Franz Werfel: A Life in Prague, Vienna, and Hollywood
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Erzählungen aus zwei Welten. Edited by Adolf D. Klarmann. Vol. 1, Krieg und Nachkrieg. Stockholm: Bermann-Fischer Verlag, 1948. Vol. 2. Berlin and Frankfurt am Main: S. Fischer Verlag, 1952. Vol. 3. Berlin and Frankfurt am Main: S. Fischer Verlag, 1954.
Das Franz Werfel Buch. Edited by Peter Stephan Jungk. Frankfurt am Main: S. Fischer Verlag, 1986.
Die Geschwister von Neapel [The Pascarella Family]. Berlin, Vienna, Leipzig: Paul Zsolnay Verlag, 1931.
Jeremias: Höret die Stimme [Hearken Unto the Voice]. Frankfurt am Main: S. Fischer Verlag, 1956.
Das Lied von Bernadette [The Song of Bernadette]. Stockholm: Bermann-Fischer Verlag, 1941.
Das lyrische Werk. Edited by Adolf D. Klarmann. Frankfurt am Main: S. Fischer Verlag, 1967.
Stern der Ungeborenen: Ein Reiseroman [Star of the Unborn]. Stockholm: Bermann-Fischer Verlag, 1945.
Verdi: Roman der Oper [Verdi: A Novel of the Opera]. Berlin, Vienna, Leipzig: Paul Zsolnay Verlag, 1924.
Der veruntreute Himmel [Embezzled Heaven]. Stockholm: Bermann-Fischer Verlag, 1939.
Die vierzig Tage des Musa Dagh [The Forty Days of Musa Dagh]. Berlin, Vienna, Leipzig: Paul Zsolnay Verlag, 1933.
Zwischen Oben und Unten [Between Heaven and Earth]. Stockholm: Bermann-Fischer Verlag, 1946.
Zwischen Oben und Unten: Prosa, Tagebücher, Aphorismen, Literarische Nachträge. Munich and Vienna: Langen Müller Verlag, 1975.
ENGLISH EDITIONS:
Between Heaven and Earth [Zwischen Oben und Unten]. Translated by Maxim Newmark. New York: Philosophical Library, 1944.
Class Reunion [Der Abituriententag]. Translated by Whittaker Chambers. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1929.
Embezzled Heaven [Der veruntreute Himmel]. Translated by Moray Firth. New York: Viking Press, 1940.
Embezzled Heaven: A Play in a Prologue and Three Acts. Adapted by Laszló Bus-Fekete and M. H. Fay. New York: Viking Press, 1945.
The Eternal Road: A Drama in Four Parts [Der Weg der Verheissung]. English version by Ludwig Lewisohn. New York: Viking Press, 1936.
The Forty Days of Musa Dagh [Die vierzig Tage des Musa Dagh]. Translated by Geoffrey Dunlop. New York: Viking Press, 1934.
Goat Song: A Drama in Five Acts [Bocksgesang]. Translated by Ruth Langner. The Theatre Guild version. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, Page, 1926.
The Grand Tour. Based on S. N. Behrman’s adaptation of Jacobowsky and the Colonel. Book by Michael Stewart and Mark Bramble. Music and lyrics by Jerry Herman. New York: Samuel French, 1979.
Hearken Unto the Voice [Jeremias: Höret die Stimme]. Translated by Moray Firth. New York: Viking Press, 1938.
Jacobowsky and the Colonel: Comedy of a Tragedy in Three Acts [Jacobowsky und der Oberst]. Translated by Gustave O. Arlt. New York: Viking Press, 1944.
Jacobowsky and the Colonel. Original play by Franz Werfel, American play based on same by S. N. Behrman. New York: Random House, 1944.
Juarez and Maximilian: A Dramatic History in Three Phases and Thirteen Pictures [Juarez und Maximilian]. Translated by Ruth Langner. The Theatre Guild version. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1926.
The Man Who Conquered Death [Der Tod des Kleinbürgers; British title, The Death of a Poor Man]. Translated by Clifton P. Fadiman and William A. Drake. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1927.
