Escape to Life

Last updated

Escape to Life
Mann-erika-klaus-escape-to-life.jpg
Cover of the original 1939 English-language edition
Author Erika Mann and Klaus Mann
CountryU. S.
LanguageEnglish
Publisher Houghton Mifflin Company
Publication date
1939
OCLC 253202

Escape to Life is a book of essays jointly written by the German writers Erika and Klaus Mann (daughter and son, respectively, of Thomas Mann). The book is about the world and culture of exiled German artists, scholars, and political figures during the initial part of the Nazi era, before the outbreak of World War II. [1] [2] [3] It was originally published by Houghton Mifflin in the United States in English translation April 14, 1939; [1] [2] [3] an expanded edition was published in German as Escape to Life. Deutsche Kultur im Exil in 1991. [2] [3] The German edition consisted largely of the original German-language texts, although a small portion of (about 5%) it had to be re-translated from English because the original texts were lost. [2]

Contents

The book, commissioned by Houghton Mifflin, was a sort of "Who's Who" of the German exile community. [1] [2] The authors, Erika and Klauss Mann were themselves in American exile at the time, [1] [2] having escaped Germany in 1933, shortly after the Reichstag fire. Their work was translated from German to English by the Scottish writer/publicist Mary Hottinger. [2] [3] Many of the portrayed musicians, literary figures, artists, scientists and physicians frequented their father Thomas Mann's house. The original 375-page 1939 edition included illustrated biographies, anecdotes and character analyses [1] of such German and Austrian exiles as Albert Einstein, Lion Feuchtwanger, Sigmund Freud, George Grosz, Ferdinand Kramer, Thomas Mann, Max Reinhardt, Arnold Schoenberg, Ernst Toller, Bruno Walter, and Stefan Zweig. One chapter, "Culture in the Third Reich," dealt with cultural figures such as Gustaf Gründgens who had come to terms with Nazi Germany.

The book remained unpublished in Germany, and in the German language, throughout the lifetime of its authors. In 1991, Edition Spangenberg (Munich) published a German-language version compiled by Heribert Hoven, who also wrote a foreword. [2]

A film Escape to Life: The Erika and Klaus Mann Story (2000, Andrea Weiss and Wieland Speck), a documentary with dramatized episodes, told the story of Erika and Klaus Mann. Christoph Eichhorn played Klauss Mann in the dramatized scenes; elsewhere he was voiced by Corin Redgrave. Cora Frost played Erika Mann, voiced by Vanessa Redgrave. [4]

Editions

Sources

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Klaus Mann</span> German writer and dissident

Klaus Heinrich Thomas Mann was a German writer and dissident. He was the son of Thomas Mann, a nephew of Heinrich Mann and brother of Erika Mann and Golo Mann.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Erika Mann</span> German actress and writer

Erika Julia Hedwig Mann was a German actress and writer, daughter of the novelist Thomas Mann.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gustaf Gründgens</span>

Gustaf Gründgens, born Gustav Heinrich Arnold Gründgens, was one of Germany's most famous and influential actors of the 20th century, and artistic director of theatres in Berlin, Düsseldorf, and Hamburg. His career continued unimpeded through the years of the Nazi regime; the extent to which this can be considered as deliberate collaboration with the Nazis is hotly disputed.

<i>Listen, Germany!</i>

Listen, Germany! is the published collection of letters by exiled German author Thomas Mann to his former country during World War II. Originally published in 1943 by Alfred A. Knopf Inc., these letters, twenty-five of them, were read over long and medium wave radio broadcasts being made by the BBC into Nazi Germany as part of the allied propaganda effort from October 1940 to August 1943.

