A01=Uwe Wittstock
aesthetics
anti-Semitism
art
Author_Uwe Wittstock
authoritarian
Berlin
Category=NH
Category=NHD
culture life
dictatorship
Emergency Rescue Committee
eq_bestseller
eq_history
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
exile
fall of France in 1940
Franz Werfel
genocide
Germany
Hannah Arendt
Heinrich Mann
Hitler
Holocaust
how did writers and artists live under the Nazis?
how writers and artists escape the Nazis? did persecution of writers and artists by the Nazis
intelligentsia
Jewish
Joseph Roth
Lion Feuchtwanger
literature
Marseille
Mary Jayne Gold
National Socialism
Nazi
Second World War
Thomas Mann
totalitarianism
Varian Fry
Varian Mackey Fry
Walter Benjamin
Product details
- ISBN 9781509565429
- Weight: 680g
- Dimensions: 160 x 231mm
- Publication Date: 23 May 2025
- Publisher: John Wiley and Sons Ltd
- Publication City/Country: GB
- Product Form: Hardback
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June 1940: France surrenders to Germany. The Gestapo is searching for Heinrich Mann and Franz Werfel, Hannah Arendt, Lion Feuchtwanger and many other writers and artists who had sought asylum in France since 1933. The young American journalist Varian Fry arrives in Marseille with the aim of rescuing as many as possible. This is the harrowing story of their flight from the Nazis under the most dangerous and threatening circumstances.
It is the most dramatic year in German literary history. In Nice, Heinrich Mann listens to the news on Radio London as air-raid sirens wail in the background. Anna Seghers flees Paris on foot with her children. Lion Feuchtwanger is trapped in a French internment camp as the SS units close in. They all end up in Marseille, which they see as a last gateway to freedom. This is where Walter Benjamin writes his final essay to Hannah Arendt before setting off to escape across the Pyrenees. This is where the paths of countless German and Austrian writers, intellectuals and artists cross. And this too is where Varian Fry and his comrades risk life and limb to smuggle those in danger out of the country. This intensely compelling book lays bare the unthinkable courage and utter despair, as well as the hope and human companionship, which surged in the liminal space of Marseille during the darkest days of the twentieth century.
It is the most dramatic year in German literary history. In Nice, Heinrich Mann listens to the news on Radio London as air-raid sirens wail in the background. Anna Seghers flees Paris on foot with her children. Lion Feuchtwanger is trapped in a French internment camp as the SS units close in. They all end up in Marseille, which they see as a last gateway to freedom. This is where Walter Benjamin writes his final essay to Hannah Arendt before setting off to escape across the Pyrenees. This is where the paths of countless German and Austrian writers, intellectuals and artists cross. And this too is where Varian Fry and his comrades risk life and limb to smuggle those in danger out of the country. This intensely compelling book lays bare the unthinkable courage and utter despair, as well as the hope and human companionship, which surged in the liminal space of Marseille during the darkest days of the twentieth century.
Uwe Wittstock is a journalist, critic and author who lives in Germany. He was awarded the prestigious Theodor Wolff prize for journalism in 1989.