The Pascarella Family [Die Geschwister von Neapel]. Translated by Dorothy F. Tait-Price. New York: Viking Press, 1935.
Paul Among the Jews [Paulus unter den Juden]. Translated by Paul P. Levertoff. London: Diocesan House, 1928.
Poems. Translated by Edith Abercrombie Snow. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1945.
The Pure in Heart [Barbara oder Die Frömmigkeit; British title, The Hidden Child]. Translated by Geoffrey Dunlop. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1931.
The Song of Bernadette [Das Lied von Bernadette]. Translated by Ludwig Lewisohn. New York: Viking Press, 1942.
The Song of Bernadette: A Play in Three Acts. Dramatized by Jean and Walter Kerr from the novel by Franz Werfel. Chicago: The Dramatic Publishing Company, 1944.
Star of the Unborn [Stern der Ungeborenen]. Translated by Gustave O. Arlt. New York: Viking Press, 1946.
Twilight of a World. Translated by H. T. Lowe-Porter. Contains Poor People, Class Reunion, Estrangement, Severio’s Secret, The Staircase, The Man Who Conquered Death, The House of Mourning, Not the Murderer. New York: Viking Press, 1937.
Verdi: A Novel of the Opera [Verdi: Roman der Oper]. Translated by Helen Jessiman. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1925.
Notes
The following abbreviations have been used for works by Werfel (see Bibliography), or for sources and archives containing material on Werfel.
ADK notes: Unpublished notes on conversations with Alma Mahler-Werfel, Werfel’s sisters (Hanna von Fuchs-Robetin and Marianne Rieser), and others, conducted shortly after Werfel’s death by Adolf D. Klarmann, his friend and editor of many years (Alma Mahler-Werfel Collection, Van Pelt Library, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia)
DA: Der Abituriententag
DB: Deutsche Bibliothek, Frankfurt am Main
DD: Die Dramen
DL: Deutsches Literaturarchiv, Schiller-Nationalmuseum, Marbach am Neckar
DlW: Das lyrische Werk
EzW: Erzählungen aus zwei Welten
FK letters: Author’s correspondence with Dr. František Kafka of Prague
FW/Mahler: Correspondence between Werfel and Alma Mahler-Werfel (Franz Werfel Collection, Department of Special Collections, Research Library of the University of California at Los Angeles)
FW/Spirk: Correspondence between Werfel and Gertrud Spirk (Deutsches Literaturarchiv, Schiller-Nationalmuseum, Marbach am Neckar)
GBF: Letters from Werfel to Gottfried Bermann Fischer (in the possession of the recipient)
KW Archive: Kurt Wolff Archive, Beineke Rare Books Library, Yale University, New Haven
MD conversations: Author’s conversations with Professor Milan Dubrovic of Vienna
M-W Coll.: Alma Mahler-Werfel Collection, Van Pelt Library, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia
SU: Stern der Ungeborenen
UCLA: Franz Werfel Collection, Department of Special Collections, Research Library of the University of California at Los Angeles
ZOU: Zwischen Oben und Unten (1975)
Zsolnay Archive: Archive of Paul Zsolnay Verlag, Vienna
Also abbreviated are six works of secondary literature that were of major importance for this biography.
SL: Max Brod, Streitbares Leben: Autobiographie 1884-1968 (Frankfurt am Main: Insel Verlag, 1979)
Foltin: Lore B. Foltin, Franz Werfel (Stuttgart: J. B. Metzlersche Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1972)
Haas: Willy Haas, Die literarische Welt: Lebenserinnerungen (Munich: Paul List Verlag, 1957)
DRM: Adolf D. Klarmann, Introduction to Das Reich der Mitte, a Franz Werfel reader (Graz: Stiasny-Bücherei, 1961)
ML: Alma Mahler-Werfel, Mein Leben (Frankfurt am Main: S. Fischer Verlag, 1960)
BeV: Kurt Wolff, Briefwechsel eines Verlegers 1911-1963, ed. Bernhard Zeller and Ellen Otten (Frankfurt am Main: Verlag Heinrich Scheffler, 1966)
* * *
[1] Prager Tagblatt, issues for early September 1890.
