Annemarie Böll

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Annemarie Böll , b. Čech (born June 23, 1910 in Pilsen , Austria-Hungary , today Plzeň , Czech Republic ; † November 15, 2004 in Langenbroich ) was a German translator and the wife of the writer and Nobel Prize winner for literature Heinrich Böll .

Life

Childhood and Adolescence (1910–1930)

Annemarie Böll was born Annemarie Čech in Pilsen on June 23, 1910. There she grew up bilingual with Czech and German . She was the second child and only daughter of her parents Eduard Čech, a lawyer at the Austrian State Railways in Pilsen, and Stephanie Čech, née Hagen, from Cologne . Stephanie Čech died on Christmas 1915 at the age of 32 after a miscarriage, Eduard Čech just a few months later at the age of 49 of a heart attack. While the youngest son Edi was taken in by the father's family, Annemarie Böll and her older brother Paul grew up with their maternal grandparents in Cologne-Nippes . After moving to Cologne, Annemarie attended the school of the Ursula Monastery near St. Ursula , where she graduated from high school in 1930.

Studies (1930–1933)

In 1930 she began studying German and English at the University of Cologne , which she graduated with the small state examination in 1933 . Thus she was qualified to work as a teacher in middle schools. During this time she also met Mechthild Böll , the sister of her future husband, the writer and Nobel Prize winner for literature Heinrich Böll .

Work as a teacher (1933–1952)

Despite additional training for teaching at elementary schools, Annemarie could not find a job as a teacher in Germany due to the difficult labor market situation for teachers at the time. So she moved to England , where she found a job as a temporary teacher in a convent school in Upton . She later said about her work there:

"I would have liked to stay there, tried that too, but since I still had my grandmother here, for whom I felt responsibility, I returned." - Annemarie Böll

Annemarie stayed at home as a housewife until 1947, as the Severinswall secondary school , where she had previously taught, had not yet been restored.

In August 1947, she resumed work as a civil servant teacher in the poorly restored school. Annemarie Böll's sole income shaped the family situation in the first post-war years.

In 1948 she gave up her job as a teacher because she was going on maternity leave. In an interview with Dieter Kühn , she said with a laugh: "I was out of place at school."

After returning to Cologne and doing other activities in schools and children's homes, Annemarie finally turned to her work as a freelance translator.

Family life

In 1942 she married Heinrich Böll. In 1945 the son Christoph was born, but he died soon after the birth. Their son Raimund was born in 1947, René in 1948 and Vincent in 1950 . In the post-war period, Annemarie Böll was primarily responsible for her family. Heinrich Böll describes in his letters all the work that Annemarie did for the family. Annemarie spent a large part of this time organizing food and looking after her husband and the children, who took turns falling ill. Annemarie Böll was very busy at work and in her family and was thus stressed.

Until 1948, Annemarie's and Heinrich Böll's family lived in a small two-room apartment, which was located in the von Heinrich family's house in Cologne. After the conditions in the small apartment had become too cramped, Annemarie looked for a new piece of land in 1952 to build her own home on Belvederestrasse. The family moved into this in 1954. Annemarie also planned and supervised renovation work in 1966. In favor of this, she temporarily suspended her activities as a translator.

From the 1970s onwards, the Böll family regularly hosted guests, who were mainly looked after by Annemarie.

Annemary's life was shaped by a large number of private tasks in addition to her professional activities as a teacher and translator.

Annemarie Böll died on November 15, 2004 at the age of 94.

Work as a translator

As early as the early forties of the 20th century, Annemarie Böll, who had given up her job as a teacher because of feeding her children, showed an independent interest in translating English works into German. The Böll couple worked together on translations, although Heinrich, whose knowledge of English did not meet the requirements of a professional translator, relied on Annemarie's fluent English. Heinrich Böll wrote to the publisher Joseph Caspar Witsch on June 30, 1956 about the joint translation work :

“As for the translation work (...) I really enjoy doing it, it's a great exercise in style (...). It's just a hell of a job in quantitative terms; but the fact is that really 90% of the work was done by my wife alone. " - Heinrich Boell

In 1953, Kay Cicellis published the first joint translation, “Kein Name bei den Menschen” . It was published by Kiepenheuer & Witsch as a translation by Annemarie and Heinrich Böll. In 1964, her husband confirmed that Annemarie was the sole author of this translation. Despite her husband's public concessions, Heinrich Böll alone was made an honorary member of the Association of German Translators in 1966 .

