The Lady in Gold
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2 “TROTTEL—IDIOT! WALK FASTER!”: Maria Altmann, interviews, 2006.
3 LUISE’S WEDDING BANQUET: Nelly Auersperg, archive.
4 FOR HER WEDDING PHOTO, LUISE STARED: Nelly Auersperg, archive.
5 EVEN AS A MARRIED WOMAN: Rinesch, unpublished memoir.
6 CHRISTL WAS ALREADY HAVING: Tony Felsovanyi and Maria Altmann, interviews.
7 “FLAMING SOCIALIST”: Tony Felsovanyi, interviews, Menlo Park, June 23, 2006.
8 ANTON FELSOVANYI CONQUERED CHRISTL: Tony Felsovanyi, interviews, Menlo Park, June 23, 2006.
9 “A BIG NAZI”: Tony Felsovanyi, interviews, Menlo Park, June 23, 2006.
10 SHE QUIETLY EXPLAINED THAT CHRISTL’S RELATIONSHIP: Tony Felsovanyi, interviews, Menlo Park, June 23, 2006, and by telephone, 2006–2011.
STUBENBASTEI
1 JEWS, JUST 2.8 PERCENT: Evan Burr Bukey, Hitler’s Austria: Popular Sentiment in the Nazi Era, 1938–1945 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2000), p. 131.
2 “THE SPIRIT OF THE TOWN”; “VERY HUMANISTIC”; “JEWISH HUMOR”: Rinesch, memoir.
3 “AN ASPIRING OPERA SINGER”: Rinesch, memoir.
4 BERNHARD ALTMANN SWEPT INTO: Maria Altmann, interview, June 2006.
5 “IF I WERE A PRINCE”: Maria Altmann, interview, June 2006.
THE HOUSEPAINTER FROM AUSTRIA
1 “REVELATION OF THE JEWISH RACIAL SOUL”: R. J. Overy, The Dictators: Hitler’s Germany and Stalin’s Russia (London: Allen Lane, 2004), p. 360; Sultano and Werkner, Oskar Kokoschka, p. 80.
2 “AN INSULT TO GERMAN WOMANHOOD”: Barbara McCloskey, Artists of World War II (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2005), p. 50.
3 “THE JEWISH LONGING FOR WILDNESS”: Alan Milchman and Alan Rosenberg, Postmodernism and the Holocaust (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1998), p. 93.
4 “NATURE AS SEEN BY SICK MINDS”: Overy, The Dictators, p. 360.
5 “AS FOR THE DEGENERATE ARTISTS”: Text of Hitler’s 1937 Munich speech, “Die Kunst ist in den Volkern begrundet,” in E. M. Forster and Philip Gardner, Commonplace Book (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1987), p. 110.
6 “HOUSEPAINTER FROM AUSTRIA”: Sultano and Werkner, Oskar Kokoschka, p. 12.
7 “WE CALL UPON OUR ARTISTS”: Robert M. Edsel, Rescuing Da Vinci: Hitler and the Nazis Stole Europe’s Great Art, America and Her Allies Recovered It (Dallas: Laurel Publishing, 2006), p. 9.
8 HITLER KNEW HE WAS WIELDING: Max Knight, trans., A Confidential Matter: The Letters of Richard Strauss and Stefan Zweig (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977), p. 115.
9 “TO STRAUSS THE COMPOSER”: Norman Del Mar, Richard Strauss: A Critical Commentary on His Life and Works, vol. 3 (London: Barrie & Jenkins, 1978), p. 47.
10 THE NAZIS BANNED FELIX SALTEN’S 1923 BAMBI: Siegried Mattl and Werner Michael Schwarz, Felix Salten (Vienna: Holzhauren Verlag, 2006), p. 63, say Bambi was declared verboten in Germany in 1935, and in 1936 the Gestapo ordered copies seized. See also Angela Lambert, The Lost Life of Eva Braun (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2006), p. 32.
11 MORE THAN SIXTEEN THOUSAND “DEGENERATE” ARTWORKS: Lynn H. Nicholas, The Rape of Europa (New York: Vintage, 1995), p. 23.
