INFORMATION - The Association of Jewish Refugees

INFORMATION
£2 (to non-members)
Volume XLII No. 3 March 1987
T
he German elections on 25 January produced on the whole a satisfactory result.
The Bonn coalition of Helmut Kohl's
conservative Christian Democratic Union in
alliance with its sister Christian Social Union and
the liberal Free Democrats was significantly
recast when the conservatives lost 22 seats and the
liberals gained 10. The original centre-right
Government was shifted a little towards the
centre, and the fact that its reliance on the liberals
has been increased appears to be encouraging,
despite the ominous gains of the neo-Nazi
'National Democrats' who trebled their vote,
gaining between 2 and 2.5 per cent of the total.
Certainly the curb on Franz Josef Strauss, the
(and is) no strong feehng below the surface.
While Kohl believes, and said so five days before
the elections, which happened to be the 45th
anniversary ofthe Wannsee Conference, that 'the
crimes must never be forgotten, repressed or
minimised', nevertheless not a few, especially
among the young, insisted that Germany had
done enough penance and they want to be rid of
the feeling of guilt. The President, Richard von
Weizsacker, to some extent sympathised with
them, and he scorned the 'demand that Germans
should wear a white sheet of penitence', but
likewise he denounced as "irresponsible' the call
for 'putting paid to the past'.
Strauss, as usual more aggressive, urged a new
After the German Elections
The Past Stays Present
CSU leader, with his foible for the Munich beer
Cellar, must be welcomed - even by those who
may hesitate to share the belief of the Times that
West Germany has given a "final sign of her return
to political normality'.
For "political normality' among Germans must
depend on a healthy relationship to their past,
and this is as yet far from being achieved. The
struggle is still being waged in German minds
between, on the one hand, the knowledge that
terrible crimes were committed "in the name of
Germany', and, on the other, the search for a new
patriotism, a new sense of national pride and
self-confidence, that will allow a line to be drawn
Under the Nazi period.
Characteristically, this struggle was a conspicuous feature of the election campaign, and both
Kohl and Strauss made a determined effort to
present themselves as the champions of national
reassertion. If the appeal did not quite come up to
expectation it must not be thought that there was
On Other Pages
A Teacher on the Holocaust
Berlin's 'Rag Trade'
A Chat with Andre Deutsch
Life After Retirement
p.3
p.6
p. 7
p.10
sense of "reality', while (he said) those who denied
that 'the Germans, in monstrous numbers, committed terrible crimes' were 'out of touch with
reahty', the same "lack of reahty' (he thought) was
shown 'by saying that the Germans and their allies
did not suffer horrible crimes at the end ofthe war
and afterwards'. To him it was all much of a
muchness. He warned against making the Nazi
past a priority in the public debate: it would be
"morally intolerable, impossible to expect from
human beings and, in terms of politics, a disaster
not only for the Germans but for all Europeans'.
Such is the battleground from whichHo German, in the foreseeable future, can withdraw. He
remains involved, collectively committed to his
country's history. It is not that the sons shall be
held responsible for the sins of the fathers, but the
shame can never die, and to that extent it must
seem idle to distinguish between collective and
individual responsibility.
The past remains present - a fact of some
significance especially in view of the forthcoming
visit to Germany of Israel's President Herzog and as a Jewish professor of modern history at the
Military University, Munich, has pointed out, the
Germans will have to resign themselves to an
"anti-Germanism' much as the Jews must live with
antisemitism. Professor Michael Wolffsohn
referred in this connection to a 'political biologism' which he said had been practised by the Nazis
and was now rebounding on Germany. There is
some force in the point but precisely the Nazi
association should sound a warning. Sweeping
"anti-Germanism' makes no more sense than
sweeping antisemitism. and apart from its inherent injustice, it may well prove to be folly in that it
could be expected to antagonise and embitter a
new generation, with consequences that would
compound the original evil.
Germans after all are not a different species of
man, and it does no credit to either our intelligence or common sense if we regard them,
within the span of one lifetime, as both the flower
of civilisation and the scum of humanity. When
the Times recently introduced a forthcoming
book (by John Ardagh) on Germany and the
Germans under the headhne "A people who live
only for themselves', it was indulging in peculiarly
unsophisticated generalisation. The author thinks
it "sinister', for example, that 'Germans turned a
blind eye when Jewish neighbours were carted off
to the camps'. Like so many other judges with
hindsight he apparently never tried to put himself
in the position of those who taking such daring
action, must immediately expect to be exposed to
the gravest danger. There is something 'sinister'
about it indeed, but it is not in the German but,
essentially, in the human condition: that's, unfortunately, how most of us, born to be neither
heroes nor martyrs, behave in comparable circumstances.
All in all, the elections have left the Germans'
struggle for their collective sanity where it was.
We shall be sensible not to watch it entirely from
our own point of view but to try and see things
also through the eyes of others because in our
fellow-men there is much that is ourselves.
Please give your
Immediate Attention
to the
Urgent Call
for
Volunteers
see page 5
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AJR INFORMATION MARCH 1987
The New Leo Baeck
Yearbook
BEFORE EMIGRATION AND AFTER
Bridge Between the Generations
T
he Leo Baeck Institute exists to research the
history of German-speaking Jewry from
Emancipation to the Third Reich, publishing
Year Books that put the fruits of its labours
before a wider public. The current volume
(XXXI, Seeker & Warburg; 594 pp.. £15) takes
the annual series into its fourth decade. This in an
impressive achievement, even if with time the
format of the book has become somewhat intimidating to ordinary readers.
Three items are particularly interesting. Pride
of place belongs to Henry Wassermann's study of
the image of the Jews purveyed in the cartoons
and jokes of Simplicissimus. the famous illustrated magazine. Simplicissimus is generally seen
as the gadfly of the Kaiserreich holding up to
ridicule bodies like the Junker caste and the
duelling fraternities. Closer analysis however
reveals that the journal played a more ambiguous
role. For all the corrective it provided to Wilhelminian excesses. Simplicissimus subscribed to
Establishment views in such areas as relations
with Britain, the position of women, and so forth.
In addition it fed its "upmarket' readership a
staple diet of jokes and cartoons of unmistakably
antisemitic character. A typical example was a
cartoon captioned "Military Instruction'. Here an
officer asked a group of recruits the question:
"Why should a soldier lay down his Hfe for his
king?' "To which a Semitic-looking private
rephed: "You're right, Herr LeutnantI Why
should he?'
human - often specifically Jewish - suffering.
With the passage of time his polemical staccato
tone modulated into nostalgia-filled poignancy.
What he yearned for was the world of AustriaHungary which, viewed from 1930s Berlin,
appeared a lost domain of humanity and racial
tolerance. He actually mooted plans for a Habsburg restoration to prevent a Nazi Anschluss. Not
only did these plans fail - Monarchists disdained
him as a Jew while Jews disapproved of him as a
crypto-Catholic. Isolated, unpublished and
exiled, he increasingly surrendered to alcohol,
dying in a cheap Paris hotel on the eve of the
Hitler war.
Roth's colleagues who similarly chose death in
the shadow of Nazism included Tucholsky.
Toller, Hasenclever, Stefan Zweig and Waiter
Benjamin. It is a little known fact about the last
that he almost obtained a post at the New York
School of Social Research, successor to the
Frankfurt School. This institution, cradle of
Critical Theory and the fusion of Marx and Freud,
is the subject of another novel study in the Year
Book. The School boasted a faculty whose names
read like a roll call of the radical German-Jewish
intelligentsia: Horkheimer. Adorno. Fromm.
Marcuse and Hannah Arendt. Though practically
all Jews, they hardly espoused strong Jewish
consciousness. Erich Fromm alone had an Orthodox upbringing. This famous pioneer of social
psychology subsequently linked his interest in
Marx to his youthful exposure to Old Testament
teaching particularly the prophets' promise ofthe
'end of days'.
Limitations of space preclude commensurate
attention being given to the other items in the
Year Book. There is, above all, Jacob Boas's
Shrinking World of German Jewry, which
recounts how after 1933 the Central Verein,
Jewish newspapers, schools, etc., provided a
crutch for people caught up in an earthquake;
Friedrich
Brodnitz's
Memories
of
the
Reichsvertretung fills out the picture. Intra-Jewish
controversies before 1933 are evoked in F.R.
Nicosia's study of Revisionist Zionism, and
Jehuda
Reinharz's companion
piece on
Hashomer
Hazair.
Steven
Schwarzschild
contributes an affectionate reappraisal of Martin
Buber's political philosophy. An earlier, more
hopeful, period is evoked in two monographs on
Jewish emancipation in the 19th century.
I found the piece on the Frankfurt School of
particular interest because it is a bridging item,
linking the work of German Jews before the
catastrophe with that of the emigration. I would,
if I may, suggest that the Year Book feature more
such bridge items. For one thing the series run the
risk of mining near-exhausted seams - there is yet
another piece on Jewish Defence under the
Kaiser in the current volume. And for another,
the unique contribution of transplanted German
Jews to their host countries surely repays study.
(Recently The Observer recalled Lady Astor's
1950s complaint about the paper: 'Too many
Germans writing about too many Coloureds'.)
If the Year Book is to reach that wider audience
that exists outside of learned societies and specialist libraries it might do well to become more
accessible to potential readers - alike in its timeframe and presentation.
RICHARD GRUNBERGER
V.
Fascination and Repulsion
On the other hand, in antisemitic eyes Simplicissimus - some of whose journalists received jail
terms for lese majeste - appeared as a perversely
cosmopolitan and Judaised publication. Wassermann adduces a convincing explanation for this
paradox: 'Simplicissimus functioned as a safety
valve expressing and syphoning off reactions
engendered by the process of educated upper
class Germans gaining a closer acquaintance of
Jews'. On an attempt to account for the vogue of
Judenwitze among readers who were not hardened antisemites. he adds that fascination and
curiosity do not rule out an admixture of repulsion - a hypothesis which I find quite convincing.
Another engrossing item in the Year Book
focuses on aspects of Joseph Roth's life and work.
Roth is remembered as the author of The
Radetzky .March. a book best described as a prose
requiem for the Habsburg Empire; incidentally, it
is still in print half a century after publication.
Reared in a Galician shted. the precociously
gifted schoolboy determined at an early age to
turn himself into a German writer. Stages along
his route were Vienna University, frontline
service in the war and entry into journahsm.
Roth's early work was suffused by postwar
disillusionment
and
compassion
for
'Thank you Britain' Lecture on 11 March
This year's (the tenth) 'Thank you Britain' lecture
will be delivered at the British Academy, 20-21
Cornwall Terrace (second entrance Allsop
Place), N.W.I, near Baker Street Station, on
Wednesday 11 March, 5 p.m. sharp.
The lecturer will be Field Marshal Lord Carver
GCB, CBE, DSO, MC, and his subject is
'Strategy in the 20th Century". Everybody is
welcome.
Summary of the Lecture
After a brief discussion of the definition and
nature of strategy, the lecturer will review the
strategies pursued by the major military nationsBritain, France, Germany, the U.S.A. and Japan
- since 1900, and the contrast between the
strategies they attempted to pursue before and
during the first and second World War and those
they were forced to adopt; the results and possible
alternatives will be considered. The hope that
aircraft and mechanised forces would make it
possible to reduce both length and cost of wars by
direct action against the opponents' will to resist
and means of exercising control, and thus the
escape from the choices offered by Delbruck of
either a strategy of annihilation or one of exhaustion, will be shown to have been misplaced. The
changes that have taken place in the strategies
that the same nations have followed since 1945
under the shadow of nuclear weapons, will
conclude the lecture.
The Lecturer
Field Marshal Lord Carver was born in 1915 and
commissioned into the Royal Tank Corps in 1935.