[2] Birth certificate, M-W Coll.
[3] Rudolf Werfel (September 21, 1858-July 31, 1941) and Albine Werfel, née Kussi (March 10, 1870-1964?), were married on December 15, 1889 (ADK notes, FK letters; see also FW’s own statements in “Autobiographische Skizze,” ZOU, pp. 701ff.)
[4] ADK notes, FK letters.
[5] The full name of FW’s nanny is given in ADK notes. Her dates of birth and death (August 21, 1854-March 23, 1935) were researched by Dr. Kafka, FK letters.
[6] ADK notes.
[7] Adolf D. Klarmann, “Das Weltbild Franz Werfels,” in Wissenschaft und Weltbild (Vienna: Herold Verlag, 1954), pp. 35ff.
[8] ADK notes. These also mention Albine Werfel’s apocryphal anecdote that Father Janko repeatedly exhorted Rudolf Werfel not to convert
to Christianity.
[9] FW, “Erguss und Beichte,” ZOU, pp. 690ff.
[10] See Haas, p. 11; and see his unpublished lecture “Der junge Werfel: Erinnerungen von Willy Haas,” M-W Coll.
[11] See FW’s poem “Der dicke Mann im Spiegel,” DlW, pp. 19f., and Johannes Urzidil, Prager Triptychon (Munich: Langen Müller Verlag, 1960), p. 13.
[12] “Piarists, bad Christians!” was a taunting cry addressed to the children who went to that school. See Peter Demetz, René Rilkes Prager Jahre (Düsseldorf: Eugen Diederichs Verlag, 1953), p. 34.
[13] Dr. Kafka (FK letters) managed to obtain exact details of FW’s schooldays from the archives of Prague. According to these, FW went to the Piarist school from 1896 to 1900, to the Royal and Imperial German Gymnasium in the New Town from 1900 to 1903, and to the Royal and Imperial German Gymnasium on Stefansgasse from 1904 to 1909. All of his school records have been preserved, as have the names of his teachers and classmates. The famous actor Ernst Deutsch was FW’s schoolmate at the Piarists’, as was the renowned graphic artist and illustrator Walter Trier, who was the son of a glove manufacturer too.
[14] See FW’s poem “Der Kinderanzug,” DlW, pp. 14f., and SU, pp. 286f.
[15] Johanna Werfel. Dr. Kafka (FK letters) gives her birthdate as July 11, 1894; other sources give 1896.
[16] The main evidence for this comes from FW’s school reports; he missed so many classes that he did not receive any grades for a semester. A letter to his aunt Emilie Böhm, one of his father’s sisters, written between 1897 and 1899, during his time at the Piarist school, has been preserved (DL). As it is the earliest extant written document by FW, it is quoted here verbatim: “Dearest Aunt! On your birthday celebration today I send you many good wishes. May the dear Lord make my dear Auntie very happy and jolly, may he shower the dear aunt with his richest blessings, may he repay her many times over for all the good things she has done in her life! Ardent kisses from your nephew Franz.”
[17] Born October 30, 1899 (FK letters).
[18] ADK notes.
[19] Unpublished memoirs of František Kraus, Prague, M-W Coll.; see also the official letterhead of the firm Werfel & Böhm.
[20] On the entire complex of questions surrounding the relationships of Jews, Germans, and Czechs, and on the actions of the employees of the Werfel glove factory, see Christoph Stölzl, Kafkas böses Böhmen: Zur Sozialgeschichte eines Prager Juden (Munich: Edition text + kritik, 1975).
[21] FW, “Erguss und Beichte,” ZOU, pp. 690ff.
[22] See FW’s poem “An den guten Kameraden,” in DlW, pp. 17f., and Der Gute Kamerad, volumes for 1899 to ca. 1907.
[23] ADK notes.
[24] See May issues of Prager Tagblatt for any year during this period.
