Reimar Lenz (publicist)

Reimar Lenz (born July 5, 1931 in Munich , † August 26, 2014 in Berlin ) was a German publicist and writer (pseudonym: Wolfgang Harthauser ). Lenz has published numerous articles in newspapers and magazines as well as over 70 articles in books.

Life

Childhood and youth

Reimar Lenz was born in Munich in 1931 as the fourth child of the physician, eugenicist and racial hygienist Fritz Lenz and the first child with his second wife Kara von Borries. From 1934 to 1944, Lenz's father was head of the eugenics department at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Anthropology in Berlin . He tried to have Reimar exempt from the marches of the Pimpfe of the German Young People . Because of his good school performance, he was supposed to enter a national political educational institution , which was prevented with certificates from his parents. Lenz was allowed to hang out with his childhood crush Justus Alenfeld, a child from a “ privileged mixed marriage ”.

In Berlin-Zehlendorf , Lenz experienced the horrors of the war years, "phosphor bomb in the front yard, air mine in the neighborhood and an incendiary bomb in the children's room". In 1944 his parents fled to their mother's relatives in North Rhine-Westphalia. At the age of 14 he was already occupied with Buddhism , and at the age of 15 Lenz founded a boys' association with three principles: 1. All nations are equal. 2. All religions are equal. 3. The cosmic consciousness is to be cultivated. After graduating from high school, he worked in a “work camp” with American quakers in southern Italy for a development aid project to develop a water source.

Truth seeker

From 1955 Lenz studied psychology in Tübingen and joined the Socialist German Student Union (SDS) there. He received a prize from the Philosophical Faculty of the University of Tübingen for his work on the role of time experience for the phenomenology of memories . He later went to the editorial office of Atomzeitalter magazine . He edited the magazines Lyrische Blätter and Alternative for Skriver-Verlag . Two years later Lenz traveled to Moscow for the World Youth Festival . In 1958 he organized vigils in Tübingen. On January 3, 1959, Helmut Gollwitzer opened the anti-nuclear weapons congress in Berlin. The discussion leaders included Peter Meier, Ulrike Meinhof , Norbert Adrian, Reimar Lenz and Eva-Maria Titze. Lenz was co-organizer of the “ Student Congress Against Nuclear Armament ” (early 1959) and headed the “Scientists' Responsibility” section.

Lenz was one of the first in the Federal Republic to take a critical look at French colonial policy and in particular the Algerian war . For Claus Leggewie he is one of the German baggage handlers , the supporters of Algerian independence, who began collecting material about the war of independence in Algeria in 1959. He found supporters in Berlin who constituted themselves as the Algeria project and put together an exhibition on the atrocities of the Algerian war in the FRG. The exhibition toured several German university cities from West Berlin, and the exhibition team left a diary - “a beautiful document of the politicization in the early Federal Republic” - which was printed in alternative in February 1962 (issue 22).

As one of the first German-speaking writers, Lenz dealt critically with the topics of religion and criticism of religion. In January 1960 an essay by Lenz appeared in the magazine alternative under the title Be our guest , a discussion of the Christian faith, including one's own. In the magazine Civis , the organ of the “ Ring of Christian-Democratic Students ”, a comment appeared that saw “God blasphemed”. The member of the Bundestag Hermann Diebäcker filed a criminal complaint for blasphemy ; the case went to the second instance until the Berlin Public Prosecutor's Office finally closed the investigation. The magazine Der Spiegel reported on it.

Lenz was only partially drawn to the 1968 movement and flew to Tangier for six months ; there he wrote his radio play Greedy, Knowledgeable, Mindful . In the early 1960s he was a freelancer for the satirical magazine Pardon and the left-wing magazine Konkret ; in addition there were publications in alternative magazines of the countercultural scene, including Der Metzger . In addition, he wrote works for radio, adult education centers and academies: poetry, radio play, essay, reportage, time criticism. His critical comments on publications in "Springer newspapers" were printed in Der Spiegel . His publication on the persecution of homosexuals in the Hitler dictatorship was more momentous than all other writings ; the first publication took place in 1967 under the pseudonym Wolfgang Harthauser . This publication was recognized as pioneering by the Holocaust Museum in Washington . He was a veteran of the first German movement " Kampf dem Atomtod " and held a peace vigil at the Gedächtniskirche in Berlin for seventeen years .