Annemarie Böll translated more than 70 works into German. In the early years of Heinrich's writing career, her translation work formed the basis of the family's common livelihood. This relieved her husband, who was able to look after his literary career without financial restrictions. The authors she has translated include Brendan Behan , Flann O'Brien , George Bernard Shaw , Saul Bellow , O. Henry , Patrick White, and Judith Kerr .

Cooperation with Heinrich Böll

Annemarie Böll supported and influenced Heinrich Böll in his literary work. During the Second World War , the young couple wrote each other several letters a day, and Annemarie instigated Heinrich to tell the story; to her he described all his experiences and feelings. By writing letters with Annemarie, Heinrich was able to counteract his feeling of complete lack of freedom, which the war and barracking life aroused.

When Heinrich Böll's literary success failed to materialize in the post-war period despite the great enthusiasm for work, Annemarie Böll strengthened his back - not only financially through her work as a teacher, but also emotionally through her encouragement and her confidence. She encouraged Heinrich Böll in his plans to work as a writer. In September 1948 he wrote: "My wife has a lot to do to save me from complete despair every day."

Annemarie Böll also supports her husband in a practical way. She practiced machine writing and shorthand and was Heinrich Böll's first and most important reader. He discussed all of his texts with her, and Annemarie Böll did not allow any literary compromises despite the difficult circumstances. Heinrich Böll described his wife's criticism as "infallible".

Even after Heinrich Böll's breakthrough as a writer, the collaboration continued. On the one hand, Heinrich helped Annemarie with her translations, on the other hand, Annemarie continued to work on Heinrich's writing and correction phases. In collaboration with publisher Dieter Wellershoff , for example, Annemarie Böll came up with the title of the 1971 novel Group picture with lady . Again and again, however, her work was not even identified with the mention of her name.

Annemarie and Heinrich Böll had many contacts abroad and enjoyed traveling. In August 1968, the couple and their son René traveled to what was then Czechoslovakia to get an idea of ​​the Prague Spring . In 1975 and 1976 alone, according to Heinrich Böll's workbook, the couple made five trips: to Denmark, Greece, the Netherlands, France, Portugal and Switzerland. In 1979 the couple traveled to Ecuador, the home country of their daughters-in-law Carmen-Alicia and Teresa Böll, where a kind of family reunion took place. In addition to several trips to Russia, the family was also in contact with friends and acquaintances in the Soviet Union, with Annemarie Böll taking care of the correspondence and organizing and coordinating auxiliary activities. For example, in the 1960s and 1970s she procured medicines, clothing and other items of daily life for the befriended couple Lew and Raja Kopelew . The extensive and friendly correspondence with the Kopelew couple is characterized by warmth and constant offers of help on the part of Annemarie.

Social Commitment

Annemarie Böll was not only known for her translation work and as Heinrich Böll's wife, but also appeared repeatedly as a political person in public. She was active in the peace movement and took part in the blockade of the military depot in Mutlangen .

In 1972 she publicly declared herself in favor of Willy Brandt's election by signing the leaflet “We elect Willy Brandt and support his election campaign” with her husband.

In January 1976, she and Heinrich Böll resigned from the church with publicity. In a joint declaration, the Böll couple justified this step with institutional criticism of the Catholic Church .

Furthermore, she was involved in the founding of the Germania Judaica library in Cologne, which at the end of the 1950s was supposed to make a contribution against the increasing anti-Semitism in Germany and to this day is one of the most important libraries for German-Jewish history.

Comments on the German past were very important to Annemarie Böll. About the Böll family, including themselves, she said:

"All were determined opponents of Hitler and war opponents, even if the views on how to behave in the disasters that have now occurred diverged. All came from a Catholic background. Despite frequent criticism of the official church and an occasional anti-clericalism, the Christian faith was but a livelihood that was perceived as the antithesis of National Socialist ideology. " - Annemarie Böll's foreword to "Letters from the War"

Annemarie Böll also acted together with her husband as an escape helper for artists from the Eastern Bloc .

Estate administration of Heinrich Böll and foundation / association work

In her final years she took part in the processing of Heinrich Böll's estate. In 1987 - two years after the death of her husband - Annemarie Böll was involved in founding the Heinrich Böll Foundation named after him , the development of which she also accompanied in the years that followed.

In addition, she was chairwoman and jury member of Heinrich-Böll-Haus Langenbroich e. V., which gives politically persecuted artists space for their work in a former holiday home of the Böll family. There she was entrusted with the decision on the award of scholarships . In the first few years of this activity in particular, she spent several summer weeks with the fellows in the Heinrich-Böll-Haus, where she was given her own wing.