[25] See Willy Haas, “Werfels erster Lehrmeister,” in Die literarische Welt, no. 26 (June 29, 1928); Haas says of Neumann (1838-1910), “... an old wandering comedian with Caesarian pretensions — the scintillating form, glossy with brillantine, hair tonic, and makeup, tightly corseted, both Napoleonic and sleazy, of old Angelo Neumann!... He is the true social ruler of this city... Out of thin air, he constructs a society, salons, conversations, sophistication, even something like a social hierarchy. The center of this mirage of a society is the opera box; everything depends on it. And the center of that center is the May Festival, the great annual Italian stagione in May. Caruso comes to sing, and so do Battistini, Arimondi, Brombara, La Tetrazzini, La Hidalgo; Maestro Toscanini from Milan’s Scala is the conductor. All Verdi’s main works are performed... An entire society literally constitutes itself around this musical event.”
[26] In a letter to his lover Gertrud Spirk dated November 16, 1916, FW wrote: “When, as a child, I was taken to the theater, I was always overwhelmed by great sadness during the first act because things kept moving on, there was no stopping them, and in a short while it would all be over. I always yearned terribly for the happiness of expectation in the mornings” (FW/Spirk).
[27] ADK notes. See also FW’s novella Die Entfremdung, EzW, vol. 2, pp. 67f., 88f.
[28] See FW, “Erguss und Beichte,” ZOU, pp. 690ff. “Up to my fourteenth year, my only and most faithful friend was a Christian. He died of consumption at the age of eighteen” (p. 693).
[29] Ibid. FW refers to him only as “F.J.”; the full name of this classmate was deduced from school documents provided by Dr. František Kafka.
[30] See Haas, p. 15, and Prager Tagblatt, June 1901.
[31] See, for instance, SU, p. 76: “Ten weeks of summer vacation lie before me — an eternity of laziness, of curiosity, of physical pleasure and spiritual happiness: swimming in the lake, sailing, wild games with other boys, croquet tournaments, drives, outings, mountain climbing, picnics...”
[32] FK letters.
[33] FW, “Erguss und Beichte,” ZOU, pp. 690ff.
[34] Ibid.
[35] ADK notes. See also Haas, p. 18: “When one entered the wide, glossy-white corridors of the Werfels’ apartment, there was always a smell of fresh lacquer or other ingredients of extremely genteel cleanliness.”
[36] Interview with FW in Green Sheet Journal, Milwaukee, Wis. (March 17, 1944). See also FW’s novella Kleine Verhältnisse, EzW, vol. 2, pp. 238, 249. No doubt the description of the eleven-year-old Hugo’s paternal home is largely based on the Werfel apartment at Mariengasse 41.
[37] ADK notes. On Erna Tschepper, see also FW’s Kleine Verhältnisse, EzW, vol. 2, where FW calls her Erna Tappert. Dr. Kafka discovered that Erna Tschepper was born on May 9, 1869, in Reichenberg; she was a Catholic and officially listed her profession as “governess” (FK letters).
[38] FW in a 1917 letter to Gertrud Spirk: “I remember that I cried secretly for two nights after our bonne told me she would be leaving us... One was still a member of the human race, then” (FW/Spirk).
[39] The Prager Tagblatt for May 1904 gives extensive reports on festival performances and Caruso’s triumphal visit.
[40] “Autobiographische Skizze,” ZOU, pp. 701ff.
[41] ADK notes.
[42] Ibid.
[43] Ibid.
[44] Ibid.
[45] Ibid.
[46] FK letters. The change of schools may have been suggested by Rabbi Kisch, who taught at the Stefansgymnasium.
[47] Haas, “Der junge Werfel,” M-W Coll.
[48] Haas, p. 14.
[49] See the chapter “Geheimnisse des alten Prag” in ibid., pp. 18ff.
[50] FW notebook, UCLA.
[51] DD, vol. 2, p. 518.
[52] ADK notes. See also “Die Katze,” ZOU, pp. 815ff.
[53] See Haas; and see his “Der junge Werfel,” M-W Coll.