12 “TO MAKE SOME MONEY”: Ibid.
13 “EXHIBITION OF JEWISH COMMUNIST ART”: Sultano and Werkner, Oskar Kokoschka, p. 68.
WITH OR WITHOUT YOU
1 FRITZ’S COLLECTION INCLUDED: Maria Altmann, interviews, June 16, 2006.
2 MARIA PANICKED: Maria Altmann, interviews, June 16, 2006.
3 “IF YOU MARRY HIM”: Maria Altmann, interviews, June 2006.
4 MARIA’S MOTHER MADE THE BEST OF IT: In the private family memoir, one contributor said some in the family were “horrified” that Maria was marrying Fritz. In some cases, the accounts given in my interviews were supported by interviews in an early 248-page draft of a privately published family memoir, undertaken by the Prentice and Bentley branch of the family, with interviews with Maria Altmann, Nelly Auersperg, and others. Michael Bentley allowed me to read an early draft in Vancouver in August 2006.
5 “NO. WE ARE GALICIAN”: Maria Altmann, interviews, 2001.
6 “WE DON’T BELIEVE IN DOWRIES”: Maria Altmann, interviews, 2001. According to the private family memoir, Fritz also brushed off the idea of a dowry in a separate appointment with Gustav.
7 “BACK IN THE DAY”: Poem by Julius Bauer, Maria Altmann, archive. “Tisch-Rede zur Feier des Hochzeitpaares, Fritz und Maria, am December 1937, Gesprochen von Julius Bauer.”
8 MARIA WAS STUNG: Maria Altmann, interviews, 2007.
9 “THE SILENCE OF THE BRIDAL BED”: Edgar Alfred Bowring, ed., The Poems of Goethe (Whitefish, MT: Kessinger, 2004), p. 61.
10 “STUPID IRON VIRGIN”: Maria Altmann, interviews, June 16, 2006.
11 “LENE!”: Maria Altmann, interviews, June 16, 2006.
12 “WELL, AT LEAST NOW I KNOW”: Maria Altmann, interviews, June 16, 2006.
THE RETURN OF THE NATIVE
1 WHEN THEY RETURNED, BERNHARD HANDED THEM THE KEYS: Maria Altmann, interviews, 2001.
2 “WELL, WE EASTERN JEWS”: Maria Altmann, interviews, 2001.
3 “THE BLOCH-BAUERS ARE NOT OSTJUDEN”: Maria Altmann, interviews, 2001.
4 A FEW DAYS LATER, A MESSENGER ARRIVED: Maria Altmann, interviews, 2001.
5 “GERMAN BLOOD:” Peter Utgaard, Remembering and Forgetting Nazism: Education, National Identity and the Victim Myth in Postwar Austria (New York: Berghahn Books, 2003), p. 75.
6 BUT ROBERT WOULDN’T HEAR OF: Thea Bentley, interview, Vancouver, Aug. 2006.
7 “HEIL HITLER!” AND “JEWS, KICK THE BUCKET!”: Hans Mühlbacher, interviews, Mar. 2006.
8 “AUSTRIA WILL LIVE AGAIN”: Hans Mühlbacher, interviews, Mar. 2006.
9 “IT’S JUST NONSENSE”: Hans Mühlbacher, interviews, 2007.
10 A FEW MORNINGS LATER, MARIA AWOKE: Maria Altmann, interviews, 2001.
11 “ARE YOU SURE?”: Maria Altmann, interviews, 2007.
12 GET US TO THE HUNGARIAN BORDER: Interviews with Maria Altmann and Bernhard’s son, Cecil Altmann, 2001.
13 “DO YOU KNOW YOUR HUSBAND”: Maria Altmann, interview, 2001.
14 “WOULD YOU MIND”: Maria Altmann, interview.
15 CHRISTL COULDN’T TALK LONG: Maria Altmann, interviews, 2006–2007.
16 HE FOUND HIS OLD WORLD WAR I PISTOL: Tony Felsovanyi, Maria Altmann, interviews.
17 “HE WAS SO HAPPY”: Maria Altmann, interviews.
