Herta Zerna

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Herta Zerna (born February 11, 1907 in Berlin ; † January 23, 1988 there ) was a German journalist , writer and resistance fighter against National Socialism .

Life

Herta Zerna was born in Berlin-Moabit and grew up in a social democratic family as the daughter of a machinist . After attending middle school and working as an office worker, she came into contact with the writing guild as an editorial assistant. From 1928 to 1932 and then again from 1947 to 1951 she worked as an editor for the social democratic workers' press, most recently as deputy editor-in-chief for the social democrat Berlin (now the Berlin voice ).

In 1953 Herta Zerna published her first novel, It was near Rheinsberg . From then on she worked as a freelance writer and wrote novels and books of poetry, some of which reached several editions (as original hardcover, paperback and book club edition).

During the National Socialist era , Herta Zerna was in constant contact with resistance groups and was questioned by the Gestapo several times . She worked for the Reichsrundfunk and used her position to evaluate and pass on foreign radio broadcasts. She also helped the Jew Ruth Moses, whom she had met with friends, to survive by employing her under a false name as a temporary secretary for the radio. When Herta Zerna's conspiratorial activity threatened to be exposed, she quit the radio and moved to Kagar near Rheinsberg in the countryside. She and her mother had owned a small house there since 1939, in which they now offered shelter to people at risk. So she saved the Jewess Susanne Meyer (also with the help of the local host Georg Steffen and his wife Elise) from the concentration camp . The people who lived temporarily in Berlin and Kagar with Herta Zerna during the Nazi era and who were protected from access by the Gestapo by her and the Steffen couple also included the later governing mayor of Berlin, Otto Suhr , and his Jewish man Wife Susanne. The writer Alois Florath (a former editor of the social democratic forward ) also found refuge with Herta Zerna in Kagar.

Herta Zerna kept memories of her time at Reichsrundfunk under the title I am an unsung heroine or a ballad of the little resistance in the anthology The Gestapo Did Not Record (1966). In 1963 she was named an "unsung heroine" by the Berlin Senate, and on March 31, 1974 she was awarded the Federal Cross of Merit on ribbon.

She died on January 23, 1988, lonely and unnoticed by the public in Berlin-Zehlendorf.

Books (first releases only)

  • It was at Rheinsberg (story). Text drawings Hildegard Roedelius. Universitas, Berlin 1953.
  • Summer in Nipperwiese (Roman). Ullstein, Berlin 1956
  • Rieke Jury, a Berlin love story (novel). S. Mohn, Gütersloh 1960 (later also published under the title A Dress for the Goddess )
  • Vacation in Carinthia (Roman). Signum, Gütersloh 1963
  • Getting married is better (novel). Mosaic, Hamburg 1964
  • Songs from the arbor colony. Rhyming and inconsistent for good and bad weather (poetry). Blanvalet, Berlin 1967
  • In the middle of Berlin (poetry and short prose). Drawings by Kurt Mühlhaupt. Marion von Schröder, Hamburg, Düsseldorf 1973
  • Adam on the Adriatic. A cheerful family story (novel). Blanvalet, Berlin 1975

Contributions to anthologies (selection)

  • Young Berlin (poems). Edited and with an afterword by Robert Kukowka. Wedding-Verlag, Berlin 1948
  • Homeland. Memories of German Authors . Horst Erdmann, Herrenalb 1965
  • The Gestapo never thought of that (series: Contributions to the resistance on the radio). Published by Sender Free Berlin. Haude & Spenersche Verlagbuchhandlung, Berlin 1966
  • This country sleeps a restless sleep. Social reports 1918–45. A reader . Edited by Friedrich G. Kürbisch. Dietz, Berlin, Bonn 1981. ISBN 3801200566 .

literature

  • Kürschner's German Literature Calendar 1988 , vol. 60, de Gruyter, Berlin 1988
  • Article about Herta Zerna in: Learning civil courage. Analyzes - Models - Working Aids . Federal Agency for Civic Education, Bonn 2004, page 111

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ This is the name Herta Zerna calls herself. In a portrait published by The International Raoul Wallenberg Foundation , Margot Moses is mentioned.
  2. ↑ Peter Böthing / Stefanie Oswalt: Jews in Rheinberg. A search for clues. Edition Rieger, Karwe 2005
  3. ^ E-mail information from the Office of the Federal President of February 23, 2012.
  4. ↑ Beate Kosmala: Refuge for the persecuted. Kagar near Rheinsberg 1939-1945. in: Peter Böthig / Stefanie Oswalt: Jews in Rheinsberg. A search for clues. Edition Rieger, Karwe 2005
personal data
SURNAME Zerna, Herta
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German journalist, author and resistance fighter
DATE OF BIRTH February 11, 1907
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin
DATE OF DEATH January 23, 1988
Place of death Berlin