Margarete Kollisch

Last updated
Margarete Kollisch
BornMargarete Moller
(1893-12-09)December 9, 1893
Vienna, Austria
DiedOctober 11, 1979(1979-10-11) (aged 85)
Staten Island, New York City
Occupation Poet, Translator, Massage therapist
LanguageGerman
NationalityAmerican
Education Philology and education
Alma mater University of Vienna
Genre Poetry
Notable worksWege und Einkehr, Unverlorene Zeit, Rückblendung,
SpouseOtto Kollisch
ChildrenEva Kollisch

Margarete Kollisch (born December 9, 1893 in Vienna; died October 11, 1979 in Staten Island, New York City) was an Austrian writer and poet who fled from the Nazis and continued her artistic creation in the United States.

Contents

Biography

Kollisch was born Margarete Moller in Vienna, Austria as the daughter of the lawyer Ignaz Moller (1859–1937) and Hermine Moller née Bunzl-Federn (1870–1928). She attended a girls' school in Vienna and then studied philology at the University of Vienna. In 1917, she earned her teaching degree. [1] During World War I, she worked as a nurse, earning a silver medal from the Red Cross. She also worked as a journalist and translator for the French Embassy in Vienna.

In 1923, she married architect Otto Kollisch, and the couple had three children: Steve, Peter, and Eva. After their youngest son, Peter, was born in 1928 the family moved to Baden near Vienna. When the Nazis annexed Austria, the family prepared to leave the country. In 1939, their children fled Austria on a Kindertransport to England. Otto Kollisch immigrated to the United States via England, and Margarete immigrated via the Netherlands, arriving in the U.S. in October 1939. Their three children joined them in 1940, and the family settled in the Staten Island borough of New York City. Margarete Kollisch worked as a massage therapist [2] and gave private language instruction for most of the remainder of her life. [3] Her youngest daughter, Eva Kollisch, has become a noted author as well and a professor for German, Comparative Literature, and Women's Studies at the Sarah Lawrence College. [4] Eva Kollisch went to great lengths to review and preserve her mother's work.

Creative writing career

Kollisch published many works in German, Austrian, and U.S.-American newspapers and journals throughout her life. After immigrating to the United States, Kollisch became part of a circle of writers in exile alongside Mimi Grossberg and others. [5] She published the first anthology of her poetry, Wege und Einkehr (Paths and Retreats), in 1960 [6] A second collection of poetry, Unverlorene Zeit (Unlost Time), followed in 1971. [7] Her work was considered to fall into late romantic poetry, following Rilke and other German-language romantic poets. [8] She also published work in the Austrian journal Literatur und Kritik alongside Mimi Grossberg, Maria Berl Lee, and Rose Ausländer. [9] She was accepted into the Austrian PEN-Club in 1978. [10] A third collection of Kollisch's poetry, Rückblendung, was published posthumously in 1981.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rose Ausländer</span> Jewish poet and author (1901–1988)

Rose Ausländer was a Jewish poet writing in German and English. Born in Czernowitz in the Bukovina, she lived through its tumultuous history of belonging to the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Kingdom of Romania, and eventually the Soviet Union. Rose Ausländer spent her life in several countries: Austria-Hungary, Romania, the United States, and Germany.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Leo Baeck</span> German Jewish rabbi and theologian (1873–1956)

Leo Baeck was a 20th-century German rabbi, scholar, and theologian. He served as leader of Reform Judaism in his native country and internationally, and later represented all German Jews during the Nazi era. After the Second World War, he settled in London, in the United Kingdom, where he served as the chairman of the World Union for Progressive Judaism. In 1955, the Leo Baeck Institute for the study of the history and culture of German-speaking Jewry was established, and Baeck was its first international president. The Leo Baeck Medal has been awarded since 1978 to those who have helped preserve the spirit of German-speaking Jewry in culture, academia, politics, and philanthropy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard Beer-Hofmann</span> Austrian dramatist and poet (1866–1945)

Richard Beer-Hofmann was an Austrian dramatist and poet.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Friederike Mayröcker</span> Austrian writer (1924–2021)

Friederike Mayröcker was an Austrian writer of poetry and prose, audio plays, children's books and dramatic texts. She experimented with language, and was regarded as an avantgarde poet, and as one of the leading authors in German. Her work, inspired by art, music, literature and everyday life, appeared as "novel and also dense text formations, often described as 'magical'." According to The New York Times, her work was "formally inventive, much of it exploiting the imaginative potential of language to capture the minutiae of daily life, the natural world, love and grief".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Leo Baeck Institute</span> International Jewish research institute

The Leo Baeck Institute, established in 1955, is an international research institute with centres in New York City, London, Jerusalem and Berlin, that are devoted to the study of the history and culture of German-speaking Jewry. The institute was founded in 1955 by a consortium of influential Jewish scholars including Hannah Arendt, Martin Buber and Gershom Scholem. The Leo Baeck Medal has been awarded since 1978 to those who have helped preserve the spirit of German-speaking Jewry in culture, academia, politics, and philanthropy.