18 SOMETIMES THE WATER WAS MIXED WITH ACID: Berkley, Vienna and Its Jews, p. 259.
19 THEY GRABBED A WOMAN: Thomas Weyr, The Setting of the Pearl: Vienna Under Hitler (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), p. 77.
20 JEERING CROWDS WERE PLUNDERING: Mark Mazower, Hitler’s Empire (New York: Penguin, 2008), p. 49.
21 DAPPER LOUIS ROTHSCHILD: Petropoulos, Art as Politics in the Third Reich, p. 84.
22 THE GESTAPO AGENTS WHO “SEARCHED” THE HOME: Saul Friedlander, Nazi Germany and the Jews, vol. 1: The Years of Persecution, 1939–1945 (New York: HarperCollins, 1997), p. 243.
23 “BUT THE ANSCHLUSS HAS NONETHELESS”: Gordon Brook-Shepherd, Anschluss (London: Macmillan, 1963), p. 203.
24 “I HAVE BEEN INFORMED”: David Lehr, Austria Before and After the Anschluss (Pittsburgh: Dorrance, 2000), p. 113.
25 HUNDREDS OF VIENNESE JEWS: Mazower, Hitler’s Empire, p. 50.
26 “IN THE PAST, GERMANS”: Jonathan Goldstein, The Jews of China, vol. 2 (Armonk, NY, and London: M. E. Sharpe, 1999), p. 114.
LOVE LETTERS FROM A BRIDE
1 “MY BELOVED FRITZL”: Letter, Maria Altmann, Apr. 29, 1938. The 1938 correspondence between Maria Altmann and Fritz Altmann is courtesy of Maria Altmann.
2 “MY BELOVED DUCKLING!”: Letter from Fritz Altmann to Maria Altmann, Apr. 28, 1938.
3 “FROM AN OLD AUSTRIAN”: Maria Altmann, interviews; also private family memoir.
4 “MY BELOVED FRITZL”: Letter from Maria Altmann to Fritz Altmann, Apr. 30, 193
8.
5 “HAS PROBLEMS WITH HIS NERVES”: Letter from Maria Altmann to Fritz, May 5, 1938.
6 “THE DUCKLING RUFFLES HER FEATHERS”: Letter from Thea Bentley to Fritz Altmann, May 6, 1938.
7 SEVEN CLOSE FAMILY FRIENDS: Maria Altmann, interviews.
8 “WE’RE THINKING OF YOU”: Postcard, Therese Bloch-Bauer, Gustav Bloch-Bauer, and Maria Altmann to Fritz Altmann, undated.
9 “MY DEAREST FRITZL”: Letter, undated, from Maria Altmann to Fritz Altmann, May 11, 1938.
10 BERNHARD HAD TRAMPED THROUGH: Cecil Altmann, interview.
11 “I WENT AWAY QUITE DEPRESSED”: Letter from Maria Altmann to Fritz Altmann, May 13, 1938.
12 “MY BELOVED WIFE”: Letter from Fritz Altmann to Maria Altmann, May 15, 1938.
13 “WE BOTH HAVE TO BE PATIENT”: Letter from Maria Altmann to Fritz Altmann, May 16, 1938.
14 “MY LOVE, TODAY”: Letter from Maria Altmann to Fritz Altmann, May 18, 1938.
15 HE WAS BORN IN 1910: Jerzy Ficowski, Regions of the Great Heresy: Bruno Schulz, a Biographic Portrait (New York: W. W. Norton, 2003), p. 164.
16 WHEN HITLER ROSE TO POWER: Ibid.
17 RELEASED IN 1937, LANDAU HEADED: Ibid.
18 LANDAU WAS PLAYING A STEALTHY GAME: Petropoulos, “Report of Professor Jonathan Petropoulos.”
19 “FROM THE POST I GET”: Letter from Fritz Altmann to Maria Altmann, May 22, 1938.
