John Spalek

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John M. Spalek (born July 28, 1928 in Warsaw ) is an American German studies scholar . His research area is the German emigrants during the National Socialist era .

Life

Spalek came to Cologne with his family in 1945 , where he completed an apprenticeship as a carpenter . In 1949 he emigrated to the USA , graduated in 1951 with a degree in Spanish literature and began doing research at Stanford University . He did his doctorate on Theological Problems on the Contemporary German Stage .

Spalek worked at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles and the State University of New York in Albany. In the 1970s he began to track down and describe materials from German-speaking emigrants in the USA, including a. Partial bequests from Thomas Mann , George Grosz , Hermann Borchardt , Soma Morgenstern , Stefan Zweig , Joseph Roth , Fritz von Unruh and others. In this context he met u. a. Henry Koster , Marta Feuchtwanger and Billy Wilder .

He set up an exile collection at the State University of New York in Albany. In the early 1970s he began working with the German Exile Archive 1933–1945 of the German National Library. He brokered many holdings in this collection, including a. the bequests of Hermann Borchardt and Soma Morgenstern .

Movie

  • Mr. Spalek's suitcases. Documentary, 72 min., 2012

Honors

  • Goethe Medal 2010
  • Honorary member of the "Society for Exile Research" 2010

Works (selection)

  • as editor: German-language exile literature since 1933. de Gruyter, Saur, Munich, later Berlin.
  • with Joseph P. Strelka : California. 1976. Two parts; only these volumes: Upper title German exile literature since 1933. Francke, Bern 1976.
  • UNITED STATES. Parts 1–5, 2000–2005 (Part 2 = New York, first time 1989).
  • with Konrad Feilchenfeldt , Sandra H. Hawrylchak: USA. Supplement 1. 2010.
  • Bibliographies. Writer, publicist and literary scholar in the USA. 1994. Part 1: AG , Part 2: H-M , Part 3: N-Z.
  • as editor: Ernst Toller: Collected works. Hanser, Munich 1978.
  • with Wolfgang Frühwald : The Toller case. Hanser, Munich 1979.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Curriculum vitae on the unhcr website , accessed on August 31, 2010 (English).
  2. ↑ About the film and an interview with the author Gregor Eppinger.
personal data
SURNAME Spalek, John
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Spalek, John M.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American German studies specialist
DATE OF BIRTH July 28, 1928
PLACE OF BIRTH Warsaw , Poland