Meta Samson
Meta Samson (born March 26, 1894 in Berlin , † November 1942 in Auschwitz ) was a German educator, journalist and children's book author.
life and work
Meta Samson learned the profession of educator at the Pestalozzi-Froebel School . During the First World War she opened a kindergarten in Berlin . She also worked as a journalist on issues such as reform pedagogy and women's emancipation issues.
She had to give up her position as an educator after power was handed over to the National Socialists in 1933. In order to support her three children, she gave tutoring and worked as a domestic help. Their older children Gert and Ellen managed to emigrate to Palestine and the USA .
Samson stayed in Berlin with her youngest daughter, Marlene, and after limited professional opportunities , she wrote children's books.
Her first and only book was the autobiographical book "Spatz macht sich". It was the last printed Jewish children's book in autumn 1938. Because all Jewish publishers were banned after it went to press, the book was no longer officially sold. Meta Samson and her daughter Marlene were deported to Auschwitz three days before her 14th birthday in November 1942 and gassed there.
In 1990 her nephew Walter Lindenberg, who was able to flee to England on a Kindertransport , organized a new edition of the book and wrote an afterword to it.
Works
- Sparrow makes himself . Illustrations by Lilly Szkolny, Berlin: Philo, Jüdischer Buchverlag 1938 DNB
- Sparrow makes himself . Altberliner Verlag , Berlin 1990, ISBN 3-357-00336-8 .
- Kerstin Schoor: From the literary center to the literary ghetto: German-Jewish literary culture in Berlin between 1933 and 1945 . Göttingen: Wallstein, 2010 ISBN 978-3-8353-0656-1 .
literature
- Hadassah Key note: Meta Samson , in: Bettina Kümmerling-Meibauer (Hrsg.): Jewish children's literature: history, traditions, perspectives. Exhibition catalog . Wiesbaden 2005, p. 110 f.
- Samson, Meta , in: Joseph Walk (ed.): Short biographies on the history of the Jews 1918–1945 . Munich: Saur 1988, ISBN 3-598-10477-4 , p. 325.
- Jana Mikota: Jewish writers - rediscovered: "Should Spatz be happy or sad that his older siblings were so far away?" The writer, journalist and educator Meta Samson . In: Medaon 4 (2010), 6 ( online ).
Web links
- Literature by and about Meta Samson in the catalog of the German National Library
Individual evidence
- ↑ Jana Mikota: Jewish writers - rediscovered: "Should Spatz be happy or sad that the older siblings were so far away?" The writer, journalist and educator Meta Samson , Medaon, magazine for Jewish life in research and education, Edition 6/2010
- ^ Exhibition of Jewish children's books: Baby Moses in a rinsing basket
- ↑ Bettina Kümmerling-Meibauer: Childhood Images in Jewish Children's Literature of the 20th Century (PDF; 74 kB)
- ↑ Monday, July 15, 2013, 6.30 p.m .: Meta Samson - “Spatz macht sich” The last children's book to be published in Nazi Germany by the Jewish Philo publishing house
- ^ Philo-Verlag (formerly Philo-Verlag) in the Lexicon Berlin-Charlottenburg / Wilmersdorf from A to Z
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Samson, Meta |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German pedagogue, journalist and children's book author |
| DATE OF BIRTH | March 26, 1894 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Berlin |
| DATE OF DEATH | November 1942 |
| Place of death | Auschwitz |