Wilhelm Unger (Author)

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Wilhelm Unger (born June 4, 1904 in Hohensalza , today's Inowrocław, † December 20, 1985 in Cologne ) was a German author , journalist and theater critic . He was the brother of the writer and dramaturge Alfred H. Unger .

Life

Unger's parents, the Jewish doctor Samuel Unger and Flora Unger, who came from Russia, moved to Cologne in 1907, where Wilhelm Unger completed an apprenticeship as a bookseller after graduating from school and studied German, philosophy and psychology in Cologne and Bonn.

He then worked for the Kölnische Zeitung and Westdeutscher Rundfunk. His first book, Beethoven's Legacy , was published in 1929, and it was burned in 1933 .

When the German invasion of Prague was reported on March 15, 1939, Wilhelm Unger fled to England, where his older brother Alfred H. Unger had been living for two years. His sisters Ella and Grete were murdered in the concentration camp , while their parents survived Theresienstadt . After the outbreak of World War II , Unger was deported by ship to Australia as an enemy alien in the summer of 1940, along with around 3,000 other emigrants . He returned to London a year and a half later and worked in the BBC's cultural department until the end of the war . Together with HG Adler , at the instigation of West German publishers, encouraged by Ricarda Huch , Günther Weisenborn and Erich Kästner , he built a German library in post-war London.

In 1947 Wilhelm Unger traveled to Germany on behalf of the British Control Commission , where he took part in the First Post- War German Writers' Congress from October 4 to 8. PEN International had entrusted him with the task of finding twenty unencumbered German writers of national standing for the foundation of a new German PEN .

Not until December 1956 did Wilhelm Unger return to his former hometown of Cologne, where he worked in the features section of the Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger as well as for the WDR , Deutsche Welle and the Allgemeine Wochenzeitung der Juden in Deutschland (today's Jüdische Allgemeine ). As a columnist and theater critic, he used his influence to support young theater talents, including Peter Zadek and Jürgen Flimm .

Unger was, together with Heinrich Böll and Paul Schallück , one of the founders of the Cologne Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation (1958) and the Germania Judaica Library (1959).

Grave: Wilhelm Unger

Wilhelm Unger died on December 20, 1985 in Cologne. He was buried in the Jewish cemetery in Cologne-Bocklemünd (hall 10 no. 55/56).

Unger's library found a place for research in the Salomon Ludwig Steinheim Institute in 1999 .

Fonts

  • Beethoven's legacy , Sieger-Verlag, Cologne, 1929.
  • Taschen-Lexikon der Astrologie , Theodor Hoock Verlag, Cologne, 1934.
  • The Goethe-Year: 1749–1949 , Maxson & Co., London 1952.
  • For the consecration of the restored Roonstrasse synagogue and the Jewish cultural center in Cologne , Synagogue Community, Cologne 1959.
  • What is that a sign for? Selection from published and unpublished works by the critic and author . Edited by Meret Meyer. DuMont, Cologne 1984. ISBN 3-7701-1635-6

Awards

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Wilhelm Unger: The other Germany . In: Willehad P. Eckert and Wilhelm Unger (eds.): HGAdler, the book of friends, voices about the poet and scholar with unpublished poetry . Wienand, Cologne 1975, ISBN 3-87909-062-9 , pp. 14-18 .
personal data
SURNAME Unger, Wilhelm
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Chiron
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German author
DATE OF BIRTH June 4, 1904
PLACE OF BIRTH Hohensalza
DATE OF DEATH December 20, 1985
Place of death Cologne