Lion Feuchtwanger

Communist East Germany stamp in memory of Dr. phil. Lion Feuchtwanger

Lion Feuchtwanger (b. 7 July 1884 in Munich, Kingdom of Bavaria, German Empire; d. 21 December 1958 in Los Angeles, California) was a Jewish novelist and playwright, who eventually emigrated to the United States. He is best known as author of the book Jud Süß which was made into two films after publication, the 1934 British film, and more notably the famous 1940 German version. During "'McCarthyism" in the USA, he became the target of suspicion as a pro-Soviet intellectual. He later became a Zionist.

Life

Lion Feuchtwanger was the son of a Jewish entrepreneur. During his school years, he studied the Jewish Talmud and the Old Testament in Hebrew. He studied humanities in Berlin and earned his doctorate on a Jewish topic and the writer Heinrich Heine.

Feuchtwanger himself made various grandiose claims regarding his own importance, such as supposedly being the "Enemy of the state number one" of National Socialist Germany. Sources such as the leftist Wikipedia accept these claims uncritically.

After some success as a playwright, Feuchtwanger shifted his emphasis to the historical novel. His most successful work in this genre was the faction novel Jud Süß (Jew Süss) (written 1921-22, first published in Munich in 1925), and later published in numerous languages. The July 1929 English language reprint boasted it had sold 98,000 copies. Jud Süß was a faction story based upon the life of the real "Court Jew" Joseph Süß Oppenheimer, who was executed in 1738.

Feuchtwanger left Germany for France following the NSDAP being elected to power in January 1933. His citizenship was revoked. He was interested in Soviet Communism, visited the Soviet Union briefly, and in his book Moskau 1937, he praised life under Joseph Stalin, defending the Great Purge and the show trials that were then taking place.

When France declared war on Germany in 1939, Feuchtwanger was interned for a few weeks at Les Milles (Camp des Milles). At the beginning of the Battle of France in 1940, Feuchtwanger was captured and again imprisoned at Les Milles. Later, the prisoners of Les Milles were moved to a makeshift tent camp near Nîmes due to the advance of German troops. From there he was smuggled to Marseilles disguised as a woman. After months of waiting in Marseilles, he was able to flee with his wife Marta to the United States via Spain and Portugal.

He escaped with the help of Marta; Varian Fry, an American journalist who helped refugees escape from occupied France; Hiram Bingham IV, US Vice Consul in Marseilles; the Rev. Waitstill and Mrs. Martha Sharp, a Unitarian minister and his wife who were in Europe on a similar mission as Fry. The Rev. Sharp volunteered to accompany Feuchtwanger by rail from Marseilles across Spain to Lisbon. If Feuchtwanger had been recognized at border crossings in France or Spain, he would have been detained and turned over to the Gestapo. Realizing that Feuchtwanger was still not out of reach of the National Socialists even in Portugal, Martha Sharp gave up her own berth on the Excalibur so Feuchtwanger could sail immediately for New York City with her husband.

Works

Dan Johnson (left), Larry Attille (centre), and Will Lampe (right) in the Riverside Shakespeare Company's 1982 production of Bertolt Brecht's and Lion Feuchtwanger's Edward II (1924).

• Die häßliche Herzogin Margarete Maultasch (The Ugly Duchess), 1923—about Margarete Maultasch (14th century in Tyrol)
• Leben Eduards des Zweiten von England (The Life of Edward II of England), 1924: written with Bertolt Brecht.
• Jud Süß (Jew Suess, Power), 1925.
• Marianne in Indien und sieben andere Erzählungen (Marianne in Indien, Höhenflugrekord, Stierkampf, Polfahrt, Nachsaison, Herrn Hannsickes Wiedergeburt, Panzerkreuzer Orlow, Geschichte des Gehirnphysiologen Dr. Bl.), 1934—title translated into English as Little Tales and as Marianne in India and seven other tales (Marianne in India, Altitude Record, Bullfight, Polar Expedition, The Little Season, Herr Hannsicke's Second Birth, The Armored Cruiser "Orlov", History of the Brain Specialist Dr. Bl.)
• Der falsche Nero (The Pretender), 1936—about Terentius Maximus, the "False Nero"
• Moskau 1937 (Moscow 1937), 1937
• Unholdes Frankreich (Ungracious France, Der Teufel in Frankreich, The Devil in France), 1941
• Die Brüder Lautensack (Die Zauberer, Double, Double, Toil and Trouble, The Lautensack Brothers), 1943
• Simone, 1944
• Die Füchse im Weinberg (Proud Destiny, Waffen für Amerika, Foxes in the Vineyard), 1947/48 - a novel mainly about Pierre Beaumarchais and Benjamin Franklin beginning in 1776's Paris
• Goya, 1951—a novel about the famous painter Francisco Goya in the 1790s in Spain
• Narrenweisheit oder Tod und Verklärung des Jean-Jacques Rousseau ('Tis folly to be wise, or, Death and transfiguration of Jean-Jaques Rousseau), 1952, a novel set before and during the Great French Revolution
• Die Jüdin von Toledo (Spanische Ballade, Raquel, The Jewess of Toledo), 1955
• Jefta und seine Tochter (Jephthah and his Daughter, Jephta and his daughter), 1957
• The Wartesaal Trilogy
  • Erfolg. Drei Jahre Geschichte einer Provinz (Success), 1930
  • Die Geschwister Oppermann (The Oppermanns), 1933
  • Exil, 1940
• The Josephus Trilogy—about Flavius Josephus beginning in the year 60 in Rome
  • Der jüdische Krieg (Josephus), 1932
  • Die Söhne (The Jews of Rome), 1935
  • Der Tag wird kommen (Das gelobte Land, The day will come, Josephus and the Emperor), 1942

See also

• Jud Süß
• Walter Duranty