Samuel Maximilian (Max) Rieser (1893–1981) was an Austrian-born American lawyer and philosopher.

Manfred George, born Manfred Georg Cohn, later shortened to Manfred Georg, was a German journalist, author and translator. He left Germany after the Nazis came to power, living in several different European countries and eventually emigrating penniless to the United States in 1939. He became the editor of Aufbau, a periodical published in German, and transformed it from a small monthly newsletter into an important weekly newspaper, especially during World War II and the postwar era, when it became an important source of information for Jews trying to establish new lives and for Nazi concentration camp survivors to find each other. George remained Editor in Chief of Aufbau until his death.

Carola Strauss Trier (1913–2000) was a German dancer, acrobat, contortionist, and later a teacher, lecturer, and practitioner.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maria Janitschek</span> German writer

Maria Janitscheknée Tölk was a German writer of Austrian origin. She wrote under the pseudonym of Marius Stein.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vera Schwarz</span> Austrian opera singer

Vera Schwarz was an Austrian soprano, known primarily for her operetta partnership with Richard Tauber.

Greta Loebl Schreyer, born Greta Loebl, was an Austrian-American, Jewish jewelry designer and painter. She survived the Holocaust and died in New York City.

Georgia Doll is an Austrian-born German theatre director, playwright and poet.

Ilse Blumenthal-Weiss was a German poet. A survivor of Westerbork and Theresienstadt concentration camps, she wrote largely about the Holocaust.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Clementine Krämer</span> German poet and writer

Clementine Sophie Krämer was a German writer of poetry, novellas and short stories. She was also an activist in the German Jewish community and was ultimately detained in Theresienstadt concentration camp, where she died.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Toni Stolper</span> Austrian-German economist and journalist

Antonie "Toni" Stolper was an Austrian-German economist and journalist. She fled Europe and immigrated to the United States in 1933 and moved to Canada in 1977.

Lessie Sachs (1897–1942) was a German-born American poet and artist who was active during World War I and World War II.

Margarete Susman was a German-Jewish poet, writer, and critic who lived much of her life in Switzerland. The author of hundreds of essays, five collections of poetry, and notable literary-critical works, she distinguished herself as a philosophical writer addressing vital questions in literature, politics, culture and religion. Her 1946 work Das Buch Hiob und das Schicksal des jüdischen Volkes (1946), a reflection on Jewish history through the lens of the Biblical book of Job, was one of the earliest postwar Jewish theological responses to the Holocaust.

Edith Neumann was an Austrian microbiologist.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Margarete Berent</span>

Margarete Berent, also known as Margareth Berent or Grete Berent in the United States, was the first woman lawyer in Prussia. She was the co-founder of the Association of Women Jurists and Association of German Women Academicians. As a Jew, she suffered from persecution during the Nazi Regime and fled via Switzerland, Italy, and Chile to the United States, where she finally arrived in 1940. After studying American law, she opened her second own law firm, now in the US, in 1951.

Ruth Selke Eissler, was a Jewish–American physician and psychoanalyst. She is sometimes known as Ruth Eissler-Selke.

References

  1. Burghardt, Lydia and Dianne Ritchey Oummia. "Biographical note." Guide to the Papers of Margarete Kollisch. New York: Leo Baeck Institute, 2007.
  2. "Masseuse to Serve Women as Part of Health Program"The Bulletin Jewish Community Center of Staten Island. October 10, 1941.
  3. Burghardt, Lydia and Dianne Ritchey Oummia. "Biographical note." Guide to the Papers of Margarete Kollisch. New York: Leo Baeck Institute, 2007.
  4. Kollisch, Eva. "Eva Kollisch." Voices of Feminism Oral History Project. Kate Weigand, Interviewer. Northampton, MA: Sophia Smith Collection, Smith College, 2004.
  5. Niers, Gert. Arrived at Last: An Immigrant Narrative. AuthorHouse, 2014.
  6. "Vollendung der spätromantischen Lyrik." New York Staatszeitung June 21/22, 1975.
  7. "Abschied von Margarete Kollisch." Aufbau October 19, 1979
  8. "Vollendung der spätromantischen Lyrik." New York Staatszeitung June 21/22, 1975.
  9. "Wie wir hoeren." Aufbau. November 3, 1978.
  10. "Wie wir hoeren." Aufbau. March 31, 1978.