In the last years of her life, Annemarie Böll transcribed and edited the letters - mostly addressed to her - that her husband had written during the war. She describes this as a “precious legacy” for her personally and generally as an “important contemporary testimony”. They were published in 2001 by Jochen Schubert with a foreword by Annemarie Böll under the title “Letters from the War” .

She accompanied and supported the new edition of the Heinrich Böll work edition as part of the so-called Cologne edition, which was published by Kiepenheuer & Witsch from 2002 to 2010 , and she only partially witnessed the publication. In addition, until shortly before her death, she had long conversations with Heinrich Böll's first biographer, Heinrich Vormweg . The co-editing of “ Der Engel schwieg ”, one of her husband's early novels, is also one of Annemarie Böll's last projects.

Translations

partly with the collaboration of Heinrich Böll

  • Brendan Behan
    • Tomorrow's Man , 1958/59 (Original: The Quare Fellow )
    • The hostage , 1958/59 (Original: The Hostage )
    • Der Spanner , 1966 (Original: The Scarperer )
    • Confessions of an Irish Rebel , 1978 (Original: Confessions of an Irish Rebel )
  • Kay Cicellis
    • No name among the people , 1953 (Original: No Name in the Street )
  • Charles Dickens
    • I - the comedian. The Memoirs of Joseph Grimaldi , 1983 (Original: Memoirs of Joseph Grimaldi )
  • Eilis Dillon
    • The black foxes. The adventures of the four island children with the fox family , 1967 (Original: A Family of Foxes )
    • In the shadow of Vesuvius, 1980 (Original: The Shadow of Vesuvius )
  • O. Henry
    • Hostages to Momus , 1974 (Original: Hostages to Momus )
    • The Rose of Dixie , 1974 (Original: The Rose of Dixie )
    • The Man Above Me , 1974 (Original: The Man Higher Up )
    • A Spurned Sacrifice , 1974 (Original: A Sacrifice Hit )
    • Nebel in Santone , 1974 (Original: A Fog in Santone )
  • Judith Kerr
  • Bernard Malamud
    • The Assistant , 1960 (Original: The Assistant )
    • Der Judenvogel , 1971 (Original: The Jewbird )
    • The talking horse , 1977 (Original: Talking Horse )
  • Zindzi Mandela
    • Black as I am , 1986 (Original: Black as I am )
  • Flann O'Brien
    • Das harte Leben , 1966 (from English, English title: The Hard Life ), Suhrkamp Taschenbuch Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1993, ISBN 3-518-38696-4 .
  • Tomás Ó Criomhthain
    • The boats don't go out anymore , 1960 (Irish original title: An tOileánach , English title: The Islandman )
  • James Plunkett
    • Some, they say, are damned
  • Jerome David Salinger
    • Shortly before the war against the Eskimos , 1961 (Original: For Esmé - with Love and Squalor, and Other Stories )
    • The Catcher in the Rye , 1962 (Original: The Catcher in the Rye )
    • Franny and Zooey , 1963 (Original: Franny and Zooey )
    • Lift up the roof beam, carpenters. Seymour is introduced , 1965 (Original: Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters. And Seymour an Introduction )
  • George Bernard Shaw
    • Caesar and Cleopatra 1965 (Original: Caesar and Cleopatra )
    • Mensch und Übermensch , 1972 (Original: Man and Superman )
    • Manual of the revolutionary , 1972 (Original: The Revolutionist's Handbook )
    • The Emperor of America , 1973 (Original: The Apple Cart )
    • Mesalliance or wrongly connected (Original: Misalliance )
  • John M. Synge
    • A true hero , 1960 (Original: The Playboy of the Western World )
    • Our fate is the sea , 1969 (Original: Riders to the Sea )
  • Patrick White
    • The tree of man never came to rest , 1957 (Original: The Tree of Man )

literature

  • Dieter Kühn : On the way to Annemarie Böll , Berlin 2000 (internal publication) - new version In: Portrait studies in black and white . Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag 15050, Frankfurt am Main 2006
  • Bibliography of the translations by Annemarie and Heinrich Böll In: The work of Heinrich Böll. Bibliography with studies on early work. Edited by Werner Bellmann . Westdeutscher Verlag, Opaden 1995, pp. 251-257.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Viktor Böll and Jochen Schubert: Heinrich Böll . Deutscher Taschenbuchverlag, Munich 2002, p. 38-39 .
  2. ↑ Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch . Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 17-20 .
  3. ↑ Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch . Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 23 .
  4. ↑ Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch . Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 23-24 .
  5. ↑ Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch . Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 24 .
  6. ↑ a b Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch . Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 92 .
  7. ↑ Heinrich Böll and Herbert Hoven (eds.): Hope is like a wild animal: Correspondence with Ernst-Adolf Kunz 1945-1953 . Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, Munich 1997, p. 86 .
  8. ↑ Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch . Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 94 .
  9. ↑ Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch . Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 24-25 .
  10. ↑ a b Heinrich Böll and Herbert Hoven (eds.): Hope is like a wild beast: Correspondence with Ernst-Adolf Kunz 1945-1953 . Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, Munich 1997, p. 43 .
  11. ↑ Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch . Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 89 .
  12. ↑ Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch . Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 113 .
  13. ↑ Heinrich Böll and Herbert Hoven (eds.): Hope is like a wild animal: Correspondence with Ernst-Adolf Kunz 1945-1953 . Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, Munich 1997, p. 310 .
  14. ↑ Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch . Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 118 .
  15. ^ Elsbeth Zylla: Heinrich Böll and Lew Kopelew: Correspondence . Steidl, Göttingen 2011, p. 75 .
  16. ^ Elsbeth Zylla: Heinrich Böll and Lew Kopelew: Correspondence . Steidl, Göttingen 2011, p. 283 .
  17. ↑ Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch . Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 98 .
  18. ↑ Birgit Boge: The beginnings of Kiepenheuer & Witsch: Joseph Caspar Witsch and the establishment of the publishing house (1948-1959) . Otto Harrassowitz Verlag, Wiesbaden 2009, p. 210 .
  19. ↑ Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch . Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 116 .
  20. ↑ Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch . Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 146 .
  21. ↑ Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch . Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 156 .
  22. ^ Jochen Schubert: Letters from the war 1939-1945 . 1st edition Kiepenheuer & Witsch, Cologne 2001, p. 10 .
  23. ↑ Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch . Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 64 .
  24. ^ Heinrich Vormweg: The other German, Heinrich Böll . Kiepenheuer and Witsch, Cologne 2000, p. 86-87 .
  25. ↑ a b Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch . Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 97 .
  26. ↑ Heinrich Böll and Herbert Hoven (eds.): Hope is like a wild animal: Correspondence with Ernst-Adolf Kunz 1945-1953 . Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, Munich 1997, p. 391 .
  27. ↑ Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch . Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 97-117 .
  28. ↑ Hope is like a wild animal: Correspondence with Ernst-Adolf Kunz 1945-1953 . Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, Munich 1997, p. 256 .
  29. ^ Heinrich Vormweg: The other German, Heinrich Böll . Kiepenheuer and Witsch, Cologne 2000, p. 307 .
  30. ↑ a b c d e f Wieland Freund: The woman for whom literature only had subordinate clauses. November 20, 2004, accessed February 25, 2018 .
  31. ↑ Viktor Böll and Jochen Schubert: Heinrich Böll . Deutscher Taschenbuchverlag, Munich 2002, p. 119-168 .
  32. ^ Elsbeth Zylla: Heinrich Böll and Lew Kopelew: Correspondence . Steidl, Göttingen 2011, p. 74-287 .
  33. ↑ a b Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch. Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 174 .
  34. ↑ Jochen Schubert: Heinrich Böll . Ed .: Heinrich Böll Foundation. Theiss, Darmstadt 2017, p. 237 .
  35. ↑ Viktor Böll and Jochen Schubert: Heinrich Böll . Deutscher Taschenbuchverlag, Munich 2002, p. 127-128 .
  36. ↑ Viktor Böll and Jochen Schubert: Heinrich Böll . Deutscher Taschenbuchverlag, Munich 2002, p. 94-95 .
  37. ^ Jochen Schubert: Letters from the war 1939-1945 . 1st edition. tape 1 . Kiepenheuer & Witsch, Cologne 2001, p. 9 .
  38. ↑ Viktor Böll and Jochen Schubert: Heinrich Böll . Deutscher Taschenbuchverlag, Munich 2002, p. 105 .
  39. ↑ Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch . Ed .: Heinrich Böll Foundation. Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 195 .
  40. ↑ Dieter Kühn: On the way to Annemarie Böll: A biographical sketch. Ed .: Heinrich Böll Foundation. Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2000, p. 197 .
  41. ^ Jochen Schubert: Letters from the war 1939-1945 . 1st edition. tape 1 . Kiepenheuer & Witsch, Cologne 2001, p. 11 .
  42. ^ Heinrich Böll Foundation: Annemarie Böll (1910–2004) - An obituary. Heinrich Böll Foundation, January 3, 2008, accessed on February 25, 2018 .
personal data
SURNAME Böll, Annemarie
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German translator
DATE OF BIRTH June 23, 1910
PLACE OF BIRTH Pilsen , Austria-Hungary , today Plzeň, Czech Republic
DATE OF DEATH November 15, 2004
Place of death Langenbroich