20 THE NUREMBERG LAWS: Bukey, Hitler’s Austria, p. 135.
21 THERE WERE 170,000 JEWS IN VIENNA: Ibid., p. 131.
22 “I CAN HEARTILY RECOMMEND”: Ernest Jones, The Life and Work of Sigmund Freud (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1963), p. 506. Freud was rephrasing the slogan of a Vienna ad.
23 “DEAREST WIFE”: Letter from Fritz Altmann to Maria Altmann, May 22, 1938.
24 “DESPERATELY BEGGING FOR INFORMATION”: Letter from Maria Altmann to the Dachau administration, May 24, 1938.
WORK MAKES FREEDOM
1 “THE GANGSTER’S METHOD”: Fritz Altmann, My Adventures and Escape from Nazi Germany, undated. Courtesy of Maria Altmann.
2 THEY SET UP A MEETING IN PARIS: Ibid.
3 AS THE AFTERNOON WORE ON: Dirk Riedel, research associate, Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial.
4 “EVERYTHING IN DACHAU IS PROHIBITED”: Paul Cummins, Dachau Song: The Twentieth-Century Odyssey of Herbert Zipper (New York: Peter Lang, 1992), p. 77.
5 SOME OF THE FIVE HUNDRED MEN: Ibid., p. 76.
6 THE DEPOSED MAYOR OF VIENNA: Giles MacDonogh, 1938: Hitler’s Gamble (London: Constable, 2009), p. 109.
7 ALSO IN DACHAU, UNBELIEVABLY, WERE ERNST AND MAXIMILIAN HOHENBERG: Ibid. See also Cummins, Dachau Song, pp. 86–87.
8 “JEWS AND JEW LACKEYS”: Marie-Therese Arnbom and Christoph Wagner-Trenkwitz, Grüss mich Gott! Fritz Grünbaum 1880–1941: Eine Biographie (Vienna: Christian Brandstätter Verlag, 2005), p. 78.
9 “YOUR MOTHER CROAKED”: Cummins, Dachau Song, p. 81.
10 “MY BELOVED GOOD WIFE”: Letter from Fritz Altmann to Maria Altmann, June 1, 1938.
11 “I’M FIT AS A FIDDLE”: Letter from Fritz Altmann to Maria Altmann, June 6, 1938.
12 ON THIS LEVEL PLAYING FIELD: Cummins, Dachau Song, p. 87.
13 “THAT I WAS THE PERSON”: Altmann, My Adventures and Escape.
14 “MY BELOVED HUSBAND”: Letter from Maria Altmann to Fritz Altmann, June 17, 1938.
15 “AFTER YOUR LAST LETTER”: Letter from Fritz Altmann to Maria Altmann, July 3, 1938.
16 HE HELD UP A NEWSPAPER OBITUARY: Maria Altmann, interviews, 2001.
17 AS HE WORKED, HE BEGAN TO SING: Maria Altmann, private family memoir.
18 “WHEN YOUR HEART WITHIN YOU BREAKS”: Franz Liszt, The Schubert Song Transcriptions for Solo Piano/Series II: The Complete Winterreise and Seven Other Great Songs (New York: Dover, 1996).
THUNDER AT TWILIGHT
1 “THINGS WILL BE DIFFERENT NOW”: Maria Altmann, interviews, 2006.
2 “WHERE IS FRITZL?”: Maria Altmann, interviews, 2006.
3 ONE OF THE RICHTHOFEN BARONS: Rinesch, memoir.
4 “I’M IN LOVE WITH MY HUSBAND”: Maria Altmann, notes to herself while under house arrest, Sept. 29, 1938. Courtesy of Maria Altmann.
5 “YOU DON’T LOOK LIKE A JEW”: Rinesch, memoir.
6 “I HAVE FOUND A WAY”: Maria Altmann, interviews, 2006.
7 “GO WITH GOD”: Maria Altmann, interviews, 2006.
8 “I WAS ADMIRING YOUR RAINCOAT”: Maria Altmann, interviews.
9 THEY ARRESTED JAN HONNEF: Letter from Jules Huf to Maria Altmann, June 6, 1999.
DECENT HONORABLE PEOPLE
1 “ALL THE JEWISH STUDENTS”: Thea Bentley, interview, Aug. 9, 2006.
