Fritz Erpenbeck

Erpenbeck (right) with Peter Hacks at the presentation of the Lessing Prize, 1956

Fritz Erpenbeck (born April 6, 1897 in Mainz , † January 7, 1975 in Berlin ) was a German writer , publicist and actor .

Life

Erpenbeck completed an apprenticeship as a locksmith in Osnabrück , interrupted by military service in World War I , where he also took acting lessons. Since 1920 he has been in various engagements, including at the Lessing Theater and the Piscator Stage in Berlin , where he also worked as a director and dramaturge. In 1928 he married the writer Hedda Zinner . Since 1927 he was a member of the KPD . From 1929 he also worked as a journalist; From 1931 to 1933 he was editor-in-chief of the satirical magazine Roter Pfeffer .

In 1933 he emigrated first to Prague , in 1935 to the Soviet Union with his wife . There he worked as an editor for various magazines and became a member of the National Committee Free Germany (NKFD) . As part of his work for the NKFD, he was deputy editor-in-chief of the NKFD broadcaster “Free Germany” . Because of this function he was selected for the Ulbricht group .

On April 30, 1945, before the end of the war, Erpenbeck returned with her to Germany, where he joined the SED in 1946 . From 1946 to 1958 he was editor-in-chief of the magazines Theater der Zeit and Theaterdienst and founded the Henschel Verlag with Bruno Henschel . From 1951 he was head of the performing arts and music department at the GDR Council of Ministers . From 1959 to 1962 he was chief dramaturge at the Berliner Volksbühne , after which he lived as a freelance writer.

Erpenbeck received the Lessing Prize of the GDR in 1956 , the Ernst Moritz Arndt Medal in 1957 and in 1972 the plaque for the Patriotic Order of Merit .

tomb

He died on January 7, 1975 in Berlin. His grave is in the Dorotheenstadt cemetery . A street in Berlin-Pankow is named after him.

Fritz Erpenbeck is the father of the physicist, philosopher and writer John Erpenbeck , whose daughter Jenny Erpenbeck was also known as a writer.

Works

• But I didn't mean to be a coward , narrative, 1932
• Musketeer Peters , short story, 1936
• Emigrants , Roman, Moscow 1937
• Homecoming , novella, 1939
• German fates , short stories, 1939
• Little girl in the great war , story, 1940
• Founder , Roman, Moscow 1941 (= Volume I)
• Founder , Roman (Volume I and II), Berlin 1945 and 1949
• Lively Theater , Articles and Reviews, 1949
• Wilhelm Pieck. A picture of life , 1951
• M. Linzer (Ed.) From theater life. Articles and reviews , 1959
• Künstlerpension Boulanka , detective novel, yellow series 1964 (filmed in 1964 as Pension Boulanka )
• Curtain up! , Anecdotes and Stories, 1965
• Deadly Record , detective novel, 1965
• Ambushed , detective novel, 1967
• Needles in the Hay , detective novel, 1968
• The Fatima case , detective novel, 1969

Filmography (selection)

as a performer

• 1932: Kuhle Wampe or: Who Owns the World?

as a screenwriter

• 1964: Pension Boulanka

Theater (direction)

• 1960: Helmut Franke : Room 13 - ( Volksbühne Berlin - theater on the 3rd floor)
• 1960: August Strindberg : Paria - (Volksbühne Berlin - theater on the 3rd floor)

literature

• Fritz Erpenbeck . In: Richard Drews, Alfred Kantorowicz (ed.), Banned and burned. German literature - suppressed for 12 years , Berlin and Munich: Heinz Ullstein - Helmut Kindler Verlag, 1947, p. 37 f.
• Short biography for:  Erpenbeck, Fritz . In: Who was who in the GDR? 5th edition. Volume 1. Ch. Links, Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-86153-561-4 .

Web links

Commons : Fritz Erpenbeck  - Collection of Images

• Literature by and about Fritz Erpenbeck in the catalog of the German National Library
• Fritz Erpenbeck Archive in the Archive of the Academy of Arts, Berlin