Alexander Gunsberg

Alexander Günsberg (2016)

Alexander Günsberg (born January 12, 1952 in Milan ) is an Austrian-Swiss writer, publisher and chess promoter.

Life

Alexander Günsberg grew up in Milan , Vienna and Zurich . His father Max Günsberg (1920–1976) fled Nazi persecution after Hitler's invasion of Austria in 1938 ( Anschluss of Austria ) from Vienna to Switzerland and was one of the Viennese Jews rescued by St. Gallen Police Captain Paul Grüninger . Her mother Ilona Netzer (1919–2003) came to Switzerland from Hungary in 1937 as an au pair . In 1938 she ignored the deportation order and lived illegally in Zurich. In 1940 she received refugee status in Switzerland. Günsberg's paternal grandmother and her eleven-year-old daughter were shot by the SS in 1941 in the forest near Maly-Trostinez . Of the forty members of the mother's family, thirty-three were murdered in Auschwitz in 1944 .

Günsberg obtained the higher education entrance qualification (Matura) in 1971 in Zurich. He studied history, German and psychology at the universities of Zurich and Basel .

From 1968 to 1970 he was editor-in-chief of Darkenu Chadasch , the monthly magazine of the Jewish youth association Bnei Akiva in Zurich. In 1974 he won the Baselland canton of Baselland's literary prize for short stories . His story Rise was published in Excellent Stories . He wrote political and literary contributions for the Jüdische Rundschau Makkabi (including, not so , Mr. Augstein and the poem Du Volk der Juden )

From 1976 to 1981 he was a well-known jewelry wholesaler in Austria. From 1981 he worked as a real estate promoter in Switzerland and the USA. Since 2016 he turned back to his work as an author. His books have been published in several languages. The best known are the collection of authentic reports from the Holocaust What the Fathers Told , the autobiographical book Wienershops and the novels Die Eisenstadt , Tanz der Vexiere and Mischa Turow .

In 2020 Günsberg founded the ABER literature and history publishing house in Wilen near Zurich. Novels, books on historical topics and biographies are to be published. The publication of the art cassette Die Welt der Juden in 3 volumes, edited by Günsberg and illustrated by Alexander Pavlenko and Astrid Saalmann, is planned for 2020 .

Alexander Günsberg was Vice President of the Basler Chess Society from 1989 to 1992 and organized the simultaneous match Karpov against 1000 in the Hotel Hilton in Basel, at which the then world chess champion Anatoly Evgenjewitsch Karpow appeared for the first time after the dissolution of the Soviet Union at a major event in western countries. In 1996 he founded the Club échec Crans-Montana chess club in Crans-Montana , of which he was president from 1996 to 2003. In 2016 Günsberg founded the chess and art club Cercle d'échecs et d'art valaisan , of which he has been president since it was founded. He has organized numerous chess tournaments, including a. Twenty-one times the Valais Amateur Chess Championship and three International Open in Crans-Montana, in which well-known grandmasters also played (including Toni Miles , Wolodymyr Tukmakow , Thomas Luther ). He is the captain of several chess teams that play in the Swiss team championship, the Swiss group championship and the Valais team championship. His players include u. a. the grandmasters Vadim Milov , Yannick Pelletier , Igor Khenkin , Christian Bauer and Spyridon Skembris . In 2015, a game of chess against him at a charity event of the Kasparov Foundation in Geneva, at which Garri Kimowitsch Kasparov also appeared, was auctioned for 3,000 euros.

Alexander Günsberg was married 5 times. Today he lives with his wife Natalya in Wilen near Zurich and near Crans-Montana in the Valais mountains. He is the father of six children who were born between 1976 and 2012.

In 2020 Alexander Günsberg donated the ABER Literature Prize. The prize is to be awarded to authors who have made a contribution to the memory of the Holocaust in their writings. The 2020 competition is for short stories on the topic of 'but'. Jurors are u. a. Edita Koch, Roman Grinberg , Gerhard Haase-Hindenberg , Slobodan Despot, Myriam Halberstam.

Publications

• Aufstieg, literary prize for short stories of the Canton of Baselland 1974, published in the volume Excellent stories, LÜDIN Verlag Basel, 1975 stories about love, war and chess, short stories, Verlag Tredition, 2016, ISBN 978-3-7345-4659-4 .
• About love and the devil: 11 incredible but true short stories . Verlag Tredition, Hamburg 2016, ISBN 978-3-7345-5490-2 , urn : nbn: de: 101: 1-2016091911066 .
• Viennese shops: Erotic and business episodes from my life in Vienna and the surrounding area . Verlag Tredition, Hamburg 2016, ISBN 978-3-7345-6342-3 , urn : nbn: de: 101: 1-201610318989 .
• Amour, Guerre et Echecs: 16 nouvelles à couper le souffle . Verlag Tredition, Hamburg 2017, ISBN 978-3-7439-2860-2 , urn : nbn: de: 101: 1-201706054902 (French, translated by Everest Girard).
• The Eisenstadt file . Hentrich and Hentrich, Leipzig 2018, ISBN 978-3-95565-294-4 .
• What the fathers said, reports from the Holocaust . Hentrich and Hentrich, Leipzig 2018, ISBN 978-3-95565-295-1 .
• Dance of the Vexiers, novel . Münster Verlag, Basel 2019, ISBN 978-3-907146-23-1 .
• Mischa Turow, Roman . Adelaide Books, New York 2019, ISBN 978-1-949180-93-0 .
• Jewish Stories, short stories . Adelaide Books, New York 2019, ISBN 978-1-951214-62-3 .
• Eisenstadt File, Roman . Adelaide Books, New York 2019, ISBN 978-1-950437-47-4 .
• Mischa Turow, Roman . Aber Verlag, Wilen 2020, ISBN 978-3-907299-00-5 .
• The Eisenstadt files, Roman, 2nd supplemented edition . Aber Verlag, Wilen 2020, ISBN 978-3-907299-01-2 .

Web links

• Alexander Günsberg , website
• Aber-Verlag , website
• Cercle d'échecs et d'art valaisan , website
• Urs Heinz Aerni: Writing like a grandmaster , in: literaturblatt.ch , review with interview from July 12, 2019
• Adelaide Books New York , website
• Münster Verlag Basel , website
• Hentrich & Hentrich, Berlin and Leipzig , website

Individual evidence

1. ↑ On refugee policy in Switzerland, see: Switzerland in the Second World War
2. ↑ Matura on sfbi.admin.ch
3. ↑ Title details, see: WorldCat , website
4. ↑ In 1941 the journal of the Jewish Gymnastics and Sports Association Makkabi was founded, and in 1974 it was renamed the Jüdische Rundschau Makkabi . In 2001 the magazine was included in the organ tacheles .
5. ↑ Günsberg describes his business activities in his autobiographical reports from his life. tredition , website
6. ↑ Alexander Pavlenko , website
7. ↑ Astrid Saalmann is an illustrator and artist. Astrid Saalmann at Hentrich Hentrich , Astrid Saalmannn Illustrations , website
8. ↑ The publisher is presented on its website. But publisher , website
9. ↑ The chess and arts club is listed on the Union Valaisanne des Échecs - Welsh Chess Federation .
10. ↑ Further information on the chess tournaments can be found on the website of the Swiss Chess Federation
11. ↑ All jurors are listed on the publisher's website. But publisher authors and jurors , website
12. ↑ Edita Koch is a publisher and holder of the Federal Cross of Merit. She publishes the magazine Exil . see: Frankfurter Rundschau, "Exile is in me", July 27, 2016
13. ↑ Myriam Halberstam is a writer and director of Ariella Verlag , website