Not long ago friend Cath in the Netherlands emailed me an eleven page PDF called Address Unknown. It consists of a series of letters between Martin Schulse and Max Eisenstein from 1932 to 1934. Max is in San Francisco running the art gallery he and Martin created together. Martin has returned with his family to Germany. The letters start off friendly and intimate and take a turn as Hitler rises to power. You see, Max in California is Jewish and his friend Martin, while at first worrying about Hitler, joins the Nazi party and is soon breaking off his friendship with Max. But since they are also business partners Martin tells Max he can only send financial information to him and only send it to the bank. Max sadly agrees until his sister, an actress who joined an acting company that traveled to Berlin, disappears. He pleads to Martin for his help in finding her. Martin does, or rather, she finds Martin, and asks for help with the SS hot on her trail. Martin refuses aid. But it gets worse from there. By the end of these letters I was devastated.
I don’t know if I should be embarrassed or not, but I thought these letters were real. Sure, Kathrine Kressmann Taylor’s name is on the title page but I thought she was either editor or family or something. When I went looking for more information about Max and Martin, I discovered that these letters were actually a short story originally published in Story Magazine in 1938. Knowing they weren’t real life letters though did not lessen my reaction to them. Even now when I think about them I get a sinking feeling in my stomach and it is just a little harder to breathe.
Kressman Taylor wrote the story as a wake-up call to Americans about what was really going on in Nazi Germany. The editor of Story Magazine thought the piece “too strong to appear under the name of a woman,” so published it with the author name “Kressmann Taylor,” as though “Kressmann” were a first name. However, she ended up using it as her professional name for the rest of her life.
Simon & Schuster published Address Unknown as a novel in 1939 and sold 50,000 copies. International publication soon followed including a Dutch translation that was confiscated by the Nazis and a German one published in Moscow. No surprise that the book was banned in Germany.
In 1944, Columbia Pictures turned it into a movie with William C. Menzies as director and production designer (he was also the production designer for Gone With the Wind) and starring Paul Lukas as Martin.
Address Unknown was reissued by Story Press in 1995 to mark the 50th anniversary of the liberation of the concentration camps. The book was translated into 20 languages with the French edition selling 600,000 copies. In 2001, the book was finally published in Germany. The Hebrew edition was a besteller in Israel where it was also adapted for the stage.
It is a little book that made quite a splash. I don’t know how I didn’t know about it. But it says something about how well the story is written that I thought the letters were real. Letters are such intimate things, it is no easy task to create ones between two friends that actually sound and read as if two different people had written them.
If you have not read this little gem, I highly recommend it.
Thank you, Stefanie, for writing about the book and recommending it.
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Richard, you bet!
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Unknown to me as well but I am making a note of it. Thank you for the post.
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Mystica, oh you are welcome. I hope you have the chance to read it.
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I know neither the book nor the film but will search them out. I want to ask you to give the end away because I’m assuming that at the time of publication and indeed when the film was commissioned the true horror of the camps was not generally known about, so I’m interested to know if they were predicted here. However, that would be unfair on other bloggers, so I’ll just go away and find out for myself.
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I hadn’t heard of this book either and it certainly looks worth looking up. I am nearing the end of Stefan Zweig’s fine memoirThe World Of Yesterday where by 1941/42 he is an exile in Brazil. In February 1942 Zweig and his second wife committed suicide. As is often said this occurred when, with the USA in the war and Soviet Russia still fighting it was fairly clear that the Nazis could not win their war but this period saw the final intensification of their genocidal actions towards Europe’s Jews and it can be surmised that Zweig’s realisation of this contributed to his suicide.
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Ian, definitely something worth looking up. Zweig’s is such a sad story. I am glad to hear his memoir is well done. I will have to get myself a copy sometime. I read his novel Post Office Girl and it is excellent. I plan to read more of his novels especially Chess Story.
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Alex, let’s just say it is murder for murder and death by letter. Does that make you want to read it even more? 🙂 I don’t think at that time the horror of the camps was really known. What was known is that Jews were being rounded up and sometimes shot in the street.
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I would have thought the letters were real as well but I guess the story is just as powerful since it could be true.
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boarding, yes, even though the letters turned out to not be real does not diminish the story because they really could have been real.
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How interesting. I’d not heard of it either, but I’ve added it to my wishlist. I’ve been reading a number of books (fiction and nonfiction) about or set during WWII. Most are by British authors and it is interesting (as some were written during or just after the war) to hear about their perspective on the US’s take on world events at the time and our isolationism–it is certainly eye opening to read about it all from different perspectives. I’m not at all surprised that this was written in response to US attitudes and the desire to send Americans a wake up call! Now I am, of course, totally curious about the letters.
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Danielle, it is interesting to get varying perspectives, there were so many! Have you read Philip Roth’s Plot Against America? It is really good, sort of an alternative history–what if Charles Lindbergh who sympathized with the Nazis had become president of the US? I suspect you would like it.
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Interesting, but you didn’t tell us how it ends! 😉 I guess the fact that you thought the letters might be “real” shows that they were well-written. Alas my library doesn’t have it. 😦
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Sylvia, heh, this one the ending should be left as a surprise. Though it is no surprise to say it does not end well for Martin.
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Once again, I am rewarded for following your blog. It is with deep gratitude that I thank you…for so many reasons. My Dad was one of those guys who went to war against the Nazis. What he saw changed and haunted him. That time in our shared history both draws and repels me. I hope I can get my hands on a copy.
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Grad, gosh, thanks. and thank you to your dad for doing such a great service. I can only begin to imagine the things he must of seen, they would be hard to forget. I hope you can get your hands on a copy of the book.
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I just finished reading the PDF version of this story and I can completely understand your reaction; infact I am still reeling with it. Its a little gem of a work, which really rubs the human emotions raw…I am so glad you introduced me to it! Thank You!
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cirtnecce, I am so glad you got to read it. It leaves you gasping, doesn’t it? I still get chills whenever I think about it.
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Oh! I so agree…especially the end…it breaks your heart!!!
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I’ve never heard of it either, but it sounds right up my alley. It’s weird isn’t it when you discover a book isn’t what you thought it was. Makes you realise how many assumptions that we’ve not aware of lie behind our reading. Anyhow, I’m going to note this one for possible future reading.
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whisperinggums, it is a powerful little story. It is interesting the assumptions we make especially when we don’t have any cues, or the cues are minimal. In this case though, it turning out to be fiction didn’t take anything away from it.
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This sounds extremely powerful and, as such, a fine example of art. I can so easily imagine thinking the letters were real, too. I’ve been reading up on Charles and Anne Lindbergh for a biographical essay I’m writing and it was so interesting to hear how Charles got sucked into eugenics and Nazism and America First and how devastated they were when the war ended and they were both forced to realise the extent of their misapprehension. It just goes to show how some people like Kathleen Kressman Taylor were incredibly perceptive.
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Litlove, it is a fine and powerful piece. Oh the Lindberghs! Charles was an interesting man. You know, in the US his reputation has been washed clean. No one talks about his support of eugenics or the Nazis, only that he is a national hero. Have you read Philip Roth’s Plot Against America? it is an interesting alternative history, a what if Lindbergh became president during WWII. I found it entirely plausible and frightening.
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That is really interesting to know as I figure out how to approach this narrative of their lives. And I haven’t read that Roth novel though Mr Litlove has. Why didn’t he tell me? Sigh. But thank you – I am most intrigued to know more about it now!
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There are probably hundreds of airports and airport terminals named for Lindbergh and if you ask most people they will only know him as a famous aviator (he pops up in grade school lessons now and then). Some might know about the kidnapping. Very few will know he supported eugenics and the Nazis. Shame on Mr. Litlove for not telling you what Plot Against America was about! 😉
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