In "Imperium," Kracht tells us the compelling story of August Engelhardt, a remarkable and noteworthy outsider. Having received training as a pharmacist's assistant and influenced by the Lebensreformbewegung (life reform movement), he suddenly left everything behind in the early 20th century and set off for the German colonies in the Pacific.

There, in the so-called protectorate lands of German New Guinea, he founded the "Order of the Sun," a quasi-religious community aiming to realize the ideals of nudism and vegetarianism on a new basis, free from the petty bourgeois conventions of the Wilhelmine Empire. Engelhardt acquired a coconut plantation on the island of Kabakon and dedicated himself entirely, without concern for economic success or even minimal profit, to the theoretical development and practical implementation of the doctrine of cocovory.

The "Solar Man-Cocovore," free from concerns about clothing, shelter, and food, focuses exclusively on the fruit of the coconut palm, which ripens closer to the sun than any other fruit. Ultimately, this diet, reliant solely on coconuts (and thus solar energy), could lead a person to a state of immortality, making them god-like.