Herbert Paatz

Herbert Fiebrandt Paatz (1928)

Herbert Paatz (born June 2, 1898 in Berlin , † November 1944 in Prague ) was a German journalist and children's book author.

His real name was Herbert Fiebrandt, but he chose the pseudonym Paatz in order to avoid the censorship of Nazi rule.

In 1917 he refused military service in World War I and was imprisoned until the end of the war. In the revolution that followed in 1918 , he became involved as a workers 'and soldiers' council and became a member of the KPD . During his training as a social worker in Berlin in the early 1920s, he was a committed communist and the youngest KPD member of a Berlin district parliament. In the evening school he did his Abitur and studied zoology at the Humboldt University in Berlin.

Until the late 1930s he wrote numerous scientific articles as a freelance journalist, until he had great success with children's books that were translated into several languages ​​(French, Dutch). In the Dr. Kleinermacher series, published by Ullstein Verlag , he describes a scientist who leads two inquisitive neighboring children (Dieter and Traute) through the local flora and fauna with the help of a shrink agent.

The Dr. Kleinermacher series (3 volumes):

• Dr. Kleinermacher leads Dieter into the world
• Dr. Kleinermacher's experiences between basement and roof
• Adventure in Dr. Kleinermacher's garden

His work came to an abrupt end when he was drafted into the Wehrmacht at the end of 1944 and fell a few weeks later. He left his wife Elisabeth and his son Dieter.

His work was largely forgotten until it was reissued in the mid-1980s.

Web links

• Literature by and about Herbert Paatz in the catalog of the German National Library
• Works by Herbert Paatz in the Gutenberg-DE project
• Herbert Paatz - memories of a children's book author