Ludwig Levy-Lenz

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Ludwig Levy-Lenz (born December 1, 1892 in Posen , German Reich ; died October 30, 1966 in Munich ) was a German doctor and sex reformer .

Life

Ludwig Levy took on the double name Ludwig Levy-Lenz early on, after the Second World War and his return to Germany he published under the name Ludwig L. Lenz. He came from a wealthy, middle-class family. In 1909 he went to Heidelberg with his younger brother Siegbert to study medicine and from there to Munich and Breslau . At the beginning of the First World War he was stationed as a soldier in Poznan in a special hospital for reconstructive surgery and orthopedics that he set up himself . On behalf of his military superiors, he set up a war brothel and was responsible for the health care of the women working there.

After the war, with the financial support of his parents, he opened a medical practice in Berlin on Rosenthaler Platz , adjacent to the proletarian-Jewish Scheunenviertel . Around 1926, after divorcing his first wife Denise, a dancer, he moved to the middle-class Westend of Berlin at Ahornallee 51. His second marriage to Elma Wilhelm lasted until 1932. In 1933, when power was handed over to the National Socialists , Levy-Lenz married Marya Goldwasser, who was twenty years younger than her, had to flee with her to Paris because of the German rabble for Jews . In the run-up to the Olympic Games , he believed in a relaxation of German anti-Semitic politics and returned to Germany, only to finally emigrate to Egypt in 1937 . There he was able to open a cosmetic surgery practice. In 1939 he was expatriated from the Greater German Reich , and in 1944 his second divorced wife was expropriated in Berlin. Levy-Lenz's works have also been translated into other languages, and a translation was even printed in France during the German occupation in 1943. After the end of the war, Lenz worked seasonally alternately in Baden-Baden and Cairo and finally returned to Berlin in 1965 .

Levy-Lenz has worked in various interconnected medical fields of venereology , gynecology , surgery , cosmetic medicine and sexology . He wrote a number of popular writings, such as the brochure How do I protect myself from sexually transmitted diseases? that was advertised and distributed in public toilets , which earned him the ridicule (and envy) of the medical profession. Since the propagation of contraception was considered immoral and under threat of punishment, the educational courses on "sexual hygiene" offered by Levy-Lenz had to cover up their actual topic. There was a close connection between the association “Die Ehe” founded by him, the sexual counseling center he maintained and the magazine “Die Ehe” on the one hand, and the Institute for Sexology headed by Magnus Hirschfeld on the other. He was also able to win over authors such as Kurt Tucholsky and Thomas Mann and illustrators such as Otto Dix for the magazine . Levy-Lenz published educational pamphlets under popular scientific titles - with a scientific claim. Since 1925 he was a member of the medical staff at Hirschfeld's institute, where he performed surgical operations such as castration and gender reassignment , the latter in collaboration with Erwin Gohrbandt ; Dorchen Richter and Lili Elbe were among the patients treated .

In 1930 he compiled the first medical book on the subject of abortion .

After he and Peter Schmidt had participated in the experiments with rejuvenation operations according to the method propagated by Eugen Steinach , Levy-Lenz later left the field to Schmidt. After emigrating, he was forced to shift his activity to cosmetic surgery. In post-war Germany he was able to reissue some revised writings and publish an autobiography.

Fonts

  • Ludwig Levy: Martial orthopedics of the extremities , DMW - German Medical Weekly, V.41, No. 15 pp. 436-439
  • How do I protect myself from sexually transmitted diseases? , 1919
  • Peter Schmidt; Ludwig Levy-Lenz: The successes of the Steinach treatment in humans , Berlin: G. Ziemsen, 1921
  • Sexual Disasters: Images from Modern Sex and Marital Life. Leipzig 1926
    • In it: The outlaws. Pp. 259-332.
  • Maria Winter; Ludwig Levy-Lenz: Abortion or Prevention of Pregnancy? , Berlin-Hessenwinkel: Verlag d. New Society, 1928
  • The Enlightened Woman: A Book for All Women , 1928
  • Janine: Diary of a Rejuvenated Person , Berlin: Man Verlag, 1928
  • If women are not allowed to give birth: important u. Method d. Commonly understood contraception. shown , Berlin-Hessenwinkel: Verlag d. New Society 1928
  • Kurt Bendix; Johannes Werthauer; Sophie Lützenkirchen; Ludwig Levy-Lenz: The termination of pregnancy, its requirements and its technique. Significance, legal basis, indications and technique of the indicated abortion in the first three months of pregnancy; A brief guide for doctors and students , Berlin-Hessenwinkel: Baumeister 1930
  • Hexenkessel der Liebe , Leipzig: Lykeion, Kulturwiss. Verlagsges., 1931
  • with Arthur Koestler , A. Willy: Encyclopédie de la vie sexual , Paris, Aldor 1934
  • La femme initiée , Le Caire, R. Schindler, 1943
  • Discreet and indiscreet; Memoirs of a sex doctor , Schmiden b. Stuttgart: Treya-Verl. 1950
  • Cosmetic Surgery Practice: Advances & Improvements Driven , 1954

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Harald Rimmele: Biography of Dorchen Richter at www.hirschfeld.in-berlin.de , last accessed on February 15, 2018
  2. ↑ A Trans Timeline - Trans Media Watch . Retrieved February 3, 2016. 
  3. ^ Doctor Peter Schmidt (1892-1930) at the DNB
personal data
SURNAME Levy-Lenz, Ludwig
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Lenz, Ludwig L.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German physician and sex reformer
DATE OF BIRTH December 1, 1892
PLACE OF BIRTH Poses
DATE OF DEATH October 30, 1966
Place of death Munich