Isaac Bashevis Singer is one of my favorite writers. Reading the Library of America’s three volume collection of his short stories was a profound, intIsaac Bashevis Singer is one of my favorite writers. Reading the Library of America’s three volume collection of his short stories was a profound, intense joy of an addiction. This collection of essays, however, was a real letdown.
Divided into three thematical sections, the first, “The Literary Arts,” reveals a writer whose views on writing seemed downright reactionary to me. A rather closed mind who blithely, almost bitterly, derides any writing that cannot be attached to personal experience. I’m not necessarily a fan of futurism or science fiction, but Singer’s intransigence about these kinds of works put me off so much that I feel like I need to give them a shot sometime soon.
The second section, “Yiddish and Jewish Life,” is very uneven. His pithy descriptions of the meanings of the Kabbalah and the Ten Commandments reminded me of a devout Mormon trying to put lipstick on the silliness of The Book of Mormon. On the other hand, the essays on Yiddish, the significance of the language and place in Jewish culture and history, are insightful and worthy of revisiting. “Personal Writings and Philosophy” reveal a writer very different from the one we meet in the opening set of essays, making the collection as a whole very uneven and somewhat confusing.
Footnotes throughout contain selections Singer crossed out. Perhaps that’s good for an academic, but Singer must have had a reason for excising them from the final drafts. Certainly, they were not intended for final publication. It struck me as being analogous to, for example, modern day conductors who play early versions of Bruckner symphonies and claim they are historical relevant. Bruckner had a reason for changing them for posterity. He wanted to give listeners the best of his evolving ideas, not what he considered the muddle of past drafts. It seems to me that the same applies to all writers, Singer included....more
What little of Alan Lightman’s work I’ve read, I’ve truly enjoyed. I should think about him more when thinking of the next thing. He writes dense, yetWhat little of Alan Lightman’s work I’ve read, I’ve truly enjoyed. I should think about him more when thinking of the next thing. He writes dense, yet simply accessible essays about why different matters of science should matter to non-scientists. But there’s enough to entice the more intellectually curious of those for whom the science is elementary. In this collection, Lightman ponders the wonder of being a student doing truly original research, the kind of which had likely often been attempted but not yet achieved. He also gives us substantively concise thumbnail sketches of significant physicists and explains their philosophical differences in understandable sentences.
This would be a great book to give as a present to a young high school-to-early medical school student who thinks deeply about their career choices or are in the process of doing so. It conveys the message that becoming enthralled in and with your subject is more than half the battle toward being satisfied with the choices you will make. And for older fogies like me, wish these kinds of insights had been around when I was younger....more
The shocking truth is that, while insincerity may be fatal to good writing, sincerity, of itself, never taught anyone to write well. It is a moral vir
The shocking truth is that, while insincerity may be fatal to good writing, sincerity, of itself, never taught anyone to write well. It is a moral virtue, not a literary talent.
C.S. Lewis
Every now and then readers (after all, if writers are anything, they are readers) need a little time to break away from the usual. But nothing shallow or trite, please. This short collection by one of the more interesting, wide-ranging of English writers of the past century and a half, C.S. Lewis, fits the bill. Most of the pieces, except for extended readings about writing for children on J.R.R. Tolkiens first volume of The Lord of the Rings trilogy. There are bits of wisdom, humor, and vanity that all lead to thoughts about writing. Highly recommended as a diversion to tune up the mind and think a bit differently about writing.
If there was one observation about writing that stuck with me, it was his warning against the casual use of descriptive adjectives. They are often a cop-out for lazy writers and make the reader do the work for them. It never works out for either. But don’t think about this or discard them in the first draft. Use them as challenges. Rather than write something like “astoundingly,” use it as a challenge to write why it is so without using the word. “Its very limitations of vocabulary became an attraction, as the hardness of stone pleases a sculptor or the difficulty of the sonnet delights the sonneteer.” Often the difficulty of writing is its own joy.
And there is fun stuff too. It’s easy to relate to his visceral disgust with trade paperbacks; when I see them in airports and people breaking the backs and folding the corners it drives me crazy. People like these are not readers, each is “unliterary” and “may be defined as [one] who reads books only once.” When he observes, “no reader worth his salt trots along to the obedience of a timetable”, I have to admit to being occasionally guilty, so this is a good reminder for readers too. But as we write, Lewis realizes it’s all a sort of vanity, one of the reasons we write these reviews:
After all, what is the object of writing to friends except that of talking oneself into a state of self-importance and the belief that one’s own perversities are a matter of universal sympathy.
I read Measuring Racism, Fighting Discrimination in one sitting. Focused mostly on France, the essay makes occasional forays in other parts of the worI read Measuring Racism, Fighting Discrimination in one sitting. Focused mostly on France, the essay makes occasional forays in other parts of the world. The main points are the idea of identity is ascendant and that of egalitarian general welfare is on the decline. The cause, in large part, can be traced to racism and its effects in society and public policy. Therefore there have to be objective measures made to define racism, for all to see. They should be updated constantly. They should be part of every public debate. This is a wonderful defense of pluralism, the basis of which is education....more
In this short collection of essays, actually oral presentations made in academic forums, we get insights about how growing up, living and working as aIn this short collection of essays, actually oral presentations made in academic forums, we get insights about how growing up, living and working as a writer in totalitarian Romania never leaves Müller. Or anyone who lived through arrogant, overconfident authority. Actually, everyone. We are all products of our pasts and our perceptions about our present and future can never escape them. But for those who lived behind the Iron Curtain (and perhaps soon, Americans), totalitarian fascism created scars of differing depths, many invisible to everyone who has never experienced it.
The fears the accompany life, of authorities who inflict petty, malevolent rules and behaviors were deliberate policies designed to maintain power through fear and intimidation. Even when she finally emigrated to Germany, the authorities in Romania left her with a final threat, one that will never make feel completely free. People--one dare not call the citizens--were tools for the state, "The head existed to carry the eyes and ears needed for work." (Der Kopf war da, um die Augen und Ohren zu tragen, die man beim Arbeiten braucht.) Being from the German-Swabian minority living in Romania caused even greater repression, one that she could later compare with how Germans treated minorities.