2 “YOU DON’T LIKE ME”: Thea Bentley, interview, Aug. 9, 2006.
3 “WE HAVE TO GET OUT”: Thea Bentley, interview, Aug. 9, 2006.
4 “TODAY GERMANY BELONGS TO US”: Thea Bentley, interview, Aug. 9, 2006.
5 “WE’RE NOT GOING ANYWHERE”: Thea Bentley, interview, Aug. 9, 2006.
6 ONE DAY THERE WAS A KNOCK: Thea Bentley, interview, Aug. 9, 2006.
7 GUSTAV RINESCH HAD WARNED THE FAMILY: Thea Bentley, private family memoir.
8 THE OBSTETRICIAN CAREFULLY EXAMINED: Thea Bentley, interview, Aug. 9, 2006.
GAY MARRIAGE
1 SOME GAY MEN MARRIED JEWISH WOMEN: Thea Bentley, interview, Aug. 9, 2006. Thea Bentley also had an account in a draft of the collective family memoir, as does the Rinesch memoir.
2 ADA FOUND A DUTCH “FIANCÉ”: Rinesch, memoir.
3 “NATURALLY,” GUSTAV RINESCH OBSERVED: Rinesch, memoir.
4 ADA BOUGHT A SOLITAIRE: Rinesch, memoir.
5 “NOT A WORD ABOUT SENTIMENT”: Rinesch, memoir.
6 “VERY DECENT”: Thea Bentley, interview, Aug. 9, 2006.
THE ORIENT EXPRESS
1 RINESCH HELPED THEA AND ROBERT: Rinesch, memoir.
2 LUISE SENT SERVANTS: Thea Bentley, interview, Aug. 9, 2006; Rinesch, memoir.
3 THEN THE TRAIN SLOWED: Thea Bentley, interview, Aug. 9, 2006.
4 SOON THE CARABINIERE WAS GALLANTLY FETCHING: Thea Bentley, interview, Aug. 9, 2006.
5 MEN ROUNDED UP JEWS: Alan E. Steinweis, Kristallnacht 1938 (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2009), p. 94.
6 THREE DAYS BEFORE CHRISTMAS, THERESE BEGAN: Claims Resolution Tribunal, Timeline of Events Re: Account of Österreichische Zuckerindustries AG Syndicate, Exhibit C, p. 4 (“December 22: Therese Bloch-Bauer renounces her late husband’s legacy in an effort to gain permission to leave Austria”).
THE AUTOGRAPH HUNTER
1 “WE’RE GOING TO HAVE TO LEAVE”: Emile Zuckerkandl, interview, June 24, 2006, and subsequent telephone interviews.
2 FERDINAND PROVIDED FINANCIAL HELP: Petropoulos, “Report of Professor Jonathan Petropoulos,” p. 43, citing Ruth Pleyer.
3 AMALIE’S ARRESTING UNFINISHED KLIMT PORTRAIT: Ibid., pp. 24, 42.
4 “ANY NONSENSE CAN ATTAIN IMPORTANCE”: Albert Einstein, inscription in the autograph book of Emile Zuckerkandl, 1937–38, trans. Emile Zuckerkandl. Courtesy of Emile Zuckerkandl.
5 “IF HUMANS, NOW THAT AT LONG LAST”: Zuckerkandl autograph book.
6 “FOR EMILE ZUCKERKANDL”: Zuckerkandl autograph book.
7 “SO, YOU ARE AN AUTOGRAPH HUNTER”: Zuckerkandl autograph book.
8 “A DESCENDANT OF NOBLE LINEAGE”: Zuckerkandl autograph book.
9 “ONE WILL ALWAYS FORGET”: Zuckerkandl autograph book.
10 “HAS NOT EVERYTHING”: Zuckerkandl autograph book.
11 “FOR KIND REMEMBRANCE”: Zuckerkandl autograph book.
12 IF I HAD A GUN: Emile Zuckerkandl, interviews.
13 “BURN YOUR DIARY”: Emile Zuