Category: German

Mendel Singer Facing Life and God’s Trial

Joseph Roth: Hiob. (English title: Job) ISBN 978-3-423-13020-2 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Mendel Singer is an ordinary Jew in an ordinary Russian hamlet. Singer fears God and can recite for every situation in life an appropriate passage of the Torah. He has a wife, Deborah, whom he loves despite her occasional furors, two sons, Jonas and Schemarjah, and a daughter, Mirjam. A fourth child is underway, and shortly after its birth, it becomes clear that Menuchim is unlike the others. He doesn’t grow properly, he doesn’t talk properly. He seem condemned to remain an idiot with occasional epileptic fits.

It is the first of Mendel’s trials by God and more are to follow. A specific destiny seems to be reserved to each member of the family and in the end Mendel loses his faith both in God and mankind. “God is cruel and the more one obeys him, the more severe he becomes” – that’s Mendel’s conclusion. He wants to burn his book of prayers, his prayer shawl, the tallit, and his tefillin, the leather box with passages from the Torah coiled inside. But Mendel’s hands refuse to obey Mendel’s anger against God’s apparent lack of justice.

For God’s ways are inscrutable and a miracle concludes this very moving novel, published in 1930. Roth was an exceptionally gifted narrator and the way he explores the mystery of faith, the tension between religion, tradition and the modern, secular society is in the tradition of the best German writers. Until recently I didn’t know nothing about this author and I am truly glad to have discovered his writing.

The possibility of faith is a recurrent subject in classical music and the Estonian composer Arvo Pärt has written a “Te Deum” in which I hear the magnitude of the question:

Light and darkness, faith and doubt

Putting Man at the Centre of Music

Michael Heinemann: Claudio Monteverdi. Die Entdeckung der Leidenschaft. ISBN 978-3-7957-1213-6 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ I read this book with interest, no doubt. The Dresden based music scholar Michael Heinemann explains in great detail how Claudio Monteverdi’s music presented a radical shift from past compositional techniques, whose limitation were linked to dogmas of the Catholic Church. Compositions were to reflect the cosmic order as it had been created by God, and Monteverdi was the first to systematically deviate from this practice. It is needless to say that he made himself a couple of enemies inside the composers’ guild and inside the Vatican. However he freed music at the beginning of the 17th century and by putting the individual man with his often conflicting emotions at the centre of his music, he allowed for an increase in expressivity unheard of up to then.

While Monteverdi’s early compositions like the Books of Madrigals I to III lack these revolutionary compositional pattern, his later Books of Madrigals, his operas and his masses show a high degree of innovation, which Heinemann explains with scores at hand. If contemporary classical music features since the ascent of György Ligeti basic building blicks like sound clouds or sound surfaces, it was highly amusing to learn that Monteverdi had used these elements already some 350 years earlier by having separate choirs positioned in different parts of the St. Mark’s Cathedral in Venice to produce similar effects without electronics.

Heinemann excels also in giving the reader a lot of historical context which demonstrates how Monteverdi’s style evolved and became more and more daring, and how his new ideas radiated through northern Europe. One of the long-term consequences of Monteverdi’s innovation was the sharper differenciation between secular music and church music, the first finding its apogee with Richard Wagner’s operas, the latter remaining anchored in the tradition of Palestrina.

I read this book with increasing irritation too. Heinemann’s style – he seems to be obsessed by short sentences, sentences without verbs or without a subject – makes the reading extremly tiresome, needlessly tiresome, to a degree that makes me think it has a lot to do with self-aggrandizement and much less with transmitting Heinemann’s passion with Monteverdi’s music. Too bad. By his deep understanding of Baroque music, the author has already demonstrated that he deserves scientific and public recognition and is in no need for self-aggrantizement.

All the drama you can get in Monteverdi’s music is encapsulated in his “Il Combattimento di Tancredi et Clorida”, a section of the Book of Madrigals VIII:

Liberating Jerusalem with pizzicato and tremolo

Survivors’ Fate: From Nazi Camps to Allied Camps

DP camps

Angelika Königseder, Juliana Wetzel: Lebensmut im Wartesaal. Die jüdischen DPs (Displaced Persons) im Nachkriegsdeutschland. ISBN 978-3-596-16835-4 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Reading about this book put my under shock. I was appalled by its subject: After the Nazi concentration camps had been liberated, the freed Jews were put by the Allied forces in camps again, along with other displaced persons, German refugees, prisoners of war, people deported by the Nazis for work etc. Imagine, you have just escaped death, starvation, the utmost humiliation, and your liberators put you back into a camp, with armed guards and barbed wire. For some the camps would become a new home for more than a decade.

I had never given a thought to what happened to Jews right after they were set free. My understanding was that they reintegrated their original communities or emigrated to the US or to what was to become Israel: Palestine. I should have known better actually. Many had nowhere to go, many had nobody to go to. Many survivors did not know if anyone else from the family had survived or where they were. Germany had not become overnight much friendlier to the Jews, nor had the Poles, the Russians or the Austrians. There was no place to welcome them. Hence the idea of a state of their own: Palestine.

Those willing to settle down in Palestine, still under British mandate, grew more numerous by the time as Zionism spread under the displaced Jews streaming into the French, British and US occupation zone. But the British tightly controlled immigration into Palestine as they did not want to upset the Arabs. Alternatives were scarce: Few of the European countries ravaged by war were keen to resettle Jewish refugees on their territory. Other refugees wanted to stay in Germany or Austria, where they had been born and lived all their life, but were afraid about facing a hostile population. Others were too old or too weak to move to another country, not to speak about a state that had to be fought for first: Israel.

To segregate or not?

Between 1945 and 1957, Jews living on German territory shared the fate of hundred of thousands of other displaced persons: They lived in camps without having any clear vision of their future. The Allied authorities quickly realized that Jewish DPs, more traumatized and vulnerable than others, had to be placed in camps reserved for the Jews – a decision that put them into a moral dilemma as they did not wish to replicate the Nazi discriminatory policies. However the Jews, having suffered most under the Nazis, deserved a tailor-made policy.

This strategic decision helped a great deal as it allowed Jewish communities quickly to rebuild themselves – in camps, yes, but it was important for the Jews to overcome the individual isolation and feeling of helplessness. They had their own schools, hospitals, community centers, police, law courts, workshops and sports facilities, managed and financed with the help of international Jewish relief organisations. What didn’t help was the hostile attitude of many Germans towards the survivors of the Holocaust.

Few Germans realized that their own misery during and after the war had its origin in political decisions the Germans themselves had taken, in 1933 and even much earlier, and that there was no reason at all to envy the Jews. Prejudices like “They are being better treated than we are!” or “They control the black market and grow rich!” were rampant, authoritarian behaviour of newly formed German police units was a recurrent problem. It is frustrating to see that some of the racist stereotypes about the Jews voiced in the aftermath of the war are the same that are now applied to Muslim refugees from Irak and Syria. Obviously, the lessons of World War II have been lost on some.

A detailed study

Angelika Königseder and Juliana Wetzel, two German researchers specialized on research about anti-Semitism, have written a valuable book about the Jewish DPs in Germany after World War II with very detailed description of the DPs’ lives, a comprehensive study of the divergent policies applied by the US and the British army and a well researched study of the priorities of the different Jewish relief organisations and their clandestine efforts to exfiltrate as many as possible to Palestine.

One of the bright sides of the life in DP camps was the fact that the Jews were strongly determined to rebuild their lives. Cultural entertainment played an important part. Theatre plays were performed in many camps and the camp of Föhrenwald (Bavaria) had its own string orchestra. A piece of music that comes to my mind in that respect is a string trio written in 1947 by the Jewish composer Darius Milhaud:

Parallel tonalities in a time of infighting and disarray

Towards a Better Understanding of Judaism

Leo Trepp: Die Juden. Volk, Geschichte und Religion. ISBN 978-3-86539-104-9 ⭐️⭐️⭐️ Religion is a subject that has fascinated me since I was a child. Wondrous stories, ethical principles, a bizarre, old-fashioned language – I read the Bible when I was 12 or 13, a second time when I was 22 and, a few years later, the Koran with much enthusiasm and interest. Came the time when I started to explore Judaism, the history of the state of Israel and the links to the Middle East conflict – a decade after I had read the Koran. I picked up the thread recently, and you will perhaps remember my review of Paul Spiegel’s “Was ist koscher?” I bought Leo Trepp’s easy-to-read and fairly exhaustive compendium on Jewish history, culture and religion “Die Juden” upon a recommendation of a Jewish fellow blogger Juna Grossmann.

Trepp gives an excellent overview over the origin of Judaism from its origin 2000 BC until today, the Middle Ages, the 19th  century and the Holocaust being important landmarks. He devotes several chapters to current antisemitism, often disguised as an opposition against Israel’s policies. Trepp’s description of Israel’s responsibility in the Middle East conflict is extremely brief and makes me feel somewhat awkward as it follows the stereotype of “Israel is right, the Arabs are wrong”.

I would have expected a more critical approach. My edition of the book is from 2006, and the hard line the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanjahu took in the terms since 2009 could not be taken into account. Reading Trepp’s characterization of the issues separating Arabs and Jews in that light felt like a provocation. It would have been wiser to leave the subject away altogether. Especially as one of the key tenets of Judaism seems to be the role God has given the Jews: to lead by example in terms of morality.

Trepp devotes many, in my opinion too many, chapters to the presentation of Judaism’s central texts with extensive quotes. Having read the Old Testament, it was somewhat tedious to read as it has only marginally added to the understanding of the central elements of the Jewish faith. Less would have been more, here too. A positive aspect of the book is that it devotes several chapters to the position of women in the Jewish society – it’s not an easy one and gender equality is not for tomorrow.

The chapters that interested me most were those on the practical forms of living the Jewish faith today, on the many parallels between the Christian and Jewish faith and on the re-orientation of the Catholic church, who adopted a more conciliatory approach under Pope John Paul II, the Protestant churches following suit. Both the Vatican and Martin Luther did see the Jews as stubborn unbelievers that had to be converted by all means. I am very glad this is history, it makes me sad however that it took so long and that the churches do not take a more decisive stand against anti-semitic violence today.

This leads me the conclusion of Trepp which, at the same time, is his personal credo that he has reiterated since World War II as a university scholar: The generations after World War II are not to be blamed for the crimes committed against the Jews in the context of the Holocaust. However they bear a special responsibility for the Jewish people today. Are they up to that challenge? Trepp had his doubts.

The composer Arnold Schönberg was born into a Jewish family but converted to the Protestant faith in 1898. While fleeing the Nazis in 1933 he returned to the Jewish faith. He was an exceptional composer and one of my favourite pieces is his String Quartet No. 2 (Op. 10), written in 1907/08:

Transcending tonality and harmony

Cross – Death – Tomb

Thomas Mann: Betrachtungen eines Unpolitischen (English title: Reflections of a Nonpolitical Man) ISBN 978-3-596-15052-6 ⭐️⭐️ As much as I like Thomas Mann’s novels like “The Magic Mountain”, “Tonio Kröger” and “Doctor Faustus”, his reflexions about World War I and Germany’s political role, published between 1918 and1920, appalled me. Mann, a faithful follower of Arthur Schopenauer and Friedrich Nietzsche, believed in the separation of politics and arts. In 1914 he argued that arts should stay away from day-to-day politics. He saw a fundamental opposition between “Geist” (mind) and “Macht” (might) and decried a perceived proliferation of politics into all aspects of human life, arts included. He would not use his undeniable talent as a writer to voice his opposition to the pending war.

Mann was supporting the war that he saw as part of a cultural struggle opposing Germany to the rest of Europe, a mindset he did not consider a political action and thus would not be a contradiction of his goal to remain an unpolitical observer of history unfolding. “Did the world look more beautiful before the war?”, he asks rhetorically, alluding to the class differences and the excesses of unrestrained capitalism in the late 19th century. “When it [the war] was young, when it started and blew away ‘peace’, wasn’t Germany much to the contrary beautiful during a holy moment?” War as a purification of corrupt societies – on both sides, France and Germany, intellectuals succumbed to that illusion. What a tragedy!

My German edition of “Betrachtungen eines Unpolitischen” has some 580 pages, the vast majority serving to a mystic and bombastic, at times polemic defense of German militarism in the name of the superiority of the German soul and the German culture. According to Mann, both the German soul and the German culture had to defend themselves against a perceived French-Italian-English cultural dominance and influence, exemplified by these countries’ emphasis on democracy, liberalism, human rights and pluralism. Mann instead promotes the unity of the German people, the Kaiser and the church with an emphasis on duty and Germany’s fundamental cultural difference from all other countries. He uses a formula directly borrowed from German Romanticism, obsessed by death wishes and heroism: Kreuz, Tod, Gruft – cross, death, tomb. The main inspiration of his ideas: Fyodor Dostoevsky – Nietzsche was impressed by Dostoevsky’s insight into the human soul – and of course Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, a sworn enemy of French republicanism.

Germany’s alleged superiority

Mann’s credo is concisely explained in the central chapter “Against law and truth” – a direct answer to his brother Heinrich Mann, who opposed Germany’s war policy. Mann writes that a lasting peace in Europe can only be based “on the victory and the might of the supra-national people [of Germany], the people that holds the supreme universalist truth, the most accomplished cosmopolitan gift, the deepest sense of European responsibility.” Where Adolf Hitler some 20 later would emphasize the biological superiority of Germany, Mann uses the argument of cultural-philosophical superiority. Both are phantasms, both served to justify a European- and worldwide war. And Joseph Goebbels, the Nazi propaganda mastermind, would try to co-opt Mann as an ally until the latter’s emigration.

Mann claims his position about World War I “was necessary, logical, authentic and true, it was the result of my true being, my origin and education, of my nature and my culture, which cannot be completely mean, false, since they gave birth to two or three works that are good and will stay on…” I cannot be wrong now since my ideological framework allowed me to write a successful book – what kind of logic is that?

How could such an intelligent and well-educated writer fall for such nonsense? I probably underestimated Nietzsche’s attractiveness – I see his ideas as a curious historical footnote – since I have the benefit of hindsight, nevertheless it remains a mystery to me why Mann failed to see the purely geo-strategic dimension of World War I, and how the idea of a German cultural exceptionalism could obfuscate his mind to such a degree that he would rank cultural differences just as important as geo-strategic issues when it came to the reasons leading to the war.

No, I don’t like this book, and many times I was tempted to set it aside for ever. As a matter of fact I skipped several dozen pages, such as those where Mann makes fun of the use of chemical weapons against Germany’s ennemies. Nevertheless I kept going until the end, despite the ideas Mann propagates and despite Mann’s arrogant attitude. Yes, arrogant, since Mann portrays himself as the only one holding the truth and denigrates anyone who would dare question his “reflections”. Why did I persevere then? Because I think it is important to see how a brilliant mind can be led in error despite its good intentions.

Leaving the ivory tower – reluctantly

Thomas Mann switched sides a few years after he had published this collection of essays. In the chapter “Politics” he already hints at the possibility that he may change his attitude though he sees it as a possible “adaption” to the changing political and societal environment: “As far as I am concerned, I must understand that I need to absorb, learn, seek understanding, correct myself – but I can’t deny my true being and my education, I can’t pull out my roots and plant them elsewhere.”

Mann may be forgiven then, because he understood the artist’s duty well before the outbreak of World War II and left the unpolitical artist’s ivory tower. In 1930, three years before the Nazis came to power, he warned his fellow Germans in his “German Speech: An Appeal to Reason”. He called upon the Germans to vote for the Social-Democratic Party in the upcoming parliamentary elections and questioned whether it was compatible with the German spirit to “transform politics into an opiate for the masses” as the Nazis did. He denounced the fanaticism of National-Socialism as alien to the German soul.

At a time when someone like Steve Bannon sets out to poison European minds with his alt-right conspiracy theories and his overt racism to influence the 2019 elections for a new European Parliament and to promote nationalistic, xenophobic and racist parties, one has to be watchful not to repeat the errors of the past. At a time when the deliberate spreading of propaganda and fake news via social media have given nationalism, racism, anti-intellectualism an enormous potential audience, it is important to see how easily even a bright minds can be confused.

Thomas Mann loved Richard Wagner’s operas and he speaks several times in his “Reflections of a Nonpolitical Man” of “Tristan und Isolde”. I am infatuated by this opera myself and willing to share my enthusiasm, provided we leave any political interpretation aside:

A metaphysical love on the coast of Cornwall