[54] Author’s conversation with Anuschka Deutsch, May 1983. The precise biographical data were researched by Dr. Kafka (FK letters).
[55] Communication from Freda Morawetz, Maria Glaser’s sister, to Dr. Kafka (FK letters).
[56] See DA, p. 175.
[57] From “Die Schöne und das peinliche Wort,” DlW, p. 21.
[58] From “Der Getreue,” ibid., p. 41.
[59] ADK notes.
[60] Ibid.
[61] Unpublished memoirs of František Kraus, Prague, M-W Coll.
[62] Paul Kornfeld (1889-1942): His diary from his schooldays is preserved in DL.
[63] FK letters. In his seventh year of gymnasium, FW missed eighty hours, of which thirty-one were unexcused. See also DA.
[64] See Prager Tagblatt for the years 1905-7.
[65] See FW’s “Sechs Setterime zu Ehren des Frühlings von Neunzehnhundertundfünf,” DlW, p. 489.
[66] Prager Tagblatt, May 1905.
[67] The poem appeared in the Sunday literary supplement on February 23, 1908.
[68] See FW’s Die Versuchung (1912), DD, vol. 1, p. 32.
[69] From “Die Gärten der Stadt,” DlW, p. 514. Willy Haas claims, in his published and unpublished memoirs, that he sent FW’s poems to numerous newspaper editors, among them Camill Hoffmann of Die Zeit. In his autobiography,
Streitbares Leben, Max Brod writes that it was he who sent an envelope stuffed with FW’s poems to Hoffmann. In this connection, Brod quotes an undated letter from Haas in which the latter thanks him for doing this. Brod does mention that it was Haas who introduced nineteen-year-old FW to him, but at the time, the poem in question had long since appeared. Hence, it seems that Brod assumes unwarranted credit, unless he as well as Haas sent those poems to Camill Hoffmann. See Joachim Unseld, Franz Kafka: Ein Schriftstellerleben (Munich: Hanser Verlag, 1982), p. 18: “Brod’s dating is imprecise... In his memoirs, Brod projects later events onto earlier ones” — and possibly the reverse).
[70] FK letters.
[71] See FW, Das Trauerhaus, EzW, vol. 2, pp. 181ff.
[72] Haas, p. 12.
[73] SL, pp. 19ff.; see also DA, pp. 152ff.
[74] In DL.
[75] SL, p. 23.
[76] I spoke with Frau Deutsch, the widow of the actor Ernst Deutsch, in May 1983; she died in 1984.
[77] FK letters. Apparently FW’s name does not appear in the registrar’s records of the university.
[78] FW, “Autobiographische Skizze,” ZOU, pp. 701ff.
[79] See Hans Demetz, “Der Prager Dichterkreis oder die Arco-Nauten,” Tiroler Tageszeitung, February 6, 1971.
[80] Otto Pick (1886-1940), Rudolf Fuchs (1890-1942), Johannes Urzidil (1896-1970), Oskar Baum (1883-1941), Ernst Polak (1886-1947).
[81] See Haas; and see his “Der junge Werfel,” M-W Coll.
[82] Unpublished letter from FW to Axel Juncker (1890-1952), dated July 28, 1910, in the possession of FW scholar Ruth Stadelmann. Thus, Brod’s claim (SL, pp. 43ff.) that he himself sent the manuscript of Der Weltfreund (as the published book was called) to Axel Juncker Verlag is clearly untenable.
[83] Author’s conversation with Anna Mahler, who recalled that FW had told her this story several times.
[84] Unpublished letter from FW to Axel Juncker, Marienbad, August 20, 1910; in DL.
[85] FW, “Zauberer Moissi,” ZOU, pp. 417f.
[86] FW to Axel Juncker, Hamburg, October 24, 1910; in Kasimir Edschnid, ed., Briefe des Expressionismus, p. 9.
[87] Anna Mahler’s recollection, from conversations with FW about his youth. Richard Specht also gives credence to this story in his biography Franz Werfel: Versuch einer Zeitspiegelung (Vienna: Paul Zsolnay Verlag, 1926).