Alexander Kaempfe

Passport cutout and passport photo from Kaempfe

Alexander (Sascha) Paul Walter Kaempfe (born May 16, 1930 in Moscow , † December 27, 1988 in Munich ) was a German translator , journalist and writer .

Life

Kaempfe's father was a German embassy employee in Moscow , his mother Russian. Kaempfe spent the first 11 years of his life where he only attended German schools. After the attack by the German Wehrmacht on the Soviet Union, the family first moved to Berlin and later to Baden-Baden. Kaempfe studied first in Heidelberg , since 1951 in Munich Slavic Studies . During the last decades of his life Kaempfe lived in Munich- Schwabing at Gundelindenstrasse 4, only 100 m away from Helmtrudenstrasse 5, where Franziska (Fanny) Countess zu Reventlow had lived half a century before . Between the two, in the immediate vicinity, at Ungererstraße 80, at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, Parvus Helphand lived , a Russian revolutionary who made the acquaintance of Lenin and Trotsky there and published the revolutionary magazine Iskra with them . This creative field of tension between the Schwabing bohemian and Russian revolutionary exiles was the breeding ground for Kaempfe's extensive journalistic and translator activities. Here he maintained his "Alexander Herzen Club" together with the Slavist Friedrich Hitzer, who is close to the DKP , and witnessed the Schwabing riots up close. In addition to his journalistic work, Kaempfe also devoted himself to extensive lecturing. In schools in particular, he tried to get young people interested in contemporary Russian literature , which was almost hopeless during the Cold War . Kaempfe's life was marked by personal crises. As a freelance translator constantly suffering from latent material hardship, his search for his own identity also overshadowed his life. The Germans took him for a Russian, for the Russians he was of course German. And he himself lived somewhere between these worlds. Hitzer describes this aptly in his obituary and the subtitle and the blurb of Kaempfe's only own novel "Germany 1" address this conflict in life. In addition, there were numerous unfulfilled and unfulfillable loves to unreachable, often much younger, women and heightened his melancholy , which he mostly tried to treat with alcohol. When his loneliness and desperation got the better of him, Kaempfe often paid unannounced visits and then tried long conversations to find out what was so different about him. In the 1970s, for example, he was a frequent guest in the literary and philosophical salon of Marianne Hagengruber and her sister Ruth in Munich's Maxvorstadt . In another artistic circle he got to know the sculptor Karl Oppenrieder , with whom he illuminated for hours the attack by the Wehrmacht on the Soviet Union and his and Oppenrieder's roles in it and the consequences of it. Ideas from these conversations can also be found in Kaempfe's novel. He died in 1988 completely impoverished and withdrawn from the consequences of his severe alcoholic illness in Munich. As a long-time companion and friend, Hitzer wrote his moving obituary in the SZ and gave the funeral speech.

Since Kaempfe received social welfare in the last years of his life and the city of Munich had to pay for him, he should be buried anonymously and cheaply on the outskirts of Munich. The intervention of a friend and Hitzer's obituary resulted in a grave site appropriate to his importance, near his apartment, in the Munich North Cemetery , where many Munich personalities of the 20th century are buried. Oppenrieder, who decades earlier had designed and made the memorial plaque for Lenin at Kaiserstrasse 46 in Munich, which was later destroyed in an attack, insisted on designing and making the tombstone for his friend Sascha. The design with its mirrored text, similar to the Lenin memorial plaque, bilingual in German and Russian as well as the Orthodox and Evangelical-Catholic cross symbolized the two worlds of Kaempme. The grave site was closed around 2008, the stone is lost.

Literary and journalistic work and estate

Even if Kaempme’s translation and literary work is the visibly preserved work today, Kaempf’s greatest achievement is his pioneering work to have made Russian literature of the 20th century known in the German-speaking area, a very difficult task in view of the Soviet threat felt at the time in the West, although many of his poets themselves suffered from Soviet reprisals. As a tireless mediator between cultures, he made new literary contacts on numerous trips to the USSR and, wherever possible, invited these poets to the West through the publishers he worked for. This achievement of Kaempfes, also as a work of international understanding, has not yet been sufficiently researched and appreciated.

Kaempfe's previously documented translation activity began in 1959 with the translation of Pasternak's stories , one year after the German first edition by Doctor Schiwago . In his creative period of almost three decades, Kaempfe made Simonov , Voznesensky , Brodsky , Tynyanow , Lichachev , Sklovsky , Okudschawa , Alexander Solzhenitsyn , Twardowski , Valentin Rasputin , Trifonow , Sjomin , Makanin , Platonow Woinowitsch in German and Bitovich Language available and known. His special appreciation, however, was for a, the Russian poets, Akhmatova , Tsvetaeva , Akhmadulina , which he also translated, but without publication. Notes on this can be found in his estate in the Monacensia Library in Munich.

In the last years of his life, Kaempfe devoted himself primarily to his first and only own work, an essay in the form of a novel: "Germany 1". The subtitle "from one who set out to learn to be German" already suggests the content. The work is a status report of his own search between German and Russian identity against the background of the Hitler-Stalin relationship and new German elites during the Nazi era. The first chapter of the work is of extraordinary autobiographical density and a key to understanding Kaempfe's life and work.

As already mentioned by Hitzer in his obituary, on his death Kaempfe left what many Slavists believed was the largest private library of contemporary Russian literature in southern Germany. The collection comprised several thousand works, books and scientific journals, mostly in Russian, as well as an extensive handwritten legacy with project fragments and originals of translations and correspondence. Since Kaempfe was heavily in debt, the estate administrator tried to sell the estate as best he could. During an inspection of the holdings in a warehouse, at which, in addition to many creditors from second-hand bookshops and bookstores, the then director of the Monacensia Library Fritz Fenzl was present, the library threatened to be scattered to the wind. Fenzl was interested in Kaempfe's manuscripts, but had no budget for the purchase. A friend of Kaempfes who was also present convinced the estate administrator that the books were individually worthless, but as a complete library of great value. The friend was then able to acquire the entire estate of Kaempfes and gave Fenzl the manuscripts on permanent loan to Monacensia. The library was donated in full to the newly established Chair for Comparative Literature of Professor Hendrik Birus at the Ludwig Maximilians University, and the literary journals to the university library there. The manuscripts have now been cataloged and await scientific evaluation. His work as a film actor under the direction of Ula Stöckl has not yet been researched. However, films with him as an actor have been shown again and again.

Book cover of Kaempfes personal copy with personal notes

Own works

• Germany 1: From someone who set out to learn to be German. Alexander Kaempfe. ISBN 978-3-89029-011-9 , Neuer Malik-Verlag Kiel 1986. 318 pages, clothbound

Works as translator and editor (selection)

• Boris Pasternak: poems. Stories. Safe escort (from the Russian translation by Alexander Kaempfe, Mary von Holbeck and others). Fischer Library, 1959.
• Konstantin Michailowitsch Simonow: The living and the dead (from the Russian by Alexander Kaempfe). 1960.
• People, Years, Life (Vol. 1). Erenburg, Il'ja G. and Alexander Kaempfe. Kindler 1962.
• Triangular pear: 30 lyrical digressions. Andrei Voznesensky. [From d. Soot. transfer by Eckhart Schmidt u. Alexander Kaempfe. With e. Nachw. By Alexander Kaempfe] / edition suhrkamp 43; Suhrkamp Frankfurt / M. 1963.
• Selected articles: Aleksandr A. Blok (author), Alexander Kaempfe (contributor); Suhrkamp 1964.
• Essays on the theory and history of literature. Eichenbaum, Boris and Alexander Kaempfe. [Selected u. from d. Soot. trans. by Alexander Kaempfe]. Suhrkamp Verlag Frankfurt / M., 1965.
• Selected poems. Brodsky, Jossif. German by Heinrich Ost and Alexander Kaempfe. 1966.
• Writings on the film: Viktor Schklowskij; Alexander Kaempfe (Ed.): Suhrkamp 1966.
• The literary art media and the evolution in literature. Yury Tynjanov. [Selected u. from d. Soot. trans. by Alexander Kaempfe] Suhrkamp Frankfurt a. M. 1967.
• After the formalism - essays on Russian literature. Likhachev, Dmitrij; Alexander Kaempfe (afterword). Hanser series, Verlag Carl Hanser, 1968.
• Childhood and youth. Sklovsky, Viktor; Kaempfe, Alexander (translation). Suhrkamp Verlag Frankfurt am Main 1968.
• Poems and Chansons [by] Bulat Okudshawa: German by Alexander Kaempfe and Gerhard Schindele. (Afterword by Alexander Kaempfe) Kindler, Munich 1969.
• August nineteen fourteen . Solzhenitsyn, Alexander: From d. Soot. by Alexander Kaempfe: Langen-Müller, 1971.
• Home and foreign. Twardowskij, Alexander / Kaempfe, Alexander (selection, HGG.). Langen Müller, Munich / Vienna 1972.
• On the inequality of the similar in art. Edited by Alexander Kaempfe. Carl Hanser Vlg., Munich 1973.
• Incident at Kretschetowka train station. Solzhenitsyn, Alexander Alexander Kaempfe and Aggy Jais. Berlin Herbig Verlag 1973. ISBN 3-570-00120-2 .
• Refuge in the woods. Novel. Rasputin, Valentin and Aus d. Soot. trans. Alexander Kaempfe. Bertelsmann. Munich 1976.
• The other life . Novel. Yuri Trifonov; Alexander Kaempfe. from the Russian by Alexander Kaempfe, Bertelsmann Verlag 1976, ISBN 3-570-01999-3 .
• L76 Democracy and Socialism, No. 3. Heinrich Böll, Peter Bender, Alexander Kaempfe, Willy Brandt, Walter Haubrich, Michael Harrington, Volker Mauersberger, Gerd E. Hoffmann, Ludwig Harig, Hans-Peter Riese, Ludvik Vaculik, Milan Uhde, Ivan Kadlecik, Pavel Kohout, Alexander Kliment. European Publishing House, Frankfurt 1977.
• About art and artists. Sergei Eisenstein. Translated from the Russian by Alexander Kaempfe. Rogner & Bernhard, Munich 1977, OCLC 174240060 .
• The House on the Moskva River [Jan 01, 1977] Jurij Trifonow and Alexander Kaempfe ISBN 3-570-02897-6 .
• Love, a dream: novel. Zalygin, Sergej P. Translated from the Russian by Alexander Kaempfe. Bertelsmann, Munich 1977. ISBN 3-570-01996-9
• The time of impatience. Novel. Trifonov, Jurij V. and Dt. by Alexander Kaempfe. Deutscher Taschenbuch-Verlag 1978, ISBN 3-423-01406-7 .
• The exchange. Yuri Trifonov. From d. Soot. by Alexander Kaempfe u. Helen from Ssachno. [Ed .: Helen von Ssachno], Piper series, Munich 1979.
• Dear Alexander. My life with Solzhenitsyn. Reshetovskaya, Natalja; Kaempfe, Alexander (transl.). Kurt Desch publishing house, Munich 1979.
• The difference is a sign. Novel. Vitaly Syomin. Novel Translated from the Russian by Alexander Kaempfe. Bertelsmann, Munich 1978, ISBN 3-499-12575-7 .
• The political status of the Soviet writers - using the example of Yuri Trifonov. Alexander Kaempfe. Bertelsmann 1979.
• Zoo or letters not about love (Library Suhrkamp Volume 693). Sklovsky, Viktor; from the Russian by Alexander Kaempfe. ISBN 3-518-01693-8 ISBN 978-3-518-01693-0 . Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main, 1980, ISBN 3-518-01693-8 .
• Be right. A novel from Moscow. Vladimir Semjonowitsch Makanin, Alexander Kaempfe (translator) Neuer Malik Verlag, 1983.
• Ivan Tschonkin heir apparent: novel. Vladimir Voinovich. Translated from the Russian by Alexander Kaempfe. Diognens, Zurich 1983, ISBN 3-257-01640-9 .
• The faith healer. Novel about cancer therapy; Vladimir Makanin .: Alexander Kaempfe (translator). New Malik Verlag, 1984.
• The coaching suburb. Collected stories. TB Unabridged edition, 1985 by Alexander Kaempfe (editor, epilogue), Andrej Platonow (author), Agathe Jais (translator) Ullstein Taschenbuchverlag, 1985, ISBN 3-548-20507-0 .
• Home and foreign. Twardowskij, Alexander, Kaempfe, Alexander Langen - Mueller Verlag, 1985, ISBN 3-7844-1487-7 .
• Two friends. Novel. Vladimir Voinovich. Afterword by Alexander Kaempfe. Ullstein, 1985, ISBN 3-548-20554-2 .
• Rasputin, Valentin: Farewell to Matjora: Roman. From d. Soot. by Alexander Kaempfe; Rowohlt, Reinbek near Hamburg, 1985.
• Images of man. Stories 2 Vladimir Makanin; Alexander Kaempfe, Malik Verlag, 1987, ISBN 3-89029-021-3 .
• Poems: Brodsky, Joseph deutsch by Heinrich Ost and Alexander Kaempfe; Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag, Frankfurt / M. 1987, ISBN 3-596-29232-8 .
• The memorable adventures of the soldier Ivan Chonkin, novel. WOINOWITSCH, WLADIMIR and Alexander Kaempfe, diogenes detebe 20628.
• The role. Novel. Bitow, Andrej and Kaempfe, Alexander 1990, ISBN 3-596-29578-5 .
• Literature and Carnival. On romance theory and laughter culture. Mikhail. M. Bakhtin. From the Russian with an afterword by Alexander Kaempfe. Frankfurt / M. 1996.
• Stop in the desert: - Poems. Joseph Brodsky. Russian and German. Translated from the Russian by Ralph Dutli, Felix Philipp Ingold, Alexander Kaempfe, Sylvia List, Heinrich Ost, Birgit Veit. Edited by Ilma Rakusa. Suhrkamp, ​​1997, ISBN 978-3-518-22266-9 .
• Letter to the oasis: a hundred poems. Brodsky, Joseph; Transferred from Ralph Dutli, Felix Ingold, Alexander Kaempfe, Heinrich Ost, Sylvia List, Raoul Schrott and Birgit Veit. Edited and with an afterword by Ralph Dutli: Carl Hanser Verlag, Munich 2006, ISBN 978-3-446-20733-2 .

Web links

Commons : Alexander Kaempfe  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Sascha plays fights as an actor , in the film "9 Lives the Cat"
• Kaempfe as an actor plays a pastor in the film "Kübelkind"
• Alexander Kaempfe in the IMDB ( Internet Movie Database )

Individual evidence

1. ^ "Obituary by Friedrich Hitzer in the SZ of December 30, 1988"
2. ^ Franziska Gräfin zu Reventlow Historical address book of Munich
3. ↑ Alexander Herzen Club in Hubert Burda - The Media Prince
4. ↑ Dr. Marianne Hagengruber's farewell matinée in the Regen library
5. ^ "Lenin memorial plaque from Karl Oppenrieder"
6. ^ "Handwritten estate of Kaempfes" Monacensia library
7. ↑ The cat has nine lives at the Munich Film Festival 2019
8. ↑ stories from the bucket child Werkschau Ula Stoeckl; art culture quarter Nuremberg,