<i>The Confusions of Young Törless</i> 1906 novel by Robert Musil

The Confusions of Young Törless, or Young Törless, is the literary debut of the Austrian philosophical novelist and essayist Robert Musil, first published in 1906.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">S. Fischer Verlag</span> German publishing house

S. Fischer Verlag is a major German publishing house, which has operated as a division of Holtzbrinck Publishing Group since 1962. The publishing house was founded in 1881 by Samuel Fischer in Berlin, but is currently based in Frankfurt am Main, and is traditionally counted among the most prestigious publishing houses in the German-speaking world.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Konrad Heiden</span> German journalist and historian

Konrad Heiden was a German-American journalist and historian of the Weimar Republic and Nazi eras, most noted for the first influential biographies of Adolf Hitler. Often, he wrote under the pseudonym "Klaus Bredow."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Walter von Molo</span> Austrian writer (1880–1958)

Walter Ritter/Reichsritter von Molo was an Austrian writer in the German language.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Annemarie Schwarzenbach</span> Swiss writer, journalist and photographer (1908–1942)

Annemarie Minna Renée Schwarzenbach was a Swiss writer, journalist and photographer. Her bisexual mother brought her up in a masculine style, and her androgynous image suited the bohemian Berlin society of the time, in which she indulged enthusiastically. Her anti-fascist campaigning forced her into exile, where she became close to the family of novelist Thomas Mann. She would live much of her life abroad as a photo-journalist, embarking on many lesbian relationships, and experiencing a growing morphine addiction. In America, the young Carson McCullers was infatuated with Schwarzenbach, to whom she dedicated Reflections in a Golden Eye. Schwarzenbach reported on the early events of World War II, but died of a head injury, following a fall.

Alexander Stephan was a specialist in German literature and area studies. He was a professor, Ohio Eminent Scholar, and Senior Fellow of the Mershon Center for International Security Studies at Ohio State University (OSU).

<i>Die Sammlung</i>

Die Sammlung was a monthly literary magazine, first published in September 1933 in Amsterdam, and primarily affiliated with a number of influential German writers who fled from the Hitler regime during the first years of the establishment and consolidation of Nazi rule.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dimitré Dinev</span> Austrian writer

Dimitré Dinev is a Bulgarian-born Austrian writer. He is best known for his play Kozha i nebe, which controversially won the Askeer prize in 2007.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mann family</span>

The Mann family is a German dynasty of novelists and an old Hanseatic family of patricians from Lübeck. It is known for being the family of the Nobel Prize for Literature laureate Thomas Mann.

Carola Stern was the name under which Erika Assmus reinvented herself as a serious journalist and (subsequently) author and politically committed television presenter, after she was obliged to relocate at short notice from East Germany to West Germany in 1951.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maria Leitner</span>

Maria Leitner was a Hungarian writer and journalist in the German language. She is remembered as a pioneer of "undercover reporting".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Karl Lippegaus</span> German music journalist, author and radio presenter

Karl Lippegaus is a German music journalist, author and radio presenter.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Deborah Vietor-Engländer</span> British literary scholar.

Deborah Judith Vietor-Engländer is a British literary scholar.

Hildegard Feidel-Mertz was a German educational researcher.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Doris von Schönthan</span> German model, journalist, photographer and resistance fighter

Doris von Schönthan (1905–1961), born Maria-Dorothea Ehemann, called 'Dorinde', was a German model, a copywriter, journalist and photographer. She is characterised as a dazzling figure of the Weimar Republic or bohemian of the Roaring Twenties.

Eva Herrmann was a German-American painter, illustrator, draftsperson, and caricaturist.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 Shuster, George N. (7 May 1939). "Germany's Celebrated Refugees; Erika and Klaus Mann Tell of the Writers, Artists and Sages Forced Out of Germany". The New York Times . p. BR 5.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Heribert Hoven, "Zu dieser Aufgabe", foreword to Erika Mann, Klaus Mann: Escape to Life. Deutsche Kultur im Exil, Ed. Spangenberg, Munich, 1991. ISBN   3-89409-055-3. This is the citation for the precise date of original English-language publication.
  3. 1 2 3 4 "Erika und Klaus Mann: Escape to Life / Escape to Life. Deutsche Kultur im Exil (1939/1991)". Arts in Exile. German National Library . Retrieved 9 January 2022.
  4. ↑ David Noh, Escape to Life: The Erika and Klaus Mann Story, Film Journal International, November 1, 2004. Accessed online February 15, 2018.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.