He was serving in Egypt at the outbreak of war
and fought throughout the North African campaign. After the landings in Italy, he took
command of the 4th Armoured Brigade for the
rest of the war and after. In the early days of
NATO, he served on the staff of Field Marshal
Montgomery. In 1967, as a General, he was Joint
Service Commander-in-Chief Far East, and in
1971 he became Chief of the General Staff. From
1973 to 1976 he was Chief of the Defence Staff
and was created a Life Peer in 1977. He has
written several books on military matters, the
most recent of which are The Seven Ages of the
British Army and Dilemmas of the Desert War.
AJR INFORMATION MARCH 1987
page 3
well: no truck with submissiveness and meekness.
It is well-informed, alert, effective in demonstrations, orderly in protest but determined. I respect
by Bernard V. Slater
the feelings of a Jewish father I met some years
ago, but I do not think they are typical: He asked
me not to mention again anything about the
Senior Classical Master, Bradford Grammar School
concentration camps in lessons at my school when
his son was present, since the associations for his
once stayed in Czechoslovakia with a Jewish thought that they were acting morally. So did our family were too painful. The Nazis caricatured
lady who had lost her husband in Terezin ancestors who tormented old women as witches. the Jews as cowards and shirkers. Those still alive
Members of the SS were often well educated. I must have been surprised to see the emergence of
(Theresienstadt). To judge from his photograph
he had been a fine figure of a man. My hostess still experience a sense of shock when I reflect Israel as one of the most formidable military
expressed some surprise when I hesitantly asked that highly qualified doctors of medicine took powers of the modern world. Jewish prowess also
about her experiences with him and their young part in criminal experiments, and that the officer give the lie to the sneers of those who demand to
son in Terezfn. Her sad remark - "people don't signing an order for the shipment of Jews to know why reistance in the camps was so limited.
ask me about them' - stuck in my mind. She told Auschwitz from Greece might have had a sound Such sneers are grounded in ignorance - in a
me something about the camp - a 'model' camp classical education in the land of Mommsen. failure to imagine the effects of starvation,
in Nazi propaganda - and I later visited the place, There are clearly limits to the effectiveness of humiliation, disorientation and a sense of being
where I was given several photographs, one of education in the elimination of racial prejudice. powerless in a world reduced to meaninglessness.
In schools and elsewhere we must try to
which featured the German commandant's And the moral education that is needed is
notoriously difficult to put across in schools.
stimulate the imagination rather than lecture or
daughter on horseback.
I sometimes think that ideahsm necessarily moralise. The Diary of Anne Frank has in this
It was only gradually however that I learnt the
full extent of the Holocaust; and it was only after I involves an object of hatred. Class hatred pre- respect engendered more compassion among
became a father that my imagination began to dominates with the Left, racial hatred with the gentiles - audiences are said to have wept in
Right. It seem to be difficult to be for something Berlin during the play based on the diary - than
play upon the scenes that must have been reality
(our country, our religion in particular) without those pictures of corpses loaded on wagons hke so
when Jewish fathers were separated from their
wives and children, and when mothers tried to being against something at the same time. much butcher's meat, from which we find it hard
Idealists are sometimes very difficult people to to reconstruct images of individuals like ourconceal their despair from the httle ones with
selves. The
particular - Anne's
teenage
whom they were doomed to spend their last live with.
innocence
as
the
background
of
her
deportation
moments in a gas-chamber.
is more compelling than the astronomical numSince my visit to Czechoslovakia I have been to
bers in the statistics of the dead. For this reason
Uachau with my wife: had long conversations
How
to
Explain
it
television is all-important as the medium that can
With Germans who grew up under Hitler; asked
Poles from Warsaw what they saw and knew of Yet many camp guards - recruited, we must most vividly bring to life for us the past, and touch
the ghetto there; listened to an account of never forget, from a dozen or more countries - our imaginations - and our hearts.
Austrian Jewesses brought to die in a Baltic were no idealists but brutal bullies. Some seem to
forest. I have come to the conclusion that many have been devoted husbands and kindly fathers.
gentiles - and some Jews - do not wish to talk How can we explain this? Lack of imagination is. I
about the Holocaust for the simple reason that it think, one cause: the same lack of imagination
Prejudice
overwhelms their comprehension. It defies subli- that gives rise to easy talk of 'taking out'
mation into literature. It reduces life to the Washington or Leningrad, as if they were pieces
In High Places
hideous farce that in our worst moments we have on a chessboard. (A close parallel to this failure of
suspected it is. We shrink from such knowledge, imagination is the psychopath's lack of emotional Antisemitism in Britain at present, Mr. Bernard
'^any also feel guilt; surely these terrible things response). The SS guard could not see his own Levin wrote in the Times recently, "is a negligible
eould have been prevented, had there been the children in the Jewish children in the camp.
phenomenon of no serious political or social
Even where the imagination is stimulated the account and best ignored'. Certainly there is no
will.
An aspect of the Nazi creed that merits closer effect may not be lasting. A German girl I knew movement comparable even to the minor faction
attention is its per\erted idealism. One realises defended herself from feelings of guilt by saying of Mosley's before the war and the National Front
^ith horror that many members ofthe SS actually to me, "Well, it's all in the past now' or "It was all and its varieties don't add up to much. However
thought they were performing a duty - admit- Hitler's fault'. Yet she had an experience in a there is something else which was suggested in a
tedly unpleasant, as Himmler conceded in a Berlin street in 1941 that should have brought Jewish Chronicle interview with Leon Brittan.
notorious speech in Poland, but a duty all the home to her the suffering of Germany's Jews. The OC, the former Home Secretary. He did not
same - in murdering men. women and children, incident occurred when she was walking home speak about it at any length but his (non-Jewish)
'he torturers of the Spanish Inquisition also from school. A lorry slowed up beside her, and wife did. She had no doubt that one of the causes
the driver, leaning out, hurled an ugly insult at ofhis downfall last year was indeed antisemitism.
her, taking her. from her dark appearance, to be a She agreed with an Observer columnist who had
Jewess. The girl was deeply upset, but was found, besides political jealousy, antisemitism in
consoled later by the reassurances of gentiles parts of Westminster. When Mrs. Thatcher's
A Liberal Confession
confirming the pure 'Aryan' quahty of her Cabinet contained Sir Keith Joseph, Lord Young
Inai' remarkable attempt to practise self-criticism, features.
and Messrs Nigel Lawson and Malcolm Rifkind,
Why were the persecutors free from any sense Brittan could be regarded as paying the price of
"e latest issue of the quarterly journal published
y the German Free Democratic Party, liberal, of their own shame and humiliation when they other men's preferment. The late Lord Stockton
examines the historical responsibility of the Ger- jeered at elderly Jews forced to scrub streets, or (Harold Macmillan) was quoted as having re"lan liberals for the Nazi crimes. With all due kicked the helpless at Auschwitz? What hap- marked that there were more Old Estonians in
respect for the idea of tolerance, it is said, the pened to mihtary honour? How could men act the Cabinet than Old Etonians. (Actually
'feral practice remained as it had been summed like this who sometimes showed bravery on the Brittan's parents came from Lithuania.) Brittan
"P as early as the 1844 edition of the Brockhaus field of battle? I can only suggest that groups can himself is not greatly worried. He does not think
"cyclopedia: 'Liberals seeking to win the favour do things totally unacceptable to an individual. that antisemitism was that important so far as he
' the populace usually are averse from speaking This is confirmed by studies of the behaviour of was concerned, and certainly, he says, it would be
a big mistake to believe that everyone who is
P Openly and clearly for the Jews since the cause crowds.
critical
of Israel is antisemitic.
t the Jews has never been popular'.
The Jewish communitv has learnt one lesson
A TEACHER'S THOUGHTS ON THE HOLOCAUST
I
*
page 4
AJR INFORMATION MARCH 1987
GANDHI'S GERMAN-JEWISH
John Rossall
News and the Jews
'ANTI-ZIONISM' ON THE STAGE
Controversy, or even news of any kind concerning Jewish personalities, institutions or history,
tends to make Jews feel uneasy. They may deny
it. perhaps even to themselves, but to no avail.
The principle is "no news is good news', but since
the advent of Hitler, and still more the foundation
of the State of Israel, dramatic news has been the
almost daily ration.
Even so, the beginning of 1987 stands out. The
media took issue over the sudden and dramatic
abandonment, just before opening day, of a play
at the Royal Court Theatre, London. Entitled
Perdition the play is by Jim Allen, a noted
playwright who would not blanch before the
epithet Left-wing. In fact, a mutual friend once
described him as a radical of the radicals. Most
details concerning the play are hearsay since only
few could claim to have read the script. But the
press, and particularly the Sunday papers of 25
January, took up the cudgels, and it was clear that
the play is about that sub-division of the Holocaust concerning the Hungarian Jews. Paul Johnson, editor of the New Statesman from 1965 until
1970, in the Simday Telegraph, attacked Perdition
as an example of the libel started by Soviet
propaganda that some Jews collaborated with the
Nazis, sending millions to their deaths in a
bargain which ensured the survival of the Zionist
ehte and the promotion of a Jewish State. One
gathers that the play postulates this in a technical
compromise between fiction and fact (known in
the trade as "faction') in respect of Hungary, with
Eichmann eager to scoop up the remnants just
before the fall of the curtain. It is of course true
that some leading Hungarian Jews (this story has
been told repeatedly and from varying viewpoints) did try to save lives; so did Wallenberg,
the Swedish hero and probably martyr. How
could this be done without bargaining with the
Nazis in one way or another?
Following the Sunday paper furore I heard an
interesting phone-in on LBC, the London commercial radio station. The play's distinguished
director, Kenneth Loach, dealt with the views
expressed by the 'pubhc', i.e. the people who
phone in on such occasions. He was at pains to
make it clear that the play was 'not antisemitic'.
that, in fact, it expressed great sympathy with the
Jewish victims, though he did not tackle the
ticklish question how far anti-Zionism may be a
modern version of antisemitism.
Several callers, and, of course, many people
not heard in this controversy, feel uneasy at
anything that smacks of censorship, whether by
the State or pressure groups. The word pressure
(to achieve the closure ofthe play) was repeatedly
used. Here all of us who have lived, and in fact
grown up, under the aegis of British hberalism
and the abhorrence felt towards censorship,
cannot feel happy. I myself happen to be a writer
of historical fiction, and it would be impossible to
ban all such works because of an inevitably
subjective approach.
But is Perdition different? Johnson holds that
the 'myth of the Nazi Jews' is as potent, as
mendacious and as evil as that of 'The Elders of
Zion'. Even those with the best intentions find it
impossible to deal with the Holocaust in literature.
Could a play in the 'Upstairs' of the Court
Theatre - a tiny auditorium - do all that much
harm? But then, again, think of the Schundliteratur of the Nazis - the real ones - that was read
in the far off days of Weimar Germany.
'The Attack on the Liberty'
Two days later 'the Jews' were in the media again.
Thames TV 'tried' Israel for 'The Attack on the
Liberty'. This was the unfortunate incident during
the 1967 war when the Israeh air force and navy
bombed and torpedoed an American spy ship.
The programme was not unfair. Had it involved
some other powers, one might have regarded it as
unexceptional.
The survivors, the American servicemen, are
still shocked and bitter. All right - it's understandable. Israel paid compensation, but who can
compensate for napalm burns - or for the loss of
a loved one? We understand this aspect only too
well. Israel explained that the whole thing was an
unfortunate accident. After all, there was no man
Jack in their administration or forces mad
enought to attack on purpose their only friend
and ally.
Ah, but that is not enough for programme
makers, for advocates of the theory of conspiracy
behind all events, and those who are compelled to
believe Jews capable of anything.