Act

In 1960 Lenz had suggested a documentary exhibition about the victims of the Algerian war and organized it together with others; this exhibition went through several universities. 1962 and 1964 trips to Istanbul (called "Stambul" by Lenz); some time after a tour through Turkey. The political scientist Claus Leggewie wrote in 1984 in the book Kofferträger, which he published : As a freelance writer, he deals with non-European world views and religions, with early Turkish socialists and Islamic mystics. He had never had a relationship with “revolutionary impatience”; he preferred to focus on the theoretical and practical experience of the subculture and the countercultural scene and, long before others, sought out the subjective factor that had come to be honored again.

He then left the Socialist German Student Union (SDS); Lenz was probably more of a “left-wing liberal” who did not see himself so much as a writer, more as a seeker of truth . In 1983, an evening Friday group was founded and organized with the themes “residents meet foreigners” and “believers meet unbelievers”, with Lenz also bearing responsibility.

In the early 1970s, Lenz moved in with his partner Hans Ingebrand. Born in Westphalia in 1937, he broke off his apprenticeship as a painter and police officer in order to finance his passion for painting as a masseur and caretaker. When the opportunity was created in 2001, they entered into a registered civil partnership . Lenz refused to think about consumerism and lived according to the motto: "Culture is what you do yourself"; he did not see himself as a dropout , but as a newcomer to a new way of life and way of thinking. The film, which was broadcast in 2009 under the title Die Aussteiger as part of the long-term documentary Berlin - Ecke Bundesplatz , portrays the longstanding relationship between Lenz and his partner. On March 24, 2013, WDR television showed Die Aussteiger. A special kind of contemporary document (1986–2012) . The Rundfunk Berlin Brandenburg (RBB) broadcast Der Aussteiger on March 26, 2013 .

Quote

"Yes, I hitchhiked to the east, answered the muezzin's call when it sounded at the caravan. Drove towards the early red, the sun of the Sufis, who once lit prayers and hunger for justice. There are, so to speak, Turkish early socialists ....... Yes, I have visited quite a few ports, but not to drop anchor. I did not follow a pilot. I converted to any religion as further evidence of human creativity. Always remembering the fact that man made gods for himself ..... I read sacred syllables from the mouth of desert sheikhs, gurus ate macrobiotic grains out of hand, but never for long. Desperately I scratched the rubble of history in search of the saints buried by hagiography . "

- Reimar Lenz

editor

• Together with Richard Salis the literary magazine Alternative. Sheets for poetry and prose . Skriver-Verlag, Berlin-Dahlem. No. 1, 1958 - No. 145/146, 1982. This magazine was later taken over by Hildegard Brenner and linked to her own magazine.
• The magazine Alternative , published by Reimar Lenz and Richard Salis, should not be confused with the literary magazine Alternative , for literature and discussion. Edited by Hildegard Brenner. Berlin 1957 to 1982.

Fonts

• The nuclear armament and the intellectual. Skriver, Berlin-Dahlem 1958.
• The new belief. Comments on the social theology of the young left and on the intellectual situation. Jugenddienst Verlag, Wuppertal 1969
• The forgotten whole. On the self-criticism of the religious subculture. Frankfurt am Main 1974.
• Created and exhausted: a dialogue with the story of creation. Verlag der Ev.-Luth. Mission, Erlangen 1975, ISBN 3-87214-071-X .
• Caspar, I love you. An attempt to explain the "love of the enemy" to the US Defense Minister Caspar Weinberger . Word workshop, Bad Waldsee 1984.

Contributions

• Wolfgang Harthauser (pseudonym for Reimar Lenz): The mass murder of homosexuals in the Third Reich. In: Willhart S. Schlegel (Ed.): The big tabu. Rütten and Loening, Munich 1967.
• Reimar Lenz: Confrontation with Gottfried Benn . In: Peter Uwe Hohendahl (Ed.): Benn - Effect against will. Documents on the history of Benn's impact . Frankfurt 1971
• Reimar Lenz: Between the chairs - on fertile ground. Reimar Lenz on Dieter Duhm's new book Man is different. In: Zero - Journal for Holistic Living, No. 9, 1975.
• Reimar Lenz: The de-provincialization of the republic. In: Claus Leggewie (Ed.): Kofferträger. The Left's Algeria Project in Adenauer Germany. Rotbuch, Berlin 1984, ISBN 3-88022-286-X .

Reimar Lenz had organized a documentary exhibition with others for the victims of the Algerian war; this exhibition went through several universities in the early 1960s.

Radio and amateur plays

• Eager, knowledgeable, mindful. Südwestrundfunk (SWR2), 1968.
• SWR2; Radio play by Reimar Lenz
• Cosmos of Ibiza. A travel report. West German Broadcasting Corporation (WDR) 1968.
• Guru Zero meets Dr. Martin Luther. Paraphrase on Luther's catechism. Adult Education Center Tiergarten Berlin. As part of the literary workshop Moabit, 2000.

literature

• Sebastian Haffner :  The Christian Left. In: ders .: On contemporary history . 36 essays. Knaur 1973.

Web links

• Literature by and about Reimar Lenz in the catalog of the German National Library

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} Claudia Lenssen: The loving son. Reimar Lenz: a free spirit. His father: a Nazi. Re-encounter with a protagonist of the documentary "Berlin Ecke Bundesplatz". In: Der Tagesspiegel. March 31, 2013, accessed April 1, 2013 . 
2. ↑ R. Lenz in: Die Brücke , No. 147, 2008
3. ↑ See: Bettina Röhl : This is how communism is fun. Ulrike Meinhof, Klaus Rainer Röhl and the Konkret files . European Publishing House, Hamburg 2006, ISBN 3-434-50600-4 .
4. ↑ ^{a b} Claus Leggewie: luggage carrier. The Algeria Project of the Left in Adenauer-Germany , Rotbuch Verlag, Berlin 1984, ISBN 3-88022-286-X , p. 28 ff.
5. ↑ See the article: The new type. Religious subculture, eco-movement and the new left come together. In: Almanach 13, for literature and theology. Hammer, Wuppertal 1979.
6. ↑ Der Spiegel reported ... In: Der Spiegel . No. 43 , 1961 ( online - About the alleged "blasphemy"). Retrieved March 16, 2013.
7. ↑ The underworld in tails. To use the word "decomposition" . In: Die Zeit , No. 30/1965. Retrieved March 26, 2013.
8. ↑ Small glossary of abuse . In: Die Zeit , No. 48/1961. Retrieved March 26, 2013.
9. ↑ Reimar Lenz: Psychoses, Neuroses, Perversions . In: Der Spiegel . No. 14 , 1969 ( online ). Retrieved March 26, 2013.
10. ^ Peter Mosler: Internationalism of the early sixties: Algeria . Retrieved March 26, 2013.
11. ^ R. Lenz: The war in Algeria . In: The argument. No. 15, March 1960. Retrieved March 26, 2013.
12. ↑ See this: Reimar Lenz - Realize oneself. We want to live in person. In: Robert Jungk , N. R. Müller (Ed.): Alternatives Leben. Signal, Baden-Baden 1980, ISBN 3-7971-0201-1 , pp. 140-146.
13. ↑ documented in the Frankfurter Rundschau of March 14, 2002
14. ↑ The dropouts. ( Memento from December 2, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Documentation from Westdeutscher Rundfunk (WDR), August 18, 2009, with further consequences.
15. ^ Berlin - corner of Bundesplatz: The dropouts. A special kind of contemporary document (1986–2012) ( Memento from December 3, 2013 in the Internet Archive ). WDR television on March 7, 2013. The film was shown on March 24, 2013. Retrieved March 26, 2013
16. ↑ Broadcasting Berlin-Brandenburg . The dropout , broadcast about R. Lenz and H. Ingebrand. March 26, 2013. Retrieved March 26, 2013
17. ↑ Between Stambul and Tangier. In: Werner Pieper (Ed.): Everything seemed possible. 60 sixties about the 1960s and what became of them . Werner Pieper / Die Grüne Kraft, Löhrbach 2007, ISBN 978-3-922708-52-0 .