Richard Groß (Author)

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Richard Groß (born September 1, 1921 in Königsberg (Prussia) ; † September 9, 1968 in East Berlin ) was a German writer and radio play author in the GDR .

Life

He was born in Königsberg, East Prussia, in 1921 . His father was an employee of the general local health insurance fund and a member of the KPD .

Richard Groß, who wrote, painted and made music as a multi-talent, was drafted into the Wehrmacht in 1940 and later became a Soviet prisoner of war . After his dismissal, for family reasons he moved first to Ingolstadt and later to Düsseldorf , where he worked as a commercial clerk at Auto Union . In 1954, Groß moved to the GDR and began to publish there from 1956 as a writer. His works include short stories and novels, some of which are satirical , books for young people and radio plays, in which he primarily addressed his present. He also tried the genre of science fiction literature . The science novel The Man from the Second Millennium became his most famous book. Groß described himself as an " SED writer".

Residing in Eichwalde in Brandenburg , he gave numerous readings to the youth of the district; In addition, he worked in a political function as a member of the Königs Wusterhausen district assembly , especially in the Standing Commission for Culture, and wrote programs for Thälmann memorial services in Ziegenhals . As a staunch communist , Groß also signed up as an unofficial employee of the GDR State Security ("IM Karl"). Richard Groß died in 1968 at the age of 47.

Works

Books

  • 1956: Counterfeit Graff . Cover and illustrations by Ruprecht Haller. Publishing house culture and progress, Berlin (= small youth series, No. 8/1956, 7th year, 2nd April issue).
  • 1957: The escape . Illustrations and linocuts by Gerhard Goßmann . Publishing house Das Neue Berlin, Berlin.
  • 1957: The bloody one . With illustrations by Klaus Poche . Verlag Das Neue Berlin, Berlin (= NB-Romane, Volume 26).
  • 1961: the golden ground. A small town story . The New Berlin, Berlin.
  • 1961: The man from the next millennium. Science fiction . Illustrated by Werner Ruhner. Verlag Neues Leben Berlin, Berlin (= Excitingly told, Volume 40; 1962 book club edition at Book of Youth ).
  • 1961: The nun with the tartan skirt. Novel . Eulenspiegel Verlag Berlin, Berlin.
  • 1962: Together with Josef Sokollik: five years and one day . Publishing house culture and progress, Berlin.
  • 1964: guilty . German Military Publishing House, Berlin (= series of narrators, issue 87).
  • 1964: Adventure in Strasbourg. Novel . Publishing house Das Neue Berlin, Berlin.
  • 1964: Battle in Moabit . German military publisher, Berlin (= facts).

Radio plays

  • 1959: Bankruptcy ( GDR radio , January 4, 1960).
  • 1961: Adventure in Strasbourg (GDR radio, June 15, 1961).
  • 1961: Three whistles of opium (GDR radio, October 4, 1961).
  • 1961: The silver skull (GDR radio, November 17, 1961).
  • 1961: The red buoy (GDR radio, December 8, 1961).
  • 1963: The Golden Floor (GDR radio, March 14, 1963).
  • 1965: The expert is dead. A radio comedy from 2034 (GDR radio).
  • 1964: The presentation on the Mississippi (GDR radio, March 15, 1964).
  • 1964: West of the Appalachian Mountains (GDR radio, November 24, 1964).
  • 1964: Weekend with Carola (GDR radio, November 25, 1964).
  • 1965: Der Freiwillige (GDR radio).
  • 1967: A Made Man (GDR radio).

Guiding principle

Groß read Jules Verne and later Stanislaw Lem enthusiastically in his youth , and he was also interested in the advances in space research , but these did not encourage him to write science fiction. Rather, he saw a different task in the science fiction novel, which he himself pursued, namely to put people in the center instead of technology. A technology-dominated portrayal of the future without people's struggle for a better world order, he said, would induce the reader to lean back and relax in the face of this “bland and boring world”. Only people who have developed further out of the now of socialist society can grasp the youth. He envisioned a society that “ lives in communism , in the classless society in which the needs of our time are banished once and for all to the realm of legend”.

He demanded that his genre colleagues should extrapolate much less technical developments. On the other hand, it is essential to study Marxism-Leninism and read Engels and Bebel . Only then could future ages of perfection be developed and represented based on the model people of the GDR citizen. In short: "First people - then their machines."

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Helmut Fickelscherer: Richard Groß: The man from the other millennium. New life publishing house, Berlin 1961, 304 pp. In: luise-berlin.de. Berlin Reading Signs, May 1997, accessed on February 5, 2018 .
  2. ↑ a b Horst Kopp: The disinformant. Memories of a GDR secret service agent . Das Neue Berlin, Berlin 2016, ISBN 978-3-360-01315-6 , My Favorite IM, p. 103-114 .
  3. ↑ Coming soon in the dictionary? Portraits of young authors . Mitteldeutscher Verlag, Halle (Saale) 1961, Richard Gross, p. 29 .
  4. ↑ a b c (MV): Writer Richard Gross died . In: Märkische Volksstimme . Potsdam September 12, 1968.
  5. ^ Nina Grunenberg: Village silence in Dresden. The Sanssouci Mill and Café Moskwa-Potsdam-Berlin-Magdeburg. Educational trip through Central Germany (3). In: zeit.de. July 17, 1964. Retrieved February 5, 2018 .
  6. ↑ Richard Groß: Is Space Worth a Novel? In: Märkische Volksstimme . Potsdam January 26, 1964.
  7. ↑ Richard Groß: The image of the new man . In: New Germany . No. 279/1963 , October 11, 1963, thoughts while reading Walter Ulbricht's declaration in front of the People's Chamber, p. 5 .

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Great Richard
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German writer and radio play author
DATE OF BIRTH September 1, 1921
PLACE OF BIRTH Königsberg (Prussia)
DATE OF DEATH September 9, 1968
Place of death East Berlin