic obsession ever put to paper.
Why Conquest of the Useless Isn't Just a Movie Diary
If you pick up the book expecting a standard "making-of" memoir, you’re going to be very confused. It’s more like a fever dream. Herzog wrote these entries between 1979 and 1982, and he didn't even look at them for twenty years because the memories were too painful.
The prose is dense. It’s hallucinatory.
One day he’s describing the "steaming" silence of the rainforest, and the next he’s detailing how Mick Jagger—who was originally in the cast—had to leave because his world tour was starting, forcing Herzog to scrap half the footage he’d already shot. Then there’s Jason Robards, the original lead, who got amoebic dysentery and was forbidden by doctors to return to the set. Herzog had to start over from scratch with Klaus Kinski, a man who was, by all accounts, a ticking time bomb of rage.
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It’s called Conquest of the Useless because, at its core, the act of making the film mirrored the plot of the film itself. In the movie, Brian Sweeney Fitzgerald (Fitzcarraldo) wants to build an opera house in the middle of the jungle. It’s an absurd, useless goal. In real life, Herzog was doing something just as irrational.
The Logistics of a Nightmare
You have to understand the scale of what was happening in the Peruvian jungle. They weren't just making a movie; they were running a small city.
- The Ship: They used three different ships. One of them actually got stuck on a sandbar for months.
- The Labor: Herzog worked with the Aguaruna people, but the political situation was a mess. A neighboring tribe was at odds with the production, and at one point, the camp was attacked and burned down.
- The Physics: An engineer told Herzog it was impossible to move the ship up a 40-degree slope without the cable snapping and killing everyone. Herzog did it anyway.
The cables did snap. People were injured. It was a miracle nobody was decapitated.
When you read the diaries, you realize Herzog wasn't just a director; he was a foreman, a diplomat, and a doctor. He describes stitching up wounds and dealing with plane crashes. Yes, actual plane crashes. The production had its own small fleet of planes to ferry supplies, and multiple pilots crashed in the thick canopy.
The Philosophy of the "Useless"
Why do this? Why not just stop?
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The book touches on a concept Herzog calls "Ecstatic Truth." He isn't interested in "accountant's truth"—the dry facts of how much a movie costs or the safest way to film a scene. He wants a deeper, more primal reality that can only be captured if the struggle is real. If the ship looks like it’s struggling to get over the mountain, it’s because it actually is.
There’s a famous scene in the documentary Burden of Dreams (which was filmed alongside Fitzcarraldo) where Herzog looks at the camera and says the jungle is "obscene." He talks about the birds screaming in pain. It sounds like a man who has lost his mind, but in Conquest of the Useless, you see that this mindset was a survival mechanism. He had to become as brutal as the environment to finish the work.
Klaus Kinski made things infinitely worse. Herzog’s diaries are filled with Kinski’s "extravagant" tantrums. Kinski would scream about the food, the mosquitoes, the heat, and the lack of "grandeur." In one of the most famous (and true) anecdotes of film history, the indigenous chiefs actually offered to kill Kinski for Herzog because they found his behavior so offensive. Herzog declined, mostly because he needed Kinski to finish the movie.
What Most People Get Wrong About the Book
A lot of critics see this as a story of colonial ego. They see a white European dragging a boat through indigenous land for a piece of art.
But if you read the text closely, Herzog is just as hard on himself as he is on the landscape. He isn't a conqueror in the traditional sense. He's a man possessed. He describes himself as a "conquistador of the useless," acknowledging that the victory means nothing to the rest of the world. It won't cure a disease. It won't feed the hungry. It is a victory of the will over the impossible, and that is its only justification.
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The diaries are surprisingly poetic for someone going through such hell. He writes about the "fecundity" of the mud and the way the river looks like a "coiling snake." It’s a reminder that even in the middle of a logistics nightmare, he was still an artist watching the light hit the leaves.
How the Conquest Still Matters Today
In an era of AI-generated backgrounds and Marvel movies filmed entirely in Atlanta warehouses, Conquest of the Useless feels like a relic from another planet. It represents a type of filmmaking that literally cannot exist anymore due to insurance laws and modern safety standards.
But it’s also a lesson in persistence.
If Herzog can move a 320-ton ship over a mountain while his lead actor is having a nervous breakdown and the jungle is trying to swallow him whole, your project probably isn't as doomed as it feels. The book has become a cult classic for entrepreneurs, writers, and artists because it validates the "useless" struggle.
The "useless" things are often the only things that make life worth living.
Actionable Insights for the "Useless" Pursuits in Your Life
If you’re facing your own "mountain," Herzog’s experience offers a few grim but effective strategies for pushing through.
- Accept the misery. Don't wait for the "perfect" conditions to start. Herzog’s diaries show that things were never good. They were always bad, and then they got worse. He kept going because he stopped expecting it to be easy.
- Focus on the "Physicality" of the task. In a digital world, we get lost in abstractions. Sometimes you need to do something tangible—build something, move something, or physically go somewhere—to break a mental block.
- Document the chaos. Herzog didn't write these diaries for publication. He wrote them to stay sane. If you’re in a high-stress period, keep a log. Don't worry about being "inspiring." Be honest about the "obscene" birds and the mud.
- Know when to pivot lead actors. When Jagger and Robards were gone, Herzog didn't quit. He changed the script. He adapted. Resilience isn't just about banging your head against a wall; it's about finding a different way to climb it.
- Ignore the "Accountants." There will always be people telling you that your project is a waste of time or money. If you are chasing "Ecstatic Truth," the math will never add up. You have to decide if the "useless" victory is worth the price.
Next Steps for the Obsessed:
- Read the source material: Get a physical copy of Conquest of the Useless. The tactile experience of the book fits the theme better than a digital screen.
- Watch the companion piece: Pair the book with the documentary Burden of Dreams by Les Blank. It provides the visual proof of the insanity Herzog describes.
- Identify your "Ship": Determine the one project in your life that you are doing for no reason other than the fact that it must exist. Commit to it with the same irrationality Herzog brought to the Amazon.