This is not a book to start with Müller. But it is an important supplement, one that goes deeper into many of the themes of her novels and short stories. Anyone who has read and appreciated more than two or three of her novels will find this enlightening. And it might also be useful to anyone studying the effects of totalitarianism on individual minds and behaviors....more
I refuse to believe that fate is a thing. But how and why, when I had entered this year with heaping mounds of pessimism, was I unsuspectingly led to I refuse to believe that fate is a thing. But how and why, when I had entered this year with heaping mounds of pessimism, was I unsuspectingly led to start my reading year with this inspiring, obscure, short, dense collection of essays? I may have to start questioning my materialist, humanist self.
With the exception of a section of questions Stegner answers, this book could just as easily have been titled On Reading and Experiencing Fiction. The first two selections, “Fiction: A Lens on Life” and “Creative Writing” might well be required reading for anyone who is on Goodreads. For those of us who love the written word, Stegner provides simple philosophical guides to help us better judge and appreciate our reading choices. First, it’s about people. “If fiction isn’t people it is nothing, and so any fiction writer is obligated to be to some degree a lover of his fellowmen, though he may, like the Mormon preacher, love some of them a damn sight better than others.” It’s also about ideas, which “ought to haunt a piece of fiction as a ghost flits past an attic window after dark.” Fiction can focus much more effectively, quickly and deeply than other types of writing; “One Macbeth on stage is worth a thousand essays on ambition.”
Stegner’s flowing, approachable style includes a message to an aspiring young, gifted writer who, if she is fortunate, may find only a small audience and the chance of “reaching them all is about like the possibility of your tracking down all the surviving elk in North America.” He also considers profanity, which has its time and place, but too much might obscure its power and intent. “Some acts, like some words, were never meant to be casual. That is why houses contain bedrooms and bathrooms.” The closing essay is a wonderful reflection on one of his own short stories that was inspired by his childhood. Stegner seems to be the kind of teacher any of us would have loved to have had. This is a must read for readers....more
The first volume of Hamsun’s letters reveal an arrogant, pretentious, overconfident young man who is sure of his superiority and greatness. In this coThe first volume of Hamsun’s letters reveal an arrogant, pretentious, overconfident young man who is sure of his superiority and greatness. In this collection, covering the years 1898-1952, he has become a great man, a writer of mythical proportions who has become his nation’s leading intellectual after three of his most significant novels—Hunger, Mysteries and Pan—received the acclaim he expected. But his success leads to unexpected fears, “I am now 38 years old…but I sit here doubting whether it is any use continuing. I never had doubts before; my nerves are strained and I am poor, and I am beginning to have doubts.” But his doubts didn’t last long. Even as he squandered Bergljot’s—his first wife—small inheritance, mostly through his gambling addiction, his pity and remorse is reserved mostly for himself. He confides to a friend that “Bergljot is marvellous! She says it can’t be helped what I have lost…Heavens, I’d much rather she had given me a thorough dressing-down and called me a hound and a wastrel…” He professes his shame, but in doing so, he has one of his very moments of honest introspection, “But I must try from now on to be a somewhat better person. I don’t think I’ve ever actually been a bad person; but I do have a tendency toward excess; I don’t have the best of balance. I should have had balance enough to keep me from setting out on this adventure.” Yet, as the rest of his life would reveal, such moments of honesty were rare indeed. Indeed, just a few days writing this, he writes a delusional letter to Bergljot that his gambling would cure their financial woes writing “In fact it is possible for metro stake not more than 20 francs and for this easily to become 100,000 francs in seven minutes. I have known many such instances…”
Hamsun was a man for whom appearances and ideals were paramount. His one daughter with Bergljot, Victoria, and four more with his second wife, Marie, created the appearance of a good father with five children—an important illusion for the Norway of his times. But he was not really an engaged father as he admitted to a friend describing what he needed in a new house, “The thing is: I am alas an impossible man; I must be well away from the family, because although I am hard of hearing I damn well hear things I shouldn't, for example children's cries. And then I can't get on with my work. Therefore I must have a big house, with empty rooms between me and the children.” His letters reveal a distant father, one who had an on-again, off-again relationship with Victoria, and one who was demanding that his sons fulfill his ideals, as they did when they joined the German army in World War II. But, in one of the rare instances of humor he exhibited, it can be inferred that he had a certain love for them, “One day Tore was run over by a cyclist, but he was given a krone for this, and I think he is wondering whether to be run over again.”
His reputation was indelibly damaged when, for the first time in his life, he became politically vocal in support of Hitler and the Third Reich. It was triggered by his opposition Carl von Ossietzky’s nomination for the 1935 Nobel Peace Prize, which as awarded to him in 1936 following a concerted campaign of supporters. Hamsun was a strong supporter of Vidkun Quisling, personally presented his 1920 Nobel Literature Prize medal to Joseph Goebbels, and had an unpleasant personal meeting with Hitler. He remained a steadfast supporter, even writing an editorial extolling Nazi virtues after Hitler died in a Berlin bunker. His letters reveal a naive, blinkered man whose opinions were molded as much by the years of financial and literary success he had Germany, his instinctive derision of England, and his suspicion of democracy as by fascism. His muddled thinking was revealed when, in 1934, he wrote, “Germany is in the middle of a transformation. If the government has taken the step of setting up concentration camps, then you and world should understand that there are good grounds for this.” This gullible, immature view never wavered, even when he saw the reality of Nazi rule through his experiences with the Nazi governor of occupied Norway.
The letters of the postwar period, of his arrest, trial, and ultimate internal exile, show an aging man who intellect was sharpened and reborn. They would be of great interest to any reader of his stunning, final memoir On Overgrown Paths. This collection did little to deepen to my understanding of Hamsun. But they did add depth to some of the things I had long known. It was a good collection for me, but probably not something I would recommend to a general reader of Hamsun....more
The works of Knut Hamsun and V.S. Naipaul have fascinated me ever since I became acquainted with both in the mid-1980s. I’ve devoured all of Hamsun thThe works of Knut Hamsun and V.S. Naipaul have fascinated me ever since I became acquainted with both in the mid-1980s. I’ve devoured all of Hamsun that I could find in translation and have likely read close to all of Naipaul’s published writings. As much as their writing grips me, they both seem to have been fairly awful people. Strangely, I find most of their political and social views repugnant. I guess that’s part of my odd obsession. One thing they shared was an inordinate self-confidence in their ability, even though early in their writing lives there was little-to-nothing that justified their bravado. But each knew he would be a writer, and not just a writer, but a great writer. Upon graduation from Oxford, Naipaul knew no other career. Hamsun was restless and without the benefit of a formal education. He toiled as a young man, self-taught—as a clerk in his uncle’s store and a rootless wanderer in two visits to the United States covering about four years working in fields, as a Chicago cable car driver, as a common laborer, and as a member of the Nordic artistic community in Paris—all the while convinced of his intellectual superiority over others.
This collection of Hamsun’s letters, which cover his time in the US, his return to Norway as a starving writer, the publication of his early and most well-known novels, and up until his first marriage in 1898 reveals a vain, touchy young man—one who never wavers in his self-belief and his art. Many of the letters are about his constant solicitation of loans, advances, and government grants to support himself. There is a pathetic nature to them, even as he feels entitled to the support. After all, he is becoming a great writer who will bring culture and letters to his young, small nation—or so he implies over and over again. Time would prove him right.
Most interesting were his letters from the period leading up to the publication of his first, and arguably most read, novel, Hunger. He knew—as we all now know, or at least should know—that he was writing in a style and viewpoint with no precedent. In the most telling excerpt of a letter to a friend, he wrote
What interests me is the infinite susceptibility of my soul, what little I have of it, the strange and peculiar life of the mind, the mysteries of the nerves in a starving body. The book deliberately plays on a single string, but attempts to draw a hundred notes from that string.
Anyone who has read Hunger can relate to this. And he delved even deeper into this style and substance with Mysteries and Pan, creating a genre of writing that gave birth to many branches of 20th century literature.
By the last letter of the volume, he seems sure that his material fortunes will soon change, something that will surely change his letter-writing compiled in the next volume. I would only recommend this book to those who, like me, have an unhealthy preoccupation with his life and writing. But since I’m a bit strange—much as Hamsun admitted about himself in his early correspondence—I’m confident that I’ll be one of the few who would want to read this collection....more
More than four decades after his death, Erich Kästner is still among the most popular German writers. Born in 1899, he fought in World War I as a teenMore than four decades after his death, Erich Kästner is still among the most popular German writers. Born in 1899, he fought in World War I as a teenager and soon thereafter became a writer, even having some of his articles and poems published Die Weltbühne, the influential left-wing weekly edited by Kurt Tucholsky and later, Carl von Ossietzky. His novel Fabian is among the classics of the Neue Sachlichkeit school and led to the banning of his books in Nazi Germany. As he wrote in an essay included in this anthology, he was in Zürich when the burning of the Reichstag occurred and, against the wishes of his friends, returned to Germany on the same train that brought many writers into exile. He describes how he tried to talk fellow writers in Berlin into staying, which, as he later realized, would certainly have led to their deaths. But he felt it was important to bear witness, going so far as to be present at the infamous May 10, 1933 book burning demonstration of the Opernplatz in Berlin. During his period of “inner exile” from 1933-1945, Kästner wrote children’s books, light comedies, and other pieces under pseudonyms. After the war until his death, he wrote a regular column for a Munich newspaper.
This short collection, subtitled "Useful Words for (almost) Every Occasion," brings together some of his best poetry and essays. Virtually every selection has a memorable quote or verse. Kästner was obsessed with age and youth and the connection between both, as he wrote in an essay for children beginning their first year of school, „Nur wer erwachsen wird und Kind bleibt, ist Ein Mensch!” (“One who becomes an adult and remains a child is human!”) Along the same lines, I thought one of the best verses was in „Die Großeltern haben Besuch” (“The Grandparents Have a Visitor”):
Spielt brav mit Sand und baut euch Illusionen! Ihr und Wir Alten wissen ja Bescheid: Man darf sie bauen, aber nicht drin wohnen. Ach, bleibt so klug, wenn ihr erwachsen Seid!
(Play politely with the sand and build your illusions! You and we old ones know it well: One is allowed to build, but never live in them. Oh, remain that smart when you are adults!)
I would recommend this book highly to any teachers of intermediate to advanced German. It also makes a great bedside companion....more
Kurt Tucholsky may well have been the most prolific German writer of the Weimar era. His wide range of articles—written under four pseudonyms and his Kurt Tucholsky may well have been the most prolific German writer of the Weimar era. His wide range of articles—written under four pseudonyms and his own name—for Die Weltbühne, a leftist periodical, included political, social, theater, and cultural commentary and criticism as well as humor, light verse, travel, and romance. His left-leaning philosophy rejected the extremism of communists and was critical of social democrats as being empty, unprincipled pragmatists who were too willing to compromise with their enemies. The Nazis shut down Die Weltbühne as soon as they took power. Carl von Ossietzky, the editor, was arrested on the night of the Reichstag fire. Tucholsky was given special attention at their book burnings. He had the honor of being on their first list of Germans whose citizenship was revoked by the Nazi government. Anticipating their wrath, he left the country permanently in 1932 to live in exile in Hindås, Sweden, just east of Göteborg.
Prior to this, during one of his stays in Switzerland, he fell in love with Dr. Hedwig Müller, an internist based in Zürich. She would be the last love of his life. They had a long-distance relationship, meeting occasionally in Switzerland, on the French Riviera and in Sweden. Briefe aus dem schweigen (Letters from the Silence) is a collection of correspondence Tucholsky wrote to Müller in the last three years of his life. (Interestingly, the letters between them went on a postal route that went directly through Germany.) The title is based on a famous note he wrote shortly before he died:
[image]
The three ascending steps—speaking, writing, silence—fed the conventional wisdom that Tucholsky committed suicide by overdosing on sleeping pills on December 21, 1935. But as his biographer speculates, it is just as likely that Tucholsky accidentally did so because he had chronic health problems—a consistent topic in his letters—and had long needed medications to help him sleep. Reading these letters makes his thesis more plausible. He was certainly in a state of despair, writing in February 1934, “…I’m not living right now, haven’t for three years” (“…ich lebe doch zur Zeit gar nicht, schon drei Jahre nicht.”). He had nagging health problems, lost his writing platform and profession, lived in exile in a country that often frustrated him, and despaired about the state of the world during the ascendancy of fascism.
For a compulsive writer with so many voices, it must have been torture not to express himself in public. His one great joy was his deep love in for Nuuna, the pet name he gave Müller. He still found humor in daily life and was making daily efforts to adjust to his new world. His last letter to his beloved Nuuna, written four days before his death, does not conjure up a picture of one who either wanted or was prepared to die.
Tucholsky tried hard to adjust to Swedish life, taking as many as six hours per day to learn the language. His keen observational gift found humor in their culture. While in the hospital for a sinus operation, he noted their deep and isolated their protestantism when the nurses asked him if Catholics believed in Jesus. The stereotypical Swedish frugality and stoicism highlighted a story he shared with Nuuna:
One of your most famous colleagues in Stockholm saw an old farmer’s wife, whose life he saved. (Those kind of doctors do exist.) And after she had a very difficult and dangerous operation she asked how much she owed him, she would be very thankful to know. ‘Well, for you I’ll do it 75.’ And she said, very seriously, ‘Let’s say a whole Crown.’—and really laid down one Crown, and the man took took it politely. Whatta guy.”
(Bei einem Deiner berühmtesten Kollegen in Stockholm ist eine alte Bauersfrau gewesen, der er das Leben gerettet hat. (Es gibt auch solche Ärzte.) Und dann hat sie nach der sehr schwierigen und gefährlichen Operation gefragt, was sie ihm denn schuldig sei, sie sei ihm doch so dankbar. Es war ein ganz altes Frauchen, und da hat der Mann gesagt: ‘Na, also für Sie mache ich das für 75.’ Und da hat sie ganz ernst gesagt: ‘Sagen wir eine ganze Krone.’—und hat wirklich eine Krone hingelegt, und der Mann hat sie auch brav genommen. So jenner.)
He followed Swedish domestic politics closely and recognized similarities with Weimar Germany, reviving old frustrations: “…how should I deal with so much cowardice and timidity?” (“…wie soll ich mit so viel Feigheit und Ängstlichkeit behandeln?”) Although led by a governing coalition of Social Democrats, they acted in fear of a rising tide of fascist sympathy as he noted, “They’ll find the 100,000 needed to send 2-3 trouble makers to Parliament and then it begins.” (“Die 100,000, die nötig sind, um 2-3 Radaumacher ins Parlament zu entsenden, werden sich schon finden, und dann geht es los.”) Nor did he have much hope for the future. “I believe, as I always have, that democrats will continue to be the weakest with their pathetic methods and their secret sympathy for fascism.” (“Ich glaube nach wie vor, daß die Demokratien mit ihren armseligen Methoden und ihrer heimlichen Sympathie für den Faschismus die schwächeren blieben werden.”) For him “the idea of democratic freedom is dying here, here just like everywhere else. It isn’t being rejected, it just doesn’t interest anyone anymore. Bet on in it, it will fall.” (“die Idee der demokratischen Freiheit ist hier im Absterben, hier wie anderswo. Sie wird nicht abgelehnt, sie interessiert nich mehr. Tipp an, sie fällt.”) He was most critical of Sweden’s policies for political exiles, which did not allow him to earn a living and threw up many legal roadblocks to finalize, which in their totality were “impudent, expensive, and difficult” (“frech, teuer und umständlich”).
The messy details of a national policy of neutrality were also mirrored in Switzerland, which he followed closely because of his Nuuna. He did not settle there because he was convinced Germany would not respect Switzerland’s neutrality, especially after the Anschluß of Austria. Swiss neutrality hid from the outside world a large contingent of support of fascism, even as many Nazis hid their money in Swiss banks. He was upset, for example, when 56,000 Swiss citizens supported the creation of a referendum to outlaw freemasons. It ultimately lost by a vote of 515,000 to 234,000. Tucholsky linked his views about the two nations with his typical dark humor: “That the communists lit up the Reichstag, only the Swiss envoy believes that. Today that must be changed to: the Swedish envoy.” (“Daß die Kommunisten den Reichstag angezündet haben, das glaubt ja nur noch der schweizerische Gesandte. Man müßte das heute ändern in: die schwedische Gesandte.”)
He was also upset with how people and nations responded to Nazi Germany. Forgetting the fact that he had means and no family obligations, his view that “He who, after January 1, 1935, is still in Germany is not decent Jew,” (“Wer nach dem 1. Januar 1935 noch in Deutschland ist, ist kein anständiger Jude”) seems a bit harsh and unrealistic. The ways the nations responded to Hitler baffled him as well, “They are not strong—the others are only weak.” (“Stark sind sie nicht—die andern sind nur schwach.”) But most of his venom was reserved for England:
England does everything to let the next war fester like a boil rather than to cut it immediately off. And they do so surely not out of evil, but because they think differently than those they are thinking about—they are not Europeans, they are the ruin of Europe. It is not possible to discuss with them—it’s a different part of the world. I think German foreign policy is excellent. They whistle and the others march.
(England tut alles, um den nächsten Krieg wie ein Geschwür reifen zu lassen, statt sofort zu schneiden. Und sie tun das bestimmt nicht aus Bosheit, sondern weil sie anders denken as die, für die sie denken—sie sind kein Europäer, sie sind das Verderben Europas. Es ist mit ihnen keine Discussion möglich—das ist ein anderer Erdteil. Ich finde die deutsche Außenpolitik ausgezeichnet. Sie pfeift, und die andern marschieren.)
One of his few pragmatic thoughts was, “How good it is that Hindenburg is still alive.”
Two issues that constantly came up in his letters were his reading and his concern for Carl von Ossietzky, who was imprisoned under brutal conditions by the Nazis. Tucholsky was particularly enamored with the French poet and author Charles Péguy, who died on front in 1914. “A prophet,” according to Tucholsky. “The man speaks—30 years ago—our language, has our ideas, understands everything from its deepest meaning, and there are things about Jews (Dreyfus), I will bring it to you…I haven’t had such a literary experience since Schopenhauer, with whom the man is in now way comparable.” (“Der Mann spricht—vor 30 Jahren—unsere Sprache, hat unsere Vorstellungen, versteht alles von tief unten her, und da stehen Sachen über Juden (Dreyfus), ich werde es Dir mitbringen…Seit Schopenhauer, mit dem der Mann keinesfalls zu vergleichen ist, hab ich solch ein literarisches Erlebnis nicht gehabt.”) He was also consumed with Tolstoy’s War and Peace (“a jewel”) and Anna Karenina, Mauriac (a 1952 Nobel laureate), and Simenon. Tucholsky begrudgingly admired Kleist while hating his message on patriotism. And he ventured to read Kierkegaard in Swedish translation as his language skills improved.
But it was with Knut Hamsun that Tucholsky was most obsessed. First because of his writing. When Tucholsky read the German translation of The Road Leads On, he could not contain himself, “It is a singular delicacy. I spent the whole night reading it—it is unbelievable how someone with 75 years can pull this off. (And Thomas Mann stole from him!) it is heavenly.” (“Es ist eine einzige Köstlichkeit. Ich habe die ganze Nacht darin geläsen—es ist aber unglaublich, wie einer das mit 75 Jahren fertig bringen kann. (Und der Thomas Mann hat bei ihm gestohlen!) Es ist himmlisch.”) As he later wrote Nuuna, “I order you to cry over the new Hamsun.” (“…befehle Dir über dem neuen Hamsun zu weinen.”)
Despite his love for Hamsun’s writing, he could not reconcile it with the man, especially when Hamsun openly opposed the campaign to award Ossietzky the Nobel Prize. After reading a biography of Hamsun, Tucholsky concludes, “The man is likely not even human, rather a troll or something like that.” (“Der Mann ist wahrscheinlich überhaupt kein Mensch, sondern ein Troll oder so etwas.”) On July 1, 1935, Tucholsky wrote Nuuna about his fears for Ossietzky’s life (who they named Johann in case the Nazi censors read their letters): “The news about Johann sound so devastating. If he can only make it through this. They are doing everything so that he won’t.” (“Die Nachrichten über Johann lauten ja niederschmetternd, Du hast das vielleicht gelesen. Wenn er es nur durchsteht! Sie tun alles, damit er nicht durchsteht.”) This only intensified his his growing hate for Hamsun as he noted, “…but to write agains him, he who can’t even defend himself—that is a disgrace.” (“…aber gegen den zu schreiben, der sich nicht einmal wehren kann—das ist eine Schweinerei.”) Tucholsky even took down his former literary hero’s photograph from his wall as he concluded, “Hamsun seems to be behaving like a dumb boy…It is quite terrible and for me, an evil disappointment.” (“Hamsun scheint sich also zu benehmen wie ein dummer Junge…Es ist ganz schrecklich und mir wirklich eine böse Enttäuschung.”) He presciently saw how it would affect Hamsun’s legacy: “It will be a damned few, with time, who stay with him.” (“Es werden verdammt wenige, mit der Zeit, die bei einem bleiben.”)
Tucholsky had a vision and gift that outlived him. It is needed as much today as it was during his lifetime. Just as he could see how Hamsun was ruining his standing in history, he critiqued others just as clearly. He foresaw the damage that French politician Pierre Laval was doing to his nation; it was as though he foresaw Laval’s role in Vichy France and his execution in 1945. His observation “Fatherland, Flag Land…that never counts for the other side” (“Vaterland, Fahne, Boden…das gilt nie für die andere Seite”) foresaw how extremists of the right would consistently appropriate shared concepts for slanted political gain. Some things never change. Although these letters were never meant for publication, for students of Tucholsky they are an essential insight into a complex, gifted writer who wrote, to quote Hannah Arendt’s biographer, “for love of the world.” One can only speculate about how much he could have taught us had he lived through and survived the Thousand Year Reich....more
“Language is a weapon. Keep it sharp.” I have long understood why Kurt Tucholsky was respected, even by many who disagreed with him. After reading thi“Language is a weapon. Keep it sharp.” I have long understood why Kurt Tucholsky was respected, even by many who disagreed with him. After reading this collection, Language is a Weapon: Commentaries on Language, I now better understand why he was beloved. This assortment brings together Tucholsky’s musings about language: grammar, words, writing, dialects, translations, conversations as well as the language of bureaucracy, militarism, commentary and business. Sadly, I don’t think many of these essays can be translated, especially the pieces on Berlin dialect, which are the gems of the anthology. Those who like Bastian Sick’s articles and best-selling books like Der Dativ ist dem Genetiv sein Tod will appreciate this book. It makes you laugh, think and better understand why German is such a beautiful, diverse language....more
A more appropriate title of this intense collection of essays might be Anti-Militaristic Writings. Tucholsky’s indignant venom about the abuses of theA more appropriate title of this intense collection of essays might be Anti-Militaristic Writings. Tucholsky’s indignant venom about the abuses of the German officer corps in World War I and the early days of Weimar are astoundingly relevant today. I particularly liked how the editor concluded the book with a sampling of quotes about Tucholsky from his lifetime juxtaposed with quotes from the 1960s by his right-wing critics. He was hated by them while he lived and he continued to be hated by them long after he died. Many went so far as to blame him as being one of the causes of the end of Weimar Germany! I guess that whole Nazi/Hitler thing he couldn’t stop had little to do with it.
Tucholsky cites a number of his contemporary writers to bolster his convincing case about the incredible abuses of the military leadership; abuses against the men they command and send to death as well as abuses of living like privileged aristocrats far away from the dangers of the front while their men rotted in rat- and death-infested trenches. He exposes the lying propaganda that portrayed them as noble warriors representing the best of Germany. In his assessment of Ludendorff, the de facto leader of Germany in the latter stages of the war, during in the period before the Munich Putsch makes it seem that he sees into a crystal ball when he observes “An honorable grouch who insults fallen Jewish soldiers is not one.” Nor does he spare his fellow citizens who elevate the officer class: “The military shame of Germany was only possible because it satisfied the deepest and worst instincts of the people.”
This collection also contains a number of his poems, none of which contain a word of trite nostalgia. My favorite verse from “The Grave”:
Seid nicht stolz auf Orden und Geklunker! Seid nicht stolz auf Narben und die Zeit! In die Gräben schickten euch die Junker, Staatswahn und der Frabrikantenneid. Ihr wart gut genug zum Fraß für Raben, für das Grab, Kameraden, für den Graben!
(Be not proud of medals and decorations! Be not proud of scars and the times! Into the graves you were sent by the noblemen, State delusions and manufacturers' envy. You were good enough for feed for the ravens, For the grave, Comrades, for the graves!)
And what he wrote in the essay “Twilight” (“Dämmerung”) in the 1920 seems appropriate for today:
Was man so gemeinehin Kunst und Kultur nennt: sie sind nicht möglich ohne gemeinsame Voraussetzungen. Die sind nicht mehr da. Die Grundfesten wanken. Es ist durchaus nicht allen gemeinsam und selbstverständlich, daß das Vaterland das Höchste ist, woran sich anzuschließen Pflicht und Gewinn sei—sondern das ist sehr bestritten. Es ist durchaus nich allen geminsam, daß die Familie der Endpunkt der Entwicklung und etwas Selbstverständliches sei—das ist sehr bestritten. Es ist durchaus nicht selbstverständlich, daß der Kapitalismus notwendig oder gar nutzbringend sei—das ist sehr besritten. Sie reden verschiedene Sprachen, die babylonischen Menschen, und sie verstehen einander nicht. Sie sprechen aneinander vorbei, und sie haben weniger gemeinsam denn je.
(What we collectively call art and culture are not possible without common assumptions. These no longer exist. The foundations waver. It is altogether not common and self-evident to all that highest duty and profit are bound to the Fatherland—rather that is very much in dispute. It is altogether not common that the family is the endpoint of progress and something self-evident—that is very much in dispute. It is altogether not self-evident that capitalism is essential or even profitable—that is very much in dispute. They speak different languages, this Babylonian humanity, and they don’t understand one another. They speak past each other and have less in common than ever.)
To paraphrase Friedrich Dürrenmatt, justice has little to do with fairness. In these essays and poems covering the period from 1912 through 1932, TuchTo paraphrase Friedrich Dürrenmatt, justice has little to do with fairness. In these essays and poems covering the period from 1912 through 1932, Tucholsky exposes legal hypocrisies that undermined Weimar Germany. He also touches on issues that are as relevant today as they were in his time: the incompetence and indifference of public defenders, sexual violence in prisons, the assumption of guilt, the disregard of probable cause, the power of money, and politically motivated verdicts.
As is well known, the post WWI judicial system was particularly lenient toward the many crimes of the political right and unduly harsh against the few crimes of the political left. Tucholsky noted this in an essay in 1922, “For 314 murders by the Right, 31 years and 4 months in prison sentences, plus one life sentence. For 13 murders by the Left, 8 death sentences, 176 years and 10 months in prison sentences.”
The reactionary audacity in the courts was incredible. In a case of attempted murder against a prominent columnist, Tucholsky sums up the defender’s opening statement about one of the two defendants, “[He] wanted to rehabilitate himself to his family through the murder! He wanted to make his dear father happy!!” They were sentenced to just two years!
In the most interesting essays and poems, written in the late 20s and early 30s, he speculates about what the judicial system will be like in 1940; they are amazingly prescient. His observation, “Every nation has the judges that it deserves” („Jedes Volk hat die Richter, die es verdient.”), could well apply to the United States today, especially in the age of Trump....more
A great companion for anyone interested in American presidential history, this book covers the presidencies from Washington through Clinton featuring A great companion for anyone interested in American presidential history, this book covers the presidencies from Washington through Clinton featuring interesting short historical essays, an appendix with short summations of each presidential election, and transcripts of every inaugural address, few of which are memorable. The Dorling Kindersley volume is also peppered with their trademark attention to photographs, art work, and brief vignettes of historical information in the margins.
Two recurring theme’s struck me. Most vice presidents who were elevated to the presidency were deemed woefully inadequate before taking office. Often this was proven to correct, with Arthur and Truman being distinct exceptions. Also, many who were considered eminently qualified because of their experience turned out to be quite miserable (Van Buren, Buchanan, Grant, and Hoover).
Since the book concludes with Bill Clinton’s presidency, here’s what I think future historians might write of the two who came after him:
“In his last years, George W. Bush himself admitted that he was never up to the task of being president and allowed himself to be manipulated and misled by those he most trusted.” “Despite the symbolism of being the first black American elected president and taking in his signature accomplishment, the expansion of health care, Barack Obama's years were marked by incremental, minor changes that were more caretaker than transformational.”
What the hell, let’s speculate:
“Washington’s moneyed lobbies looked back upon the Hillary Clinton administration as their Golden Age while the constituencies that supported her are still scratching their heads and asking what happened.” “After an intransigent Congress blocked every one of Bernie Sanders's initiatives in the first two years of his administration, he rallied the nation in a 21st century reprise of Truman’s Whistle Stop Tour to elect strong progressive majorities in Washington and numerous state legislatures.” “Historians assessing the Donald Trump presidency agreed that they might have been a bit harsh on James Buchanan.” “Public and congressional opposition to the Ted Cruz administration unified the American people more than any time since World War II.” John Kasich: (see Hillary Clinton and replace references to Clinton with Kasich)
Key excerpts from each of the presidential essays:
“[George Washington] was an extraordinary man who made it possible for ordinary men to rule.” “…[John] Adams’s sensitivity to criticism led him to confuse uniformity with unity and to seek consequences through legal force—errors committed by later presidents and politicians as well.” “The making of policy throughout [Thomas] Jefferson’s presidency was essentially an editorial process.” “[James Madison] had been convinced that unbridled executive power, especially in time of war, posed a great threat to the cause of republican government.” “The [Monroe] doctrine far outlasted [James] Monroe’s tenure and indeed became more significant in the twentieth century than it was in the nineteenth.” “[John Quincy Adams] favored conviction over compromise and preferred discipline to convenience. A rare president.” “By the skillful used of his veto power, [Andrew] Jackson gained enormous advantages over Congress and won for himself a significant role in the legislative process.” “[I]n his handling of the slave issue, [Martin] Van Buren established the practice of northern Democratic leaders abetting southern interests.” “[William Henry Harrison’s] tragic death robbed the American people of their chosen leader and the Whig party of the fruits of its triumph.” “[John Tyler’s] penchant for strong unilateral action quickly established the pattern for his presidency.” “If there is a Valhalla where great presidents gather, it’s not hard to imagine Andrew Jackson standing at the gates, welcoming James Knox Polk to the select company.” “During the campaign, [Zachary] Taylor pledged not to veto congressional legislation concerning slavery in the territories, thereby mollifying proslavery and antislavery elements.” “[T]he Fugitive Slave Law…had been accepted as constitutional, and [Millard] Fillmore was as stalwart a defender of the Constitution as anyone.” “[Franklin] Pierce’s ideology of limited government together with his personal traits of accommodation and deference to the powerful southern wing of his party made for an inept president who piloted the ship of state to the shoals of secession and civil war.” “[James] Buchanan’s presidency demonstrated that harm that can result when great talent and experience are shackled to a personality ill suited to the pressures of the office.” “Washington’s legacy was one nation, perhaps divisible, with liberty for some; [Abraham] Lincoln’s was one nation, indivisible, with liberty for all.” “[Andrew] Johnson’s blunders contributed to the defeat of congressional candidates who would have supported him, greatly strengthening the radicals.” “[Ulysses S. Grant’s animosity toward reformers] blinded him to the corruption that did exist, and his resentment undermined what had been his greatest asset—his ability to identify able subordinates who could be trusted to carry out his wishes.” “Inheriting a weakened presidency, sectional bitterness, and widespread corruption, [Rutherford B. Hayes] dexterously handled the emergence of an industrial America divided by class, ethnicity, and extreme partisanship.” “For reformers, it turned out, a dead [James A. ] Garfield proved much more valuable than a living one.” “[Chester A.] Arthur’s reserve, so unexpected in a graduate of machine politics, restored to the presidency some dignity lost during the tenures of Johnson and Grant.” “A largely negative president, [Grover Cleveland] firmly believed it was his duty to prevent hurtful things from happening, rather than to make beneficial things take place.” “[Benjamin Harrison] was also the regular object of public jesting, in much the same way Gerald Ford was a century later.” “It was with sure instinct that [William] McKinley became the leading exponent of the most powerful theme of the late-nineteenth-century Republican party: American nationalism.” “[Theodore Roosevelt] tested and extended the limits of the American presidency—emphatically.” “Though an effective lieutenant under Roosevelt, [William Howard] Taft had little sense of what he wanted to accomplish as president.” “What [Woodrow] Wilson wanted was not an equilibrium based on a balance of power but a universalistic peace rooted in American moral values.” “To [a friend Warren G.] Harding declared, ‘I am not fit for this office and should never have been elected.’” “[Calvin Coolidge] regarded government, unlike business and industry, as being nonproductive: His task, therefore, was not to innovate but to improve what already worked.” “[Herbert Hoover’s] presidency is perhaps best described as a series of disasters that left the nation immobilized both at home and abroad.” “As a result of [Franklin D. Roosevelt’s policies], for the first time, people began to experience the federal government as a concrete part of their daily lives.” “[Harry S. Truman] correctly believed that the National Security Act greatly strengthened his ability (and that of future presidents) to undertake America’s apparently permanent role of world leadership.” “[Dwight D. Eisenhower’s] single greatest achievement, George Gallup’s pollsters heard over and over again as the president prepared to leave office, was that had ‘kept the peace.’” “Unfortunately, [John F.] Kennedy knew more about becoming president than being president.” “[Lyndon B. Johnson] turned his difficulties into advantages that helped him become one of the two greatest domestic reform presidents in U.S. history (the other being Franklin Roosevelt).” “In his relentless pursuit of the White House, [Richard M.] Nixon had accumulated hatreds and insecurities that seemed to grip him even more tightly when he at last achieved the long-sought power.” “[Gerald R. Ford] had the misfortune of becoming president as the mood of his party shifted right.” “[A]fter voters booted [him] from office, [Jimmy] Carter has become…renowned the world over as the epitome of the caring, compassionate, best sort of American statesman.” “Yet questions linger as to which [Ronald] Reagan was the ‘real’ one: the ideologue or pragmatist? the great man or the dunce?” “[George Bush’s] foreign policy successes and the respect he had won from America’s allies seemed to count for little during the months that followed the Gulf War.” “More likely, [Bill] Clinton will be recalled as a president who might have been great, had he not squandered his talents.”...more
Hans and Sophie Scholl were the most prominent members of the White Rose Nazi resistance group, made up largely of Munich university students and profHans and Sophie Scholl were the most prominent members of the White Rose Nazi resistance group, made up largely of Munich university students and professors who wrote and secretly distributed anti-Nazi flyers. They were exposed after Hans and Sophie were observed throwing flyers in the air in the central hall of the university on February 18, 1943. After a brief show trial presided over by the notorious Nazi judge Roland Freisler, they, along with their friend, Christoph Probst, were executed on February 22, 1943. News of the White Rose activities went global when Thomas Mann read a flyer on BBC radio later that year. After the war, Hans and Sophie—I call her Germany’s secular Joan of Arc—became iconic symbols representing the idea that not all Germans were complicit in Nazism. Today the name “Geschwister Scholl” (brother and sister Scholl) can be found on streets, schools, and public buildings throughout Germany.
These letters and diary excerpts were collected by their sister, Inge, whose lifelong advocacy of their cause is largely responsible for their place in history. Their words reveal two incredibly mature, thoughtful, strong-willed young people trying to sort out and make sense of their lives. They share a love of family, people, books, and disdain for national chauvinism.
Hans was a medical student whose studies were interrupted to serve as a medic first in France and later on the Russian front. He makes a point of engaging with the people and cultures of France and Russia, where he writes about finding “the real Dostoyevsky.” He sees beauty everywhere, especially in the flatness and open skies of Poland and Russia. There is brave humor in one letter when he refers to how the Gestapo censors must have a hard time reading his handwriting but concludes, “that’s what they’re paid for, and duty is duty, isn’t it sirs?” Since we know the ending of his story, his letter to his friend Otl Aicher of January 19, 1943, just 29 days before his arrest, takes on a more ominous note when he writes, “I can’t leave Munich this weekend for reasons that I’d rather tell you than write.”
When Sophie, as a part of her required state service, is sent to a factory to work, she works in an assembly line with a Russian forced laborer, writing her friend that this makes her happy because this allows to try to “correct her views about Germans.” In her late teens and early twenties, her reading included many theological writings and works by Goethe, Sigrid Undset, and St. Augustine. When she writes about trying to read Thomas Mann’s Der Zauberberg (The Magic Mountain) in a dormitory room with ten other girls, it is hard not to speculate what she might have experienced had she known that Mann’s BBC broadcast would tell rest of the world about their resistance activities.
This collection is not a place to start to learn about the Scholls and the White Rose. A good deal of knowledge about their story is needed to appreciate their words and thoughts. But for those who are interested to learn more, Hans and Sophie can be deeply appreciated as flesh and blood humans, not the iconic symbols they have become. These are the kind of people you would love to have as family and friends. Although they may not have been the authors, an excerpt from one of their White Rose flyers somehow seems to sum up their views and amplify the tragedy of their early deaths: “The name of Germany will forever be disgraced if German youth does not stand up and simultaneously avenge, destroy its tormentors, confess [its sins], and build a European spirit.”
(Sophie wrote many letters to her fiancé, Fritz Hartnagel, who served in army and was stationed in France, the Netherlands, Russia and north Africa. After the war he became a respected lawyer and judge who was active in the nuclear non-proliferation movement. Shortly after the war, he married their sister, Elisabeth. Their mutual childhood friend, Otl Aicher, to whom each wrote often, married their other sister, Inge. He became a respected graphic artist who designed the current Lufthansa logo in 1969. For the 1972 Munich Olympics, he designed the still-used sports pictograms and the official mascot, the dachshund Waldi. He also designed the informational pictograms that can be seen in airports throughout Europe and the world.)...more
How was it possible? asks the title of this collection of nine essays by six French academics as they consider the topic of the subtitle, The Reality How was it possible? asks the title of this collection of nine essays by six French academics as they consider the topic of the subtitle, The Reality of National Socialism. The editor and author of four of the essays, Alfred Grosser, is the son of a German emigrant to France and has spent his entire academic career studying and commenting on Franco-German relations and history. He is most well-known for his rejection of linking criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism.
The core that guides this collection—the search for answers about how it was possible—leads to answers in murky shades of gray, not black or white, right or wrong absolutist conclusions. Topics include National Socialism before and after the Munich Putsch, the September 1930 elections and what they foreshadowed about the eventual Nazi takeover of power in 1933, Hitler as chancellor, the building of the Hitler Youth, the Papal encyclical With Burning Concern (Mit brennender Sorge), the Munich Treaty of 1938, the Wannsee Conference protocol, and Grosser’s concluding essay on the meaning of the catastrophe. Although I am fairly well-read in these topics, many of the essays included a number of points of view I had not considered before.
Although it is sometimes dangerous and/or shallow to impose contemporary issues on history, I could not help but be struck by Rita Thalmann’s essay Wannsee as she described the international Evian conference on the question of Jewish refugees held on July 6-15, 1938 and comparing it to the cowardly rhetoric about Syrian and Afghani refugees today. The New York Herald Tribune noted “650,000 Jewish refugees turned back by everyone in Evian” and answered its question about who would take them in with “No one!” The Nazis realized they would face no consequences. An official from Danzig reported a conversation Winston Churchill in 1938 asking if German-Jewish lead to repercussions and receiving the answer, “no.” When Germany required Jews to place a large “J” on their passports, none were happier than the Swiss because this eased their ability to deny entry to Jews they didn’t want in their country. Indeed, Jochen Klepper, a Protestant intellectual whose wife and stepdaughter were Jewish, committed suicide together in 1942 after being denied permission to emigrate reasoning, “Since the conference in Evian has proven that countries won’t help the German Jew, everything has become much more tragic.”
Grosser’s concluding essay is the highlight of this collection. He reminds readers that the glorification of the French resistance was just one part of a complex story. Germany never intended France to be anything more than “a place of vacations and fashion” as well as a supplier of labor for the German empire. He notes the messiness of history by citing the Légion des Volontaires Françai (LVF), a voluntary military force that served on the Eastern Front and recruited members with slogans including “For a pure France cleaned of Jews and Freemasons? LVF!...For a victory of National Socialist ideals? LVF!...For the victory over Jewish democracy? LVF!” Grosser’s succinct description of the reasons why German resistance was not successful is as good as I have ever read. I’ll definitely seek out more of his writings....more
An interesting collection of by German academics about topics that contributed to the destruction of Weimar Germany and the creation of the Third ReicAn interesting collection of by German academics about topics that contributed to the destruction of Weimar Germany and the creation of the Third Reich that would interest those with an intense interest in this period of history. All of the authors lived through the Third Reich, one having spent seven years in Dachau.
It was troubling to see how many aspects of Weimar remind me so much of the world today. I couldn’t help but draw general parallels to the current state of American politics. There was a phrase in vogue during the first few decades of the Federal Republic of Germany: Bonn is not Weimar. I think now one could say that Washington and many U.S. state capitals today have a lot of similarities with Weimar. To take one example, in a democracy all parties should recognize the opposition (or minority) and value it. That was lost during Weimar and is lost today in American politics at the federal, state and local levels.
Three other stark parallels stand out. One is the concentration of wealth in the political elite and how they try to harness grassroots reactionary interests but ultimately become controlled by them. A second is the use of demonization as a popular political strategy. In Weimar it was communists, social democrats, ethnic minorities, Jews, intellectuals, and organized religion. Today in the U.S. it is immigrants, anti-intellectualism (as is most stark in the rise of anti-science constituencies), black Americans, Hispanics, women, and those who need public services for their daily lives. A third is the similarity of the Weimar Social Democratic Party and today’s American Democratic Party. Neither had a reliable political consistency or a conceptual understanding of how to act as either a party of opposition or as a majority....more
Loading...