So it was laid before the viewer - Moshe
Dayan (now dead) gave the order, the Admiralty
carried it out. Why? Israel was about to attack in
the Golan, and did not want its secret orders to be
eavesdropped on by anybody.
One wonders why they didn't dispose of the
obstacle more efficiently once they were about
their diabolical work. After all, they had just
destroyed the Egyptian air force in less than half
an hour. Nobody mentioned that the Americans
repeatedly hit their own forces with all they
had - by mistake, of course - in the Vietnam
war. Every soldier of both world wars knows
about being shelled by his own artillery. Faulty
intelligence, human error!
The progamme makers tried to be fair. Some of
the Israeli participants in the drama had their
say . . . heroes of yesteryear looking older and
much diminished, trying to argue in modest
English against well-primed questions, finding it
difficult to explain to themselves how such a
foul-up could have happened. They believed they
were seeing the Egyptian navy shelling 'our
forces' at El Arish. As far as it went, the
programme was equable. But why was it shown at
all - now?
FRIEND IN SOUTH AFRICA
Sotheby's recently auctioned more than 260
letters written by Gandhi to his German-Jewish
friend and disciple Hermann Kallenbach between
1909 and 1946 (when Kallenbach died). These
letters constitute a unique, unused source for any
historian writing the life of the great champion of
Indian freedom. Gandhi of course had several
Jewish friends in South Africa, the best known
perhaps Henri Polak, who edited his newspaper
Indian Opinion; Sonia Schlesin was his secretary,
but Kallenbach was probably the closest of his
European supporters, to the point of suffering
imprisonment with him.
Kallenbach, born in East Prussia in 1871, came
to South Africa in 1896 and practised as an
architect in Johannesburg, Durban and Pretoria.
He soon met Gandhi whose satyagraha (nonviolent resistance) struggle against Apartheid he
greatly admired, and by 1910 he had sufficiently
prospered to give Gandhi an 1,100 acre farm
some 20 miles from Johannesburg which became
known as Tolstoy Farm where Kallenbach introduced a craft workshop. Gandhi looked upon him
as 'the dearest and the nearest to me and . . . in
my lonely journey through the world you will be
the last (if even that) to say goodbye to me'. In
one letter during the Palestine troubles of 193738, Gandhi writes: 'What a tragedy (is) going on
(there). It is heart-breaking. If there is peace
ultimately it will be the peace of the grave'.
Israel's
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AJR INFORMATION MARCH 1987
Maier
The Jewish Share in
BERLIN'S RAG TRADE'
F
or over a century the "rag trade Jews' had
made a significant contribution to both the
economic and the cultural artistic hfe of the
Prussian, then German capital city. The historical
development of this tradition is the subject of a
fascinating story told in a new book: Berliner
Konfektion und Mode 1836-1939. Die Zerstorung
einer Tradition, by Uwe Westphal (Berlin.
December 1986. 208pp. Index. 96 illustrations.
Published as Volume 14 in a series Stdtten der
Geschichte Berlins).
The author begins by analysing the legal and
commercial pre-conditions for the successful
development of this line of business. With one
notable exception, the peripatetic Jewish pedlar
and old-clothes dealer did not provide the starting
point - although this traditionally Jewish way of
earning a living (in the absence of other opportunities) was something of a help. It was the process
of 'creeping' emancipation from the mid-seventeenth century onwards which acted as the
catalyst by enabling a largely immigrant Jewish
population to engage in the manufacture and
distribution of clothes. This coincided with a
growing fashion-consciousness of the aspiring
middle-class and opened the way for the creation
of markets for ready-made clothing. These opportunities were eagerly grasped by the clothing and
fashion industry's 'founding fathers', and house-
AJR
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CONTRIBLTIONS
LNDER COVENANT
GIFTS IN
YOLR LIFETIME
A BEQLEST
IN YOLR WILL
Space donated by
Arnold R. Horwell Ltd.
hold names like Gerson, Hertzog. Israel, Mannheimer are evocative of their success and that of
their descendants. The temporary eclipse of Paris
as the world's fashion capital after the FrancoPrussian war had, by 1875, boosted sales of
ready-made ladies' garments to a figure of 26
million marks, of which nearly 40 per cent was
exported.
Berlin became the centre of gravity of the
textile, garment, fur and associated trades. In the
wake of this upward swing there sprang up the
first department stores - Wertheim. Tietz. Karstadt. In 1886, Leo Schottlander started what
became the leading trade paper Der Confectiondr, and ten years later appeared Moritz
Loeb's book Berliner Konfektion. It was during
those years, around the turn of the century, that
the large fashion houses became noted patrons of
the fine arts and altogether played a prominent
part in the social and cultural, as well as the
commercial, life of the city.
The wave of patriotism, after August 1914, did
not leave the Berlin fashion industry unaffected,
and after the war 'national' styles combined with
'adapted' Paris models to create the typical
'Berlin chic'. The roaring twenties saw an
interesting interchange of innovative ideas
between the creators of fashion and the purveyors
of amusements - the theatres, cabarets, cinemas,
revue bars which provided Berliners with their
fabled nightlife. Prosperity returned and seemed
to survive the Wall Street crash of 1929 and the
following economic crisis. But it did not survive
the Nazi regime and its 'Aryan' fashion doctrines.
Alleged Jewish Domination
In his preface, the author states that the book
was, at least in part, prompted by his desire to set
the record straight in respect of the alleged Jewish
domination of the fashion trade in Germany as a
whole and especially in Berlin. In this task he has
succeeded. By an impressive array of statistical
data he demonstrates that, as applied to the
German fashion industry as a whole, the concept
of a Jewish monopoly has at no time been
anything but a myth, propagated by political
opportunists
and
eagerly
embraced
by
commercial rivals.
The author also shows that it was due preeminently to the Jews that Berlin's fashion and
clothing industry enjoyed its international fame.
The facts are that, around the mid-twenties,
one-quarter of managerial positions in the Prussian clothing industry were occupied by Jews - in
most cases because the firms' founders had passed
on control of their successful enterprises to
members of their own families, rather than to
strangers. On the other hand, top level administration was as often as not divided between a
Jewish commercial director and a Christian production manager. Moreover, as the children of
Jewish parents tended to choose other careers,
succession passed not infrequently to non-Jewish
employees. In specific sectors, such as manufacture and wholesale distribution of men's, ladies"
and children's clothing. Jewish participation was
indeed much higher, of the order of 50 per cent or
more. But of course at no time was there anything
hke a concerted action to keep out non-Jews.
Each undertaking pursued its own business objectives and success came to those who possessed the
artistic flair, the commercial acumen and the
experience accumulated over many years.
In his record of the Nazi years. Westphal
stresses the loss the industry suffered owing to the
enforced emigration especially to Britain. U.S.A.
and Holland whose export trade greatly benefited
as a result. Many Jews also of course were misled
by apparent lulls in the persecution when they
actually had Nazi customers (e.g. Emmy Goeringl). For a time, fashion seemed, unlike the arts,
to be spared strict Nazi control. Of those involved
in "Aryanisation' a number are stated to have
been in business again, unscathed, after 1945. A
valuable feature of the book is an annotated list of
176 Jewish firms in ladies' wear, the largest
section in Berlin's 'rag trade'. The 61 items of the
bibliography contain many specialised, little
known titles on which the book is based, in
addition to a large number of interviews with
dramatis personae in various countries.
I
STAMPS
(Worldwide stamps, thematics. postal history)
BUYING/SELLING
everything in the way of philately
ERIC ELIAS, 58 GREENACRES,
LONDON N3 (01) 349 1610
BELSIZE SQUARE SYNAGOGUE
51 BELSIZE SQUARE, NW3
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religious service with Cantor,
Choir and Organ
Further details can be obtained
from our synagogue secretary
Telephone 794-3949
Minister: Rabbi Rodney J. Mariner
Cantor: Rev Lawrence H. Fine
Regular services: Friday evenings at 6.30 pm,
Saturday mornings at 11 am
Religion school: Sundays at 10 am to 1 pm
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I
AJR INFORMATION MARCH 1987
A BANKER AND HIS PARADOX
Sir Siegmund Warburg's Life Story
4
page?
world affairs he was affected both as a man and a
banker. The Warburgs had traditionally been
involved in Jewish affairs - Max with the Reichsvertretung, his brother Felix with the Hebrew
University, and his daughter Lola Hahn-Warburg
with Youth Aliyah. Siegmund - a philosophical
rather than religious Jew (he was steeped in the
writings of Eli Wiesel) - proved a critical friend
of Israel. He deplored Begin's policies, while
helping discreetly to forward the Camp David
accords. At the same time he tried to counter the
Arab boycott and help limit the damage inflicted
on the world economy by the oil price rise. The
latter near-impossible undertaking contributed to
his awareness of unfulfilled tasks as he looked
back on 60 busy years from the Swiss retirement
hideaway where he died in 1982.
This is an absorbing study that does justice to a
paradoxical personality - a banker who regarded
money as completely secondary and would rather
read a book than a business report.
The closest approximation to an aristocracy In the early 60s this otherwise reclusive man
among Diaspora Jews were some banking dynas- backed into the limelight by conducting a
ties - tradition bound, closely knit families who takeover battle in the aluminium industry. This
intermarried with their counterparts in other battle in which, applauded by the press, he
countries. The Warburgs. for instance, had family mobilised shareholders against directors left him
links with the Guenzburgs of St. Petersburg and victorious, but more isolated in the "square mile'
the Schiffs of New York. They also possessed that than before. (He took the City's antisemitically
rare (at any rate among Jews) attribute of tinged censure philosophically, pace his diary
aristocracy: long lineage.
entry quoting an English traveller's comment on
Of medieval Spanish origin, they had arrived in Napoleon 'one can tell at a glance that he hasn't
Germany from Italy in the days of Luther. By been to Oxford'.)
Bismarck's time they constituted a power in the
In the mid-Sixties he supported the Wilson
land, participating in colonial ventures and the government's economic programme, for which he
foundation of shipping lines. In 1919 Max War- received his knighthood. When, soon afterwards,
burg, the head ofthe bank, served on the German the Arab-Israeli conflict took centre stage in
delegation to Versailles. Offered the post of
Foreign Minister afterwards he declined, saying
one Jew in the Cabinet was enough. (That Jew,
"alter Rathenau. was to fall victim to assassins'
bullets within months.) For similar reasons Max
persuaded his nephew Siegmund, the object of
A CHAT IN BLOOMSBURY
this biographical study under review (Jacques
'^ttali, A Man of Influence: Sir Siegmund WarMeeting Andre Deutsch
b^rg, 1902-1982. Weidenfeld & Nicolson. 1986.
il6.95), to forego a career in pohtics and join the
bank. Though Siegmund did well in the family There are many walks of British life wherein RAF over Europe. Though the leaflet was never
hrm he was a far from conventional banker - for refugees have become prominent - from atomic written it launched Andre Deutsch in publishing.
instance soliciting the friendship of Stefan Zweig physics to opera adminstration. and from banking
He took to it like the proverbial duck to water.
^la a fan-letter prompted bv reading one of his to fine arts. One area in particular stands out: At first he used the imprint Allan Wingate. but
publishing. Here refugees have run the whole after a while he dropped the protective Anglobooks.
gamut
from art books (Thames & Hudson) via Saxon mimicry in favour of his real name. LookBy the time of the Nazi takeover he was
mass publishing (Paul Hamlyn) to newspaper ing back he is full of gratitude to the various
fnarried and a father. When an interview with the
Anglo-Saxons. Above all Diana Athill and the
newly appointed Foreign Minister von Neurath - production (Robert Maxwell).
Located midway between these extremes are cartoonist Nicolas Bentley. who furthered his
a childhood acquaintance - yielded no guarantee
of future safety for the Jews Siegmund decided to firms like Andre Deutsch and Weidenfelds. Their career. He cannot recall having encountered any
founder-proprietors share a common Danubian serious antisemitic prejudice. On the other hand
leave Germany that very day (!).
background, but have been longterm rivals. That he did have some difficulty in getting admitted to
has not prevented the present Lord Weidenfeld membership ofthe Garrick Club. However, after
Lord Halifax knew better . . .
from intermittently suggesting that they go into some years' delay, he secured election and today
partnership. Once, while negotiations between he considers membership of the Garrick - renthem were actually in progress, a business trip dezvous of actors, lawyers and publishers - the
Despite family connections he did not have an
took the latter to New York, where Deutsch's second greatest prize in his hfe.
^asy start in England. Setting to work with a
'diligence that hardly endeared him to the City, he megastar author Norman Mailer lives. The next
His first prize is. of course, the publishing
thing the amazed Andre Deutsch heard was that house that bears his name. The Deutsch list of
^"^entually established himself - but by this time
his would-be partner tried to 'poach' Mailer. Not authors is catholic, comprising Mailer. Laurie
Britain's appeasement policy concerned him
surprisingly he took this rather amiss and subse- Lee, V. S. Naipaul. the Caribbean statesman Eric
"'Ore than business success. Once when he tried
quently cut Weidenfeld whenever they chanced to Williams and the Nigerian Nobel Prize winner
to convince Foreign Secretary Lord Halifax of the
meet. This went on for months till one day, at the Wole Soyinka (whose award ceremony at StockP'tfalls of that policy he was told that as a German
Frankfurt Book Fair. Weidenfeld bore down on holm he attended last year). He hopes that his
••sw he lacked objectivity in the matter . . .
the diminutive Deutsch and. calling him his obituaries will mention his involvement in the
From the outbreak of war till Pearl Harbour he
brother, said imploringly 'Tomorrow is the Day launch of independent Africa's first publishing
played a crucial role in converting American
of Atonement. You must forgive me!' Deutsch houses.
pledges of aid to Britain into actual means of
sidestepped the supplicant and enquired the date
prosecuting the war effort. Recognition of a sort
I bring the conversation back to Middle Europe
of Yom Kippur at a nearby Israeli stand. 'In a and ask 'Are you a member of the Hungarian
eaine to him when Lord Haw-Haw described him
fortnight's time', was the answer.
°n Radio Berlin as the Jew who was financing the
mafia?' He smiles 'I eat at the Gay Hussar, but
War.
Andre Deutsch tells the story with wry amuse- most of my close circle consists of English people.
ment. He is a friendly man who instantly puts the On the other hand George Mikes is an old friend;
In the postwar years he tried to persuade both
visitor to his booklined office in Bloomsbury at also my author since How To Be An Alien. Right
Labour and Tory ministers that Britain's future
ease. The route that took him from Budapest to now he is writing the autobiography of Rubik of
^y in Europe. Their refusal to heed this advice
"•^suited in Britain subsequently entering the EEC Bloomsbury forked on the Isle of Man, where he Rubik's Cube fame'.
was briefly interned after Hungary's entry into
On Worse terms. However, his failure with the
I ask myself how one man can write another's
the war. There another internee sold the camp autobiography. Maybe a mistranslation - for
Politicians was offset by successes in the City,
commandant the idea that he and his amanuensis though Andre Deutsch took the (for him) right
"ring the Fifties he provided the financial
Deutsch be given facilities for producing an road on the Isle of Man, some signposts still point
ackup for the transformation of the newspaper
Allied propaganda leaflet to be dropped by the to Budapest.
'fdustry and the launch of commercial television.
R.G.
pages
AJR INFORMATION MARCH 1987
Alice Schwab
S.B.s
Theatre and Television in
Germany
Exhibitions in Review
BRITISH ART IN THE 20TH CENTURY
T
he finest exhibition in London at present is
the Royal Academy's 'British Art in the 20th
Century' (until 5 April), already mentioned in our
last issue. From London it will go to Stuttgart.
Pride of place in it is Mark Gertler's Merry-goround, which also features on the exhibition
poster. This was Gertler's most important work
and, until a couple of years ago, was owned by the
Ben Uri who through force of circumstances were
forced to sell it to the Tate Gallery. Incidentally,
the Ben Uri will be holding its Annual Picture
Fair on 8 March (viewing on 1 March) and as
usual many good pictures have been assembled
for the draw, including a drawing by Frank
Auerbach kindly donated by the artist for the
purpose.
The Piccadilly Gallery is showing works by Sir
Max Beerbohm (1872-1956) until 21 March. The
great cartoonist was the brother-in-law of our
good friend Dr Eva Reichmann who has just
celebrated her 90th birthday. She inherited much
of Beerbohm's library and has donated the
greater part to Merton College, Oxford, where he
studied.
Annely Juda always has something fine to
show - this time drawings by Naum Gabo (until 4
April). Gabo (1890-1977) was a pioneer in the
development of Constructivist sculpture, but he
was also a prohfic draughtsman. Few of his
drawings were exhibited during his lifetime and
have only now come to light.
Yehuda Bacon and .Naomi Blake
Henny Handler (24 Wellington Road. NW8) is
showing drawings and paintings by Yehuda
Bacon and sculptures by Naomi Blake (22-29
March). The exhibition will be opened by Martin
Gilbert. Yehuda Bacon was born in MahrichOstrau in 1929. spent three years in concentration
camps and then, with the help of Youth Aliya,
emigrated to Israel in 1946, where he is now
professor at the Bezalel School. One of his
earliest exhibitions in England, arranged through
Youth Aliya, was held at the Phoenix Gallery,
Lavenham in the early 'fifties. Naomi Blake,
Associate of the Royal Society of British Sculptors, is well-known to us. An important piece by
her, as reported in an earlier issue, was recently
dedicated at the Sternberg Centre. Works on
paper by David Bomberg (1890-1957) are being
shown at the Mayor Gallery in association with
Cavan O'Brien (until 14 March). Other important
works by this artist are included in the Royal
Academy exhibition already mentioned.
From Hebron to Akko
Leinster Fine Art has been showing abstract
expressionist work by Hans Hofmann (Weissenburg 1880-New York 1966). a very colourful
painter. A little off-beat but well worth seeing is
Russian Styles 1700-1920, Court and Country
Dress from the Hermitage, at the Barbican until 26
Column
April. David Carr, a well-established London
artist, has recently had an exhibition at the
Camden Arts Centre of pictures from Israel
which he executed during two recent visits travelling by bus from Hebron in the south of Akko in
the north.
The recent enormous International Contemporary Art Fair in Los Angeles had many
participating galleries from all over the world. I
did not see it, but in the lavish catalogue it was
nice to find a picture entitled Guardian of Faith
1985-6 by David Gryn, son of Rabbi Hugo Gryn.
senior Minister of the West London Synagogue.
It was exhibited by the Osborne Gallery, London.
Is the picture, perhaps, a stylised portrait of the
artist's father?
Friedrich Feigl
And, finally, the wanderings of a painting.
Friedrich (Fred) Feigl (Prague 1884-London
1965) is one of those 'neglected' artists whose true
value is only now being recognised. He was
sufficiently well-known on the Continent before
his arrest in 1938 and incarceration in a concentration camp, to have a separate monograph dedicated to him and put)lished in the Jiidische
Biicherei series by Fritz Gurlitt in 1921. I am
fortunately the owner of a picture by Feigl The
Regatta. It was borrowed from me for an exhibition in Berlin, then went to Oberhausen. from
there to London, on to Vienna and finally
returned to me unharmed. I was not so fortunate
with a picture by Pamina Mahrtenholz - but that
is another story.
CLUB 1943
Meetings on Mondays at 8 p.m.
Hannah Karminski House
9, Adamson Road, NWS
1987
2 Mar. A. H. Ningo: Ludwig Tietz.
9 Mar. H. G. Holm: Greto Garbo.
16 Mar.
R. v.
Schulze-Gavernitz:
Bibliotheca Palatina. Die klassische
Bibliothek aus dem Heidelberger
Schlosse.
23 Mar. Charles Guttmann J.P.: Der
Judische Humor.
30 Mar. Phylippa Boyden: The Life of
Indira Ghandi.
6 Apr. E. Bendemann: Reminescencen
eines Emigranten von 1933.
13 Apr. Pesach. No Lecture.
20 Apr. Easter Monday. No Lecture.
27 Apr. Lucy Kaye: Erziehung zum
geistigen Widerstand im JiJdischen
Landschulheim Herrlingen 1933-39.
4 May. Bank Holiday. No Lecture.
The Hamburg Thaliatheater obtained raving
reviews with a production of Cat on a hot tin roof
by Tennessee Williams, directed by Israeli Arie
Zinger. Things do not appear to have gone so well
at the Hamburg Schauspielhaus where Peter
Zadek (about whom this column reported in July
last when he was 60) resigned his position as
Intendant. In his farewell message Zadek regretted the attitude of Hamburg audiences who. he
thought, did not seem to agree with his ideas of a
theatre repertoire for that city.
Bavarian Television devoted an evening to
author Carl Zuckmayer (1896-1977), dealing
with his adventurous flight from Austria in 1938.
Entitled Reise durch die Nacht, it included
genuine film documentation interspersed with
scenes based on Zuckmayer's autobiography Als
wdr's ein Stiick von mir.
Thirty years after the death of diseuse Claire
Waldof, German Television transmitted a programme dedicated to the favourite Berlin cabaretist of the Twenties and Thirties under the title
Ach Gott, wie sind die Manner dumm, featuring
songs of the period including Hermann heesst er,
her most beloved hit.
Birthdays
Polish-born film actress Pola Negri was 90 in
January. Many will remember the highlight of her
career when in 1935, she starred in Mazurka,
directed by Willy Forst. Pola Negri who started as
a dancer, was discovered by Max Reinhardt in
1917, had her triumphs in Lubitsch pictures
(Carmen. Madam Dubarry) and was the first
European actress to gain a long-term Hollywood
contract.
Paula Wessely, the actress, whose 80th birthday we recorded last month, was the subject ofan
article in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung
where reference was made to her role under the
Nazis. 'In contrast to other stars in Nazi Germany's cultural life (it was recalled) she did not
later offer any excuses. She was making no bones
of the fact (she said) that she was ashamed of
whatever part she had played, that she had failed
to muster sufficient courage to prevent her person
and her talents from being misused". According to
the F.A.Z. writer, 'more could not be expected
from an entirely non-political artist'. Perhaps the
artist's 'non-political' nature at the time was not
relevant but the feeling of shame now is.
Obituary
Lea Seidl, the Vienna-born operetta diva, has
died at the age of 91. After her many successes in
Austria during the silver era of Kalman, Lehar,
Oscar Straus, she came to this country and
charmed audiences in Friederike, Waltz Dream
and, in particular, in the Stolz-Benatzky show
White Horse Inn. Later, Lea Seidl acted in plays
in London (Claudia is particularly well remembered). She appeared on television several years
ago on the occasion of a Richard Tauber celebration when she spoke of her friendship and great
admiration for the celebrated tenor - The Austrian veteran comedian Rudolf Carl has died in
Graz aged 87.
4
I
AJR INFORMATION MARCH 1987
H. W.
pages
Freyhan
GUSTAV MAHLER AND RICHARD STRAUSS
A Distorted Image Corrected
T
ime was, not so long ago. when, in this
country, the name of Mahler used to be
coupled with that of Bruckner, both masters
treated as aliens on British concert platforms. The
link between the two tended to be overrated.
Mahler was born in 1860. and his most important
contemporary, in Central Europe anyway, was
Richard Strauss, just four years younger. They
met first in 1888. and for 24 years, a close
relationship existed between them, as is proved
especially by their correspondence, much of
which has hitherto been little known. This gap has
now been filled by Gustav Mahler. Richard
Strauss, Correspondence 1888-1911: ed. Herta
Blaukopf: transl. Edmund Jephcott. Faber and
Faber. 1984: £15. The book has a few illustrations
and concludes with a substantial essay. 'Rivalry
and Friendship', in which the editor provides a
great deal of relevant information on the ups and
downs in the relationship between the two.
The majority of the letters comes from Mahler.
These were all carefully preserved in Strauss' villa
near Garmisch. while most of Strauss' letters do
not seem to be available, although a few exist in
copies taken by Alma Mahler. The first letter,
from Gustav. is addressed to his 'dear colleague'
but concludes with 'dear friend", and this is the
form of address used from then till Strauss' last
letter, written a week before Mahler's death.
Much of the correspondence concerns the
mutual efforts of both composers, each holding
important conducting posts, on behalf of their
own works. Each showed an attitude of respect
towards the other's output. There was a good deal
of give and take in this matter, as Strauss once
rather cynically admitted to the mildly shocked
Mahler. At first, Strauss had not much to offer
besides his still immature opera Guntram. of
which Mahler performed Preludes and Interludes, but soon Strauss got in the lead with his
symphonic poems, scoring high as the representative of modernism. Mahler held the more important conducting posts but had great difficulties in
securing performances of his early works. Strauss
came to the rescue by putting on performances of
individual movements or by arranging for Mahler
to conduct his symphonies himself.
Strauss realised the practical problems which
arose from the unusual length of Mahler's
symphonies, notably the Third, and advocated
cuts, even in the Finale of No. 1, which Mahler
did not accept. It is significant that the Mahler
symphony which Strauss admired most was the
Fourth, the most concise of all.
Salome and Eleictra
Both composers were modernists in their
allegiance to Wagner. Yet Mahler did not share
Strauss' admiration for Liszt, and although he had
provided programmes for his early symphonies,
he soon departed from this practice and rejected
the idea of the symphonic poem. When Strauss
played and sang to him his Salome. Mahler was
most enthusiastic. 'And now. dear Strauss. I
Cannot help speaking of the moving impression
your work made on me. This is your apogee so
tar. Indeed. I assert that nothing that even you
have done up to now. can be compared to it - you
know - 1 do not go in for empty phrases, with you
sven less than with others. Every note is right,
"hat I have long known: you are a natural
'Iramatist!'
Mahler heard Salome twice in Berlin, once
fnder Leo Blech, and then again under the
'Composer. He wrote to Alma: 'It is a work of
Senius. very powerful, decidedly one of the most
-Oxford C.C.J.*^ur friends in the Oxford area might like to know
'•f they don't know already) ofthe local branch of
'he Council of Christians and Jews. It offers about
three lectures each University term and two social
^^enings annually. Transport for those living in
the villages near Oxford can be arranged. The
Secretary to be contacted is Mr. Bernard Hamilton, 12 Beaumont Buildings. Oxford (tei.
513970).
important that our time has produced. Deeply at
work in it, under a mass of rubble, is a live
volcano, a subterranean fire - not a mere
firework. I am firmly convinced that this is one of
the greatest masterpieces of our time". Mahler
tried extremely hard to perform Salome at the
Vienna Opera but lost the battle with the censor.
Only after the overthrow of the monarchy could
the work be staged in Vienna.
It seems that Mahler came across Elektra while
in America. According to Alma he showed little
interest, which is hardly likely considering his
reaction to the earlier opera. This raises the
question of Alma's credibility in the matter of the
relationship between the two composers. Their
friendship did not extend to their wives: neither
Mahler nor Alma were quite willing to put up with
Pauline's pecularities. and Alma had no great
sympathy with Richard. Referring to Elektra
Strauss himself mentions Klytemnestra's daydream narrative as his 'boldest passage harmonically', 'a piece which even Mahler (it was the last
thing I played to him) could not accept'.
Yet in 1907 Mahler recommended Schoenberg's String Quartet op. 7 to Strauss. In honour
of Mahler's SOth birthday. Strauss wrote: 'Gustav
Mahler's work is in my view among the most
significant and interesting in present-day art
history. Just as I was fortunate to be one of the
first to commend his symphonic works to the
public, I see it as one of my most pleasant duties
to continue by word and deed to help his
symphonies attain the general recognition they so
deserve. The plasticity of his orchestration, in
particular, is absolutely exemplary'. Strauss
attended the Munich premiere of Mahler's Eighth
Symphony.
Twenty-two years after Mahler's death came
1933 and Strauss' appointment as President ofthe
Nazi Reichsmusikkammer. In this capacity he
wrote to Furtwangler suggesting that a performance of a Mahler symphony should 'not be ruled
out'. This remark proved that Strauss' often
criticized attitude to the Nazi regime was not free
from illusions. This is also proved by his decision
to set a libretto by Stefan Zweig in Die schweigsame Frau.
In 1939 Alma Mahler requested Strauss' permission to publish some of his letters to Mahler.
He refused, as he had rejected all similar requests
and could not exempt even those of 'dear
Gustav'. At this time. Alma, now married to
Werfel, had become a refugee. Whatever respect
she may have had for Strauss was now affected by
the political situation. Her book on Mahler and
publication of his correspondence reflect this.
In 1945 the octogenarian Strauss came across
Alma's book. His marginal notes show his profound disappointment, and he felt particularly
offended by the adverse comments about his wife.
The embittered old man summed it up: 'What
surprises me in this book, that is not especially
flattering even to Mahler, whom I much admired
as an artist and with whom I had only friendly
relations, is that he apparently bore me not the
slightest trace of gratitude for introducing him to
the public'.
This makes painful reading, and it is as well to
accept Herta Blaukopfs concluding comment:
'Alma Mahler could have explained these contradictions but clearly had no such intention.
What she wrote and even more what she omitted,
was bound to misrepresent the relationship
between Strauss and Mahler. She was aided in
this by the fact that the correspondence between
the two composers had remained unpublished for
so long. The documents presented here are
intended to place the Mahler-Strauss relationship
in a truer light and so to correct the distorted
image'.
Albert Ehrenstein
Exhibition
The memory of Albert Ehrenstein, the Jewish
writer who was born in Vienna in 1886 and who
died in a New York hospital for the poor in 1950,
having emigrated first to Switzerland, then to
Spain and France, was honoured with a centenary
exhibition organised by the Archiv Bibliographica
Judaica at Frankfurt. Illustrations were given of
relationship to such people as Karl Kraus, Franz
Kafka, Else Lasker-Schuler, also Thomas Mann
and Hermann Hesse and others with whom he
was associated as a contributor to the leading
German journals of the Weimar period. He was
one of the few authors who opposed the Kaiser
war as 'evidence of a European cannibalism', but
his depression, rebellion and disgust at life
generally only combined to make him feel: 'I am a
useless poet, lost in an ailing world'.
page 10
AJR INFORMATION MARCH 1987
Sidney Jones
Is There Life After Retirement?
T
he answer is, it depends what you mean by
life. If you mean the wherewithal to sustain
life - money, food, shelter - then the answer, in
Britain at least, is Yes. But many would regard
those things as merely the basic necessities of
existence, not of life as we know it. What kind of
hfe is available which expands beyond the basic
necessities? Abraham Maslow, an American
psychologist, in his book .Motivation and Personality (New York and London, 1970), has set out a
hierarchy of our needs, from those which we
share with the other animals to the most distinctively human. They range from the psychological,
through safety, love, and esteem, to self-realisation.
That is a formidable list of requirements.
Regarding love and esteem as basic may surprise
those who view them as luxuries, not essential for
a full life. If we translate love into a sense of
belonging, of being needed, of relatedness then
the deep character of the need is apparent.
Similarly, when the esteem we receive from
others is interpreted as recognition, and a feeling
that our worth is properly valued, that too can be
seen as something other than a dispensable
luxury.
Unpredictable
Meeting these needs in retirement may be more
difficult of attainment, or easier. The problem lies
in making an accurate prediction of what retirement holds in store. This is difficult, and most
people get it wrong. That is not in any way
remarkable if you look at the fate of our other
major predictions throughout our lives. How
many of us were right about what marriage would
be like, or how our chosen career would turn out?
Not many, it may be asserted. We are wrong in
greater or lesser degree every time. The explanation is that there are unknown and unpredictable factors in the new situation. Your intended is
going to become a different person when you are
married. This is not because of an earlier concealment or pretence but because a new situation
brings out different aspects of us all.
The retired state thus as an unpredictable
element. That does not make it forbidding, just
full of possibilities. Some degree of uncertainty
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does make planning for retirement rather difficult, at least in those aspects which cannot be
accurately forecast. Perhaps the best way to plan
is to allow for a measure of unpredictability.
There are many strands in the retirement
scene. Income is obviously important: its security,
its level, the protection afforded against inflation.
Most people feel that they will be vulnerable in
retirement since they will have little room for
manoeuvre once their principal working income is
relinquished. The opportunities to recoup, should
anything go wrong, seem much more limited. The
surprises here may be pleasant ones.
Built-in Purpose
Another area where surprises are common,
however thorough the planning, is in the way in
which our lives are structured. Paid work in its
many forms builds a structure for our hves.
Always true for men, it is now applicable to an
increasing number of women. It gives a built-in
purpose, a time-table, status and role, contact
with others, and income. It is extremely difficult
to forecast how one is going to feel when these are
withdrawn, at a stroke. It is not just a case of
losing one of the supports of a life-style, they are
all threatened.
It is the actual loss which teaches us the value of
each component. What significance any one of
them will have for any individual must be a very
personal matter. Each of us will emphasise
different aspects. One which is extremely common, however, and which we are only now
beginning to understand, is the loss of the
organisational context of our everyday lives.
Organisation and structure are at the heart of
most paid work, and in retirement their lack can
be experienced as a real threat. Most people's
work is done in organisations and over a lifetime.
Starting with our schools, and then perhaps a
period in the Forces or in higher education before
entering employment, is a common pattern. The
story has been different for many women, but the
two sexes are now converging in this respect in
middle life.
Sense of Loss
Many people have thus been part of organisations for perhaps half a century. On retirement
they are no longer. The significance of that
change varies greatly between individuals. Some
grasp their freedom and revel in it, living every
day as though they are on holiday at home.
Others will suffer a loss which for some will be
very profound. This sense of loss can initiate
depression and restlessness.
The leisure pursuits which many plan to follow
- gardening, fishing, golf, even literature and
music - may pall when they become the staple
occupation in a rather solitary setting. The true
compensation for losing the organisation provided by the working life may lie in joining or in
creating a new organisation. "That this can provide
a real antidote for the sense of loss is evidenced in
the commitments which many assume, the
responsibilities which they willingly shoulder.
when they have the freedom to choose how they
are to spend their lives.
Miss M., a former civil servant, has trained for
and exercises a role in a Citizens' Advice Bureau
for two days a week, as a volunteer. The outsider
could be forgiven for thinking that this looks very
much like work, paid work, that is. And of course
it has many of its characteristics, but belonging to
an organisation, working with others, having a
recognised role and status are the essential
rewards, not money.
Another way of meeting this need is exemplified by Mr. D., a retired businessman, now to be
found administering the affairs of a large organisation, the University of the Third Age in a large
city. He not only enjoys the committee meetings
and the planning function. He leads a study group
of his peers concerned with his lifetime interest,
marine biology. His involvement in a voluntary
organisation gives his life a special meaning. It is
also good for a lot of other people.
Being involved in an organisation is welcome to
many. Indeed, some retired people have told me
'this has saved my life'. Freedom is two-faced. It
offers choice and abundance, it may also threaten
emptiness and boredom. Taking an organisational role means that we have commitments;
other people rely on us. We become part of a
network of tasks and people.
What this kind of commitment yields is
summed up by a married lady of 65, retired for
some years, who said of her membership: 'It gives
you a reason to get up in the morning and get
dressed'. Many of us seem to need such a reason.
Not everyone of course needs an organisational
setting. There are countless numbers who will
gladly pursue their interests either alone or with a
few friends, and be very happy. However, a fairly
large proportion of us find that participating
wholeheartedly in the right organisation can
satisfy some of the basic human needs which
Maslow describes. We belong (the Love need);
we have a role and status (the Esteem need).
Above all we may achieve Self-Realisation by
becoming what we are capable of becoming, in
ways which may never have been open to us
before. This is the biggest surprise of all. For
some people, life may actually begin with
retirement.
With best wishes from
VICTORINOX
Swiss Knives of Quality
page 11
AJR INFORMATION MARCH 1987
AJR CLUB NEWS
NEWS FROM AJR DAY CENTRE
a selection of songs from 18th century Bel Canto
to Johann Strauss (Die Fledermaus) and Puccini
(Tosca). After the recent temperatures, the Last
Rose of Summer proved a great hit.
Much applause also rewarded the violinist Phil
Silverstone whose fine rendering of well known
waltzes and gypsy airs was much appreciated.
Asher Clayton pleased us with Mendelssohn
songs, passages from the Pearl Fishers, and hearty
applause was drawn by Flotow's Martha, Martha
du entschwandest, sung in German. The accompanist throughout was Rosa Butwick who
keeps astonishing us with the extent and versatility of her repertoire.
MUSIC
Soloists and Community Singing
Whenever artists are delayed by traffic or for
other reasons, there is always Gerhard Tichauer
to keep the audience going, and recently he again
accompanied Hans Freund in Wer uns getraut and
other melodies from the 'Gipsy Baron', until the
afternoon's soloist arrived.
This time it was Miss Marian Lewis, who unlike
most female singers we have heard here, is not a
Soprano, but has a beautifully deep Contralto
voice. Her mellifluous rendering of such favourites as Haendel's Largo. Tchaikowsky's "None but
the Lonely Heart", the Habanera from Carmen
and Delilah's Aria from Samson and Delilah
captivated the large audience.
In between Hans Freund led some hvely
community singing of Schubert songs, and the
Hobellied from Raymund's Verschwender. Mrs.
Ruth Philipp was the accompanist on this unusually varied musical afternoon.
ENTERTAINMENT FOR MARCH
As usual our morning's activities include: Keep
Fit; Discussion Group; Various Card Games;
Chess; Scrabble; Bingo; Art Class.
BIRTHDAY CONCERT
The AJR Day Centre's first birthday was marked
^ith the presentation of a huge cherry-studded
birthday cake in which all the regulars present had
a full share. Sixty visitors attended the opening
day last year, braving the blustery rain, and about
•he same number w ere there now. survivors of the
grim winter we had just left behind us.
In honour of the occasion, a fine concert was
organised by Hans Freund who unfortunately was
ill that day. Alisa Spivack. a coloratura soprano,
oid credit to her master Benvenuto Finelli at the
Guildhall School of Music, when she treated us to
W A L M LANE N U R S I N G
The afternoon entertainment is:
Wednesday 4th "Jews in Africa' by Judge
Magnus.
Thursday Sth
General
Knowledge
Quiz
presented by Mrs. Friedlander.
Wednesday 11th Faith Healer - Mr. Jack Donn.
Thursday 12th
Ahce Sommer - Famous Concert Pianist.
Wednesday 18th Songs Old & New - Hans
Freund.
Thursday 19th
Refugee No. 562: Reminiscences of London 1933 - Mr.
C. C. Aronsfeld.
Wednesday 25th Estelle Maier entertains with
voice and accompanyist.
Thursday 26th
The London Ladies Choir.
HOME
Walm Lane is an established Registered Nursing Home providing the
highest standards of nursing care for all categories pf long and shortterm medical and post-operative surgical patients. Lifts to all floors. All
rooms have nurse call systems, telephone and colour television. Choice
of menu, kosher meals available. Licensed by Brent Health Authority
and as such recognised for payment by private medical insurance
schemes
For a true and more detailed picture of what w e offer, please ask one of
your fellow members w h o has been, or is at present here, or contact
Matron directly at
141 W a l m L a n e , L o n d o n N W 2
Telephone 4508832
ANTIQLE
FLRMTLRE
AND OBJECTS
BOLGHT
Second Seder with Arnold Horwell
On Tuesday. 14 April, at 6.15 for 6.30. Dr.
Arnold Horwell will again conduct the SECOND
SEDER at the AJR CLUB (Hannah Karminski
House. 9 Adamson Road. N.W.3). The charges
for Dinner, incl. wine, will be £8.50 for members,
£10.50 for non-members. They do not cover
costs, and voluntary contributions will be accepted gratefully.
Please book early, and not later than 24 March,
enclosing cheques payable to the AJR Club. Full
refunds will be made for cancellations received by
2 April.
BELSIZE SQUARE S Y N A G O G U E
51 Belsize Square, London, N.W.S
Our communal hall is available for cultural
and social functions. For details apply to:
Secretary, Synagogue Office.
HILLCREST LODGE
40 Shoot-up Hill
London NW23QB
H O M E FOR T H E ELDERLY
Beautifully furnished Double and
Single Rooms at Reasonable
Rates. Qualified Nurses
always in attendance.
Please telephone Matron:
452 6201
o a r (ELECTRICAL
, —-,
n . & U . INSTALLATIONS) L I U .
*
Look no further *
Good prices given
PETER BENTLEV
ANTIQLES
22 Connaught Street, London. W 2
Tel: 01-723 9394
WHY NOT
ADVERTISE IN AJR
INFORMATION?
Please telephone
the Advertisement Dept.
0 1 - 6 2 4 9096/7
Tel: 01 -794 3949
BELSIZE SQUARE
GUESTHOUSE
24 B E L S I Z E S Q U A R E , IM.W.3
T e l : 01 - 7 9 4 4307 or 01 -435 2557
MODERN
ROOMS,
SELF-CATERING
HOLIDAY
RESIDENT
HOUSEKEEPER
MODERATE TERMS
NEAR SWISS COTTAGE STATION
SPRINGDENE NURSING HOME
199b Belsize Road, NW6
624 2646/328 2646
Members: E.C.A.
N.I.C.E.I.C.
The Club's late member Mrs. Sidonie Guttman
asked her son Karlheinz to present the AJR Club
with a video after her death as a token of her
gratitude for happy hours spent there. Thanks to
her generosity, the Club is now able to organise
video shows for its members.
Sunday, 1 March, at 3.30: Kol Rinah singers
and soloists, conducted by Johanna MetzgerLichtenstern and accompanied by Paul Lichtenstern.
Sunday. 29 March, at 3.30; BurnerNachmittag.
Song, Guitar and Piano recitals. Artists: Mania
Yurmann, Maureen Nissim, Alan Milford and
Nicol Brod.
Entrance fee 40p, including tea. All meetings at
9 Adamson Road, N.W.3.
55 Oakleigh Park Nth,
Whetstone,
London N.20
TeL 446 2117
We ofTer excellent 24 hour medical
nursing care. The food is tirst-class and
kosher food can be provided. We offer
a range of luxurious rooms, some with
bathroom en suile. We have two spacious lounges, two passenger lifts, a hydrotherapy pool and a landscaped
garden. Facilities for in-patient and
out-patient physiotherapy treatment.
Licensed by the Barnet Area Health
Authority and recognised by B.U.P.A.
and P.P.P. Special rates available for
long-term care.
page 12
AJR INFORMATION MARCH 1987
ALBERT REIMANN'S SCHOOL
A Visit to the Widow
The late Albert Reimann's art school (Reimann
Schule) enjoyed a great reputation in Weimar
Germany and fully maintained it in London
where it was established in 1936 with assistance
from the British Ministry of Education. I was
therefore thrilled when I had an opportunity of
meeting the founder's widow, Elly, who now, in
her 95th year, looks back with great clarity of
mind upon a life "lived intensely and with a
cheerfulness born of courage'. She handed me a
folder dated November 1984 containing photographs, illustrations and 15 pages of typescript
headed My first 92 years. "In case I have forgotten
something', she said with a twinkle. She had not.
She was originally an actress, much encouraged
by her father who loved the theatre, and at 24 she
married her first husband, a young antiquary,
with whom she settled in Berlin. In 1938 she went
to the USA, her husband unfortunately stayed
behind and perished. Twelve years after the war,
in 1957, she married Reimann who had lost his
wife. She had already been familar with the
•Reimann Art Ballets' which were among the
most sophisticated of the entertainments at the
time, and when the Reimann School was transferred to London, she remembers, the Times, in a
report prominently featured in her folder, reported the inaugural exhibition with all the speeches
made on the auspicious occasion. Reimann's son
Heinz then spoke of the "cuhural centre of the
world' that had "shifted to Britain'.
Mrs. Reimann showed me a College prospectus
of that time, which offers, in addition to class
tuition at the school in Regency Street, Westminster, study courses in such subjects as commercial
art, fashion design and dressmaking, professional
photography, interior design and drawing and
painting. This extension of the Reimann idea into
a distance learning programme, designed to give
both pleasure and vocational proficiency, reflects
that flair for innovation which had characterised
the enterprise from its inception. The Reimann
name soon attracted an impressive faculty list and
the student body grew to 500.
The Westminster premises were destroyed
during the London bhtz and, in an RAF raid on
Berlin, the building there suffered a similar fate.
It was the end of an era. But not quite the final
chapter of this remarkable story. Elly and Albert
Reimann were married for nearly twenty years.
When he celebrated his hundredth birthday in
1974, he received a telegram from the Queen. But
BEN URI ART SOCIETY
21 Dean Street
Wl
Tel. 437 2852
PICTURE FAIR 1987
Sunday 8 March at 8 p.m.
Tickets £35. Every ticket guarantees
a picture
Elly Reimann's fondest memory ofthe occasion is
that they danced a waltz together.
A year later she was once again alone. But in
August 1976 came an invitation to travel to Berlin
to attend an exhibition organised by the Bauhaus
Archiv on the theme "Art Schools in the 1920s'.
The Reimann contribution was duly acknowledged and honoured. The widow, too, was feted
and courtesies were heaped upon her. But, when
she went to visit her parents' former home, the
memories came flooding back and she was
thankful to return to England, to the cottage in
North London, which is her home, as it was
during her life with Albert Reimann. where they
had both found contentment and happiness.
D.L.M.
REFUGEE'S
GOOD FORTUNE
Sir Ralph Halpern, chairman of the Burton
Group, who has figured so prominently in the
City news and whose name is never mentioned
without stating his £1 million a year salary, was
born in Vienna in 1938 when his family was about
to emigrate. His first job was as a trainee at
Selfridge's, earning £5 a week. He then joined the
Peter Robinson group which was owned by
Burton. The man who (with £100) started this, the
world's largest multiple tailor business, Russianborn Sir Montague Burton, had died in 1952, and
now Halpern worked his way up to such an extent
that by 1977 he was running the whole group. If
he is Britain's highest paid executive, there is
(says a Times City commentator) 'nothing
immoral or unfair about fat pay-packets for top
executives who create company wealth", though
some can foresee "dangerous macho attitudes'
developing towards salaries.
FROM AUSTRIA
TO AUSTRALIA
Vienna-born Harry Seidler, now at 64 a wellknown Australian architect, last year published
his illustrated diaries of internment in England:
Internment. The diaries of Harry Seidler. May
1940 to October 1941. Edited by Janis Wilton.
Sydney. 1986. 146pp. The immediate daily entries
furnish valuable information both on the unimaginative bureacuracy that ran the camps, first on the
Isle of Man, then in Canada, and on the solidarity
of the prisoners in trying to improve their lot.
Among them, attention is given to the activities of
the intellectuals (authors, artists) who prevented
the time from being wasted. Seidler was released
at the end of 1941 and a scholarship enabled him
to study architecture in Canada and U.S.A. In
1948 he settled in Austraha. An exhibition of his
work was held in Vienna last year.
H.S.
In Memoriam Josef Cohn
Among the Refugees
in London 1933
The passing of Dr. Josef Cohn (see December
issue) brings back memories of the days we spent
together in London early in 1933 (writes C. C.
Aronsfeld). I arrived in May, a week or so after
the book burnings, and he must have come about
the same time. Some ofthe handful of youngsters
who had by then arrived - students, typists,
shop-assistants, nurses, travellers, all "of no fixed
abode' set about forming a Gruppe J unger Zionisten of which Cohn, being already prominently
involved in Zionist work, became the chairman.
Among the active members were Cohn's sister,
Bertha, who is still with us, also the first Hon.
Sec. Alex Weinstein who later left for agricultural
hachsharah near St. Albans. As his short-time
successor I noted in my surviving 'memo book' a
number of those who had paid their annual
subscription (sixpence, i.e. IVip): Buchner, Calvary, Cohn (Dr. Franz), Elduth, Hirschfeld,
Jacob, Lilo Kaufmann (now Mrs. F. E. Falk),
Kohn, Kossmann, M. Meyer, Rehfeld, Rosenthal, Schliissel, Slonitz, Weil. Perhaps some of
them, either in this country or abroad, will read
these lines and send us their recollections.
We used to meet once a week on the 6th floor of
Woburn House which had then just been built.
There was nearly always a good attendance
(about 60), and thanks to Cohn's own scholarly
contributions as well as his useful connections,
the standard of talks and discussions was high.
Once, at a meeting held in the old Anglo-Palestine Club at the back of Warren St. station, we
had Dr. Weizmann with us.
Cohn also arranged for special Study Circles to
be run which were attended by 12-15 people
each, on such subjects as Jewish History, History
of Zionism, Jews and Germans, etc. These circles
were held in private homes of generous patrons;
among the lecturers was Hans Jonas, later Professor of Philosophy in Israel, U.S.A. and Canada.
There were also Hebrew classes conducted by
Ernst Simon who not only knew how to teach this
particular language but also introduced us into
some of the secrets of language generally.
I soon left for Leeds to do a spot of training as
an 'engineer', and I remember with gratitude the
introduction Cohn gave me to Professor Selig
Brodetsky, the Zionist leader, who taught
mathematics at Leeds University and later was
President of the Board of Deputies. The most
pleasant evenings I spent in his hospitable home
will always be associated in my mind with the
sincere kindness and gentlemanly courtesy of
Josef Cohn.
GERMAN BY LAKE CONSTANCE
Give your grandchildren a gift token to
learn German and stay where Austria,
Germany and Switzerland meet.
INLINGUA SPRACHSCHULE
Rosgartenstrasse 29-3^
D-7750 Konstanz
page 13
AJR INFORMATION MARCH 1987
FAMILY EVENTS
Entries in this column are free of
charge, but voluntary
donations
would be appreciated. Texts should
reach us by the 10th of the preceding
month.
Acknowledgement
i
Weiss:—Lisl Weiss wishes to thank
all her relatives and friends for the
many flowers, letters, telegrams,
presents and donations for charity on
the occasion of her SOth birthday.
Birthdays
Fabian:—Otti Fabian, of 42 Hertford
Street. Cambridge, celebrates her
80th birthday on l 7 March.
Scharfer:—Alfred Scharfer. of 58.
The Drive. N W l l 9TL. celebrated
his SOth birthday on 12 January.
KENTWOOD HOUSE
Retirement Home
Single and Double Rooms available
with all facilities.
Special emphasis on kindness and
the needs of Guests.
Long or short stay.
For details telephone 0322 79771
f,%
^ .
ORIENTAL
RUGS
Bought, and
Sold
i
• Saturdays and Wednesdays
Stalls outside York Arcade,
80 Islington High St, N l .
(Opp Jet Liverpool Rd and
Upper Street)
V Sundays
Stalls outside 21 Chalk Farm
Road, N W l .
• Mondays, Tuesdays and
Fridays
Visit our stockrooms any time
by arrangement.
DETAILS
01-267 1841
5-9pm or
before Sam
Steiner:—Kurt Steiner. of 790 North
Circular Road, NW2, will celebrate
his 75th birthday on 23 March. With
love and good wishes from his wife
and all the family.
Golden Wedding
Golden:—On 4 April Ruth and Morris Golden of 3 Somali Road, London
NW2, will be celebrating their Golden Wedding with their children,
grandchildren and great-grandchildren and friends. The Golden Wedding will be solemnised on 4 April at
Belsize Square Synagogue.
Deaths
Arundel-Erlich:—Mrs. Anne Arundel-Erlich died on 17 December 1986
after a long illness borne with great
courage. She will be remembered for
her efforts on behalf of fellow-victims
of Nazi persecution for whom she
collected many permits. She will be
missed by many friends.
Bleistein:—Mrs. I. L. Bleistein, of
Sunridge Court, 76 The Ridgeway.
London NWl 1, died on Thursday, 29
January, at the age of 92 after a short
illness. She will be greatly missed by
her daughter and friends.
Lunn:—Ernest
Lunn
L.D.S..
R.C.S.(Edin.), of 1 Weymouth
Street, W l , died 2 January. Deeply
mourned and missed by his family
and friends.
Preece:—Alix Preece (nee Stiel)
born in Hamburg in 1898, died in
Edgware Hospital on 19 January.
Deeply mourned by her husband and
her many friends throughout the
world.
Prouse:—Teddy Prouse of Willesden
Lane, formerly from Vienna, passed
away on 29 January, deeply mourned
by all from the AJR Meals on Wheels
Service. He will be sadly missed by
all those to whom he brought their
meals regularly every Monday and to
whom he gave pleasure through his
charming personality, his love of
music and his compassion.
In Memoriam
Weiss:—Karl Weiss who left me
heartbroken March 1982, also
Tommy who died suddenly March
1956 not quite 11 years old. To the Road, East London, in 1962. Son
world they were only grains of sand, Robert born 1957. Jack Ben-Harary
to me they were the whole world.
worked as a tailor/cutter. Would
anyone knowing the whereabouts of
CLASSIFIED
the above please contact the Jewish
The charge in these columns is SOp for
Refugees
Committee.
Drayton
five words plus £1.00 for advertiseHouse, Gordon Street, London
ments under a Box No. To save
WCIH OAN.
administrative costs, please enclose
payment with the text of your adver- ROSENTHAL. Prof. Dr. med. Felix
Manuel Rosenthal, internist, born
tisement.
1885. Professor at Breslau UniverMiscellaneous
sity, since 1930 at the Jewish HospiREVLON MANICURIST. Will visit tal, Hamburg. Last heard of in
your home. Phone 01-446 2915.
Leicester. 1949. Fuller details,
ELECTRICIAN. City and Guilds including date of death, required by
qualified. All domestic work under- Dr. med. Peter Voswinckel, Medizitaken. Y. Steinreich. Tel: 455 5262. nische Fakultat. Schneebergweg,
MOZART'S K458, K464, K465. D-5100 Aachen. West Germany.
Davey String Quartet. Burgh House.
5 April, 2.45. £5.50. Phone 435 5199.
ANSCHLUSS
JEWISH HUMOUR. Talk at 1943
Historian seeks eyewitness accounts of
Club 23 March. Guests SOp.
Ihe Anschluss for a collection to be
published in 1988. Any responses
BRIDGE PARTNER, intermegratefully received. Robert Knight. 10
diate, St. John's Wood area, wanted.
Hever Place, Canterburv. Kent CT2 70P.
Please phone 586 1584.
STATE REGISTERED NURSE
has vacancies for elderly persons to
Sweet Piano Music
live as family—Short or Long Stay.
for ail your functions
328 6631.
Situations Vacant
RETIRED widower of Austrian
background, living alone in a modern
house in N.W. London, requires a
refined housekeeper/companion up
to 60 years old, to live in. Box 1112.
Personal
WIDOWER, late sixties, car driver,
interested in art, music, theatre,
travelling, etc, with nice flat in the
Swiss Cottage area, would like to
meet lady between 55 and 65 with
similar interests. Box 1113.
Information Required
AUSTRIAN historian is looking for
information about Austrians in the
British Army or propaganda during
the Second World War. Please contact Walfgang Muchitsch, Dept. of
European Studies, Loughborough
University LEI 1 3TU.
BEN-HARARY. Margaret BenHarary born in Stuttgart, husband
born in Baku, Russia, 1918. Came to
UK 1948-50. Lived off Commercial
^;«.v'<»tWirai:'-</r.««.'il«\/V
ANTHONY J. NEWTON
&C0
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INTERNATIONAL LAW AGENTS
with Offices in: Europe/Jersey/USA
SPECIALISTS in all Legal Work:
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and Litigation
Telephone: 01 435 5351/01 794 9696
Barbara Jacobson
449 1883
AUDLEY
RESTHOME
(Hencion)
for Elderly Retired Gentlefolk
Single and Double Rooms w i t h wash
basins and central heating. TV
lounge
and
dining-room
overlooking lovely garden.
24-hour care—long and short term.
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page 14
IN AID OF REFUSENIKS
Sir - 1 am a member of the AJR but also
co-chairman ofthe organization "Scientists for the
Release of Soviet Refuseniks (SRSR)'. This body
has as its principal aim the support of those Soviet
citizens who, together with their families, seek to
emigrate from the Soviet Union.
The Soviet authorities having shown themselves opposed to emigration, especially to Israel,
SRSR relies for its effectiveness on the fact that,
from the viewpoint of the Soviet Union, scientists
can provide particularly specific forms of assistance to refuseniks.
This letter is intended to express concern that
so few former German and Austrian Jewish
refugees to this country have involved themselves
in this more recent danger to Jews. Although the
scale of the danger then and now is of course
completely different, many refuseniks are suffering physically and emotionally to an extent many
of us remember from pre-war times.
Let me therefore urge members of AJR to
consider even some slight involvement in helping
our fellow-Jews in the Soviet Union.
PROFESSOR E. P. WOHLFARTH
11 Vanbrugh Road
London W4 IJB
Editorial comment: While sympathising with the
writer, we think it only fair to point out that our
members have by no means been remiss in their
concern for the fate of the refuseniks. They have
shown themselves aware of their duty by way of
support for such organisations as the National
Council for Soviet Jewry, the Women's Campaign
for Soviet Jewry, as well as the action taken in the
individual synagogues, societies and lodges to
which they belong. We believe that such involvement and support is all that can be asked for. We
hope to be demonstrating our good will by drawing
attention to Professor Wohlfarth's organisation.
BOOKS ON JEWS IN EAST GERMANY
Sir - Would my leamed colleague and PEN Club
fellow-member Egon Larsen subscribe to the
statement 'In Israel there is no literature because
I don't read Ivrit"? His declaration 'What about
the German Democratic Republic? There, hardly
any books about the Jews ( . . . ) have been
published' begs further quahfication. My own
private library contains dozens of East German
publications by Jewish authors or on Judaism,
among them a beautiful reprint of the Sarajevo
Haggadah, an illuminated Lied der Lieder, works
in Yiddish and German translation, up to Primo
Levi's works. These books are regularly reviewed
in the Nachrichtenblatt der Judischen Gemeinden
der DDR, some of them have found mention in
AJR INFORMATION, and they are very much
discussed particularly among young Christian
believers in the GDR.
„„
.
,
ARNO REINFRANK
10 Pattison Road
London NW2
Annely Juda Fine Art
11 Tottenham Mews. London W 1 P 9 P J
01-637 5517 8
C O N T E M P O R A R Y PAINTING
AND SCULPTURE
M o n - F r i : 10 a m - 6 pm Sat: 10 a m - 1 pm
AJR I N F O R M A T I O N MARCH 1987
VOLUNTEERS FOR OSMOND HOUSE
Sir - I feel our members ought to know that a
fairly serious problem has arisen at Osmond
House, where many residents are only admitted
when they are confused
or physically
handicapped or both.
At the moment, there are 18 residents who
need to be fed three times daily at breakfast,
lunch and supper, quite apart from morning
coffee and afternoon tea. This represents about
l'/2 hours per day to feed each person, about 192
working hours per week (just to feed these 18) or
five full-time staff per week.
We are now trying to find volunteers between
the ages of 16 and 70 (male or female) to help in
this work. Matron would like to establish a rota of
at least two volunteers at each main meal, i.e.
lunch and supper to feed four residents each. We
therefore need volunteers who would come regularly once a week, or once a fortnight, or even
once every three weeks, for two hours either from
Letters
to tiie Editor
11.30 a.m. to 1.30 p.m. or from 4.45 to 6.45 p.m;
the shortage of helping hands in the evening is
even greater than at lunch time.
We therefore ask anyone willing to do this very
valuable social service to contact Matron. Miss
Ruth Gawthorpe, at Osmond House, and let her
know which day of the week and at what time they
would like to come. They can either write or
phone (458 1185 or 458 1186). Qualifications
necessary are a liking of elderly people and
patience.
The help is needed as much at weekends as
during the week. If you join the rota and are
unable to attend at any time, all you have to do is
to phone any other person on it and ask them to
change with you.
DR. LORE STEIN
Chairman, Osmond House Committee,
Osmond House,
The Bishops Ave., N2 OBQ
P.S. If people honestly feel they cannot make a
regular commitment, they might consider giving
their name as a 'relief only.
JsKSlkmsiim
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Chartered surveyors,
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26 Conduit Street
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AJR INFORMATION SUCCESS
Sir - You may be interested to learn that the AJR
publication has saved an author and his remarkable book from being completely forgotten.
Dosio Koffler, a well known script-writer in the
Weimar Republic, reached this country in 1935
after a hazardous flight via Poland and Czechoslovakia. In 1941 he wrote a brilliant play. Die
deutsche Walpurgisnacht ('The German Witches'
Sabbath') in which Goethe, Schiller and
Nietzsche pay a visit to Nazi Germany under the
guidance of Mephisto. This was published in
London - in German - and a year later in an
English translation, with a foreword by Wickham
Steed, a former editor-in-chief of The Times.
Some time ago, a German pubhsher, Lisette
Bucholz of Persona Verlag, advertised in AJR
Information, requesting anybody who knew anything about Dosio Koffler to contact her. As a
result of this appeal a reprint of this book will now
appear in spring in Germany, with a detailed
postscript, tracing the history of the quest.
HANS FELD
26 Heath Drive,
London N.W.3 7SB
PETER WEISS ARCHIV
West Berlin's Academy of Arts has been chosen
as the resting place for the Peter-Weiss-Archiv as a
major part of a planned permanent collection of
documents on German post-war literature, accessible to all literary research workers. This is a
notable tribute to one of the most creative writers
among the German-Jewish exiles. Though his
international success came only in the 1960s with
his imaginative Marat-Sade play, post-war Germany and especially Berlin, followed his career
appreciatively and brought most of his works
before the public.
Peter Weiss, born in 1916 at Nowawes near
Potsdam, emigrated in 1934, drifted from country
to country in search of a new home, and settled
eventually in Stockholm where he died five years
ago. His stage work covered a wide field; but his
main interest was to convey a political, antifascist
message like his Auschwitz oratorio Die Ermittlung. produced in 1965 by Erwin Piscator in
Berlin. Then came the 'Vietnam Discourse",
followed by a musical play on Portugal's colonial
exploitation of Angola and Mozambique. He
dramatised Trotsky's exile and wrote a Holderlin
play in the style of Georg Biichner. In between he
painted, made films, and produced some of his
own plays. He was a restless genius who left a vast
treasure of memorabilia including manuscripts,
sketches, pictures, notes. His widow Gunilla, a
Swedish theatrical designer, began the enormous
task of sorting and categorizing these archives.
E.L.
CAMPS
INTERNMENT—P.O.W.—
FORCED L A B O U R — K Z
t wish to buy cards, envelopes and folded postmarked letters from all camps of both world wars.
Please send, registered mail, stating price, to:
14 Rosslyn Hill, London NWS
PETER C RICKENBACK
page 15
AJR INFORMATION MARCH 1987
MAJOR A. WERNER LESS
Major Avner Werner Less who died in Zurich
aged 70. conducted the interrogation of Eichmann in Israel in 1960. He was born in Berlin, fled
first to France, then to Palestine where he served
in the auxiliary police. After the establishment of
the State of Israel, he joined the consular service.
The transcripts of his ten-months' interrogation of
Eichmann. running to more than 1.000 pages,
provided the State's case at the trial. Later he
Obituaries
retired to Switzerland where he nursed his wife
until her death in 1980. He was invited to work in
Germany on a series of educational films and
documentaries about the Holocaust. His father
who had won the Iron Cross during the first world
war was murdered by the Nazis.
PROF. FRANZ BERGEL
Professor Franz Bergel, FRS, who died on New
Year's Day, aged 86, was a research chemist
noted for his work on vitamins and on the
treatment of cancer by chemotherapy. He was
born in Vienna and educated at the university
there and at Freiburg. He left Germany in 1933 to
join the medical chemistry department at
Edinburgh University where he collaborated with
Dr. Alexander (now Lord) Todd. In 1936 they
moved to the Lister Institute of Preventive
Medicine in London. Two years later Bergel was
appointed director of research at Roche Products
Ltd, Welwyn Garden City. In 1952 he was
teaching chemistry at the Institute of Cancer
Research. He published a number of scientific
*orks. In 1959 he was elected Fellow of the Royal
Society.
FREDERIC SAMSON
German-born Frederic Samson who died aged 75,
was senior tutor of general studies at the Royal
College of Art until his retirement in 1976.
Having graduated at Berlin University, he came
to England in the 1930s and began his career as
tutor for the Workers Educational Association in
the Welsh mining valleys. He joined the staff of
the Royal College in 1959; lecturing on European
literature and the general history of ideas.
In a note about him in the Daily Telegraph,
referring to the impact he made on students
'whose minds were normally quite otherwise
occupied'. Professor C. Cornford. one of them,
mentions his 'personal warmth, eloquence, wit
and archetypally Gelehrter appearance', with
'piles of books from which markers would flutter
to the floor hke snow as he hunted down
quotations'. What he taught particularly (the
writer said) was 'limitless sympathy for the
oppressed everywhere in the world, and what he
called civil courage - the putting of principle
before the self-interest at whatever risk".
CHRISTIANE ZIMMER
Christiane Zimmer. only daughter of the Austrian writer Hugo von Hofmannsthal. has died in
New York aged 84. With her husband Heinrich,
an indologist, with whom she had left Germany in
1939, she spent a year in Oxford, then emigrated
to the U.S.A. When he died in 1943, she studied
social sciences at Columbia University and
worked for several social organisations. She also
taught at the Catholic Fordham University in
New York. Her home in Greenwich Village
became a meeting point for artists and intellectuals, also for newly-arrived immigrants who
found here a 'castle of refuge" for exiles.
In later years, Christiane Zimmer divided her
activities between New York and Munich, enjoying the high respect of a large circle of friends.
C D
IDA COOK
Ida Cook who died aged 82 was a British Gentile
who, with her sister Louise, helped, at great risk
to herself, to save many Jews fleeing from
Germany. She described her experiences in a
book published in 1950 under the title We
RABBI DR. L. G. GRAF
Followed Our Stars. In 1965, at a ceremony at the
Rabbi Dr. Louis Gerhard Graf, head of the Israeli Embassy, the sisters were presented by the
Reform community in Cardiff for 31 years died in Israeli Ambassador with certificates on behalf of
Yad Vashem in tribute to their heroism; they also
December aged 74. Having studied at Berlin
University, he was ordained at the city's College received the U.S. Eleanor Roosevelt award.
*
of Jewish Studies in 1938. After his emigration a
year later, he was, first. Minister of the Bradford Dr. Edith Sterba. the child psychoanalyst who
synogogue (1940-48), then helped to found the studied under Sigmund Freud died in December,
Sinai synagogue in Leeds. A member of the AJR, aged 92. She and her husband Richard fled in
he took a special interest in public affairs gener- 1939 to the U.S.A. where she founded a health
ally and was active in such bodies as the Cardiff centre in Detroit and taught at several State
branches of the United Nations Association, the universities. She was also a pianist, her husband a
Interfaith Association and the local Marriage viohnist, and between them they wrote, in 1954, a
Guidance Council.
psychological study of Beethoven.
D'piY THE FRIENDS OF AKIM
Remember
Israel
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Will, why not consult us?
We have a special knowledge of
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AJR I N F O R M A T I O N MARCH 1987
page 16
REFUGEE'S £3M BEQUEST
TO CHARITY
A bequest of more than £3 million was made to
the Imperial Cancer Research Fund by Mrs.
Barbara Burns who came to this country as a
refugee from Germany just before the outbreak
of war. Her solicitor said; 'This is a classic rags to
riches story. Mr. and Mrs. Burns arrived in
Britain with nothing. They worked very hard and
eventually built up a string of hotels and guest
houses in West London. They had no family".
Mrs. Burns who was not Jewish died last July,
aged 79. The couple had changed their name.
(Burns, the Scottish poet, usually emerges by
dropping the stein at the end.)
SHEET MUSIC
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G U I L D F O R D (0483) 60627
DAWSON HOUSE HOTEL
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Free Dutcfi-Style Continental Breakfast
72 CANFIELD GARDENS
Near Underground Sta. Finchley Rd,
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Tel: 01-624 0079
DINNER AT THE WIENER LIBRARY
The Wiener Library's Reading Room was transformed into an elegant dining-room when the Rt.
Hon. James Callaghan and Mrs. Callaghan were
the Guests of Honour at a dinner given by Mr.
Ernst Fraenkel, Treasurer of the Library, and
Mrs. Fraenkel on 21 January to 25 of their friends.
The speakers included Mr. Callaghan. who underlined the very considerable importance he
attached to the continuation of the Library and
expressed the hope that the Jewish community
would step up its efforts to ensure this: also Mr.
Alan Montefiore, Deputy Chairman of the Library, and Professor Walter Laqueur, its Director. An appeal by Mr. Fraenkel for the Wiener
Library Endowment Fund raised approximately
£20,000.
Mrs Ann Tusa who, together with her husband
John, wrote The Nuremberg Trial, was the
speaker at an evening reception given by Mr. and
Mrs. C. T. Marx at the Library on 26 January.
Mrs. Tusa also emphasised the importance which
she attached to the continuance of the library.
Friends of the host and hostess afterwards viewed
the library's archives.
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JEWISH PEN FRIENDS
Are you interested to make Jewish pen friends?
Then you may like to know about the Interstate
Club of Jewish Pen Friends which seeks to
'nurture friendship and cultural contacts between
Jews all over the world". The address is P.O.B.
1508. Ramat Gan 52 115. Israel.
The 30th anniversary of the death of Alfred
Doblin, the German Jewish author, is to be
marked by the publication in May of the first six
volumes of his works in a chronologically
arranged edition planned to run up to 34. The
publishers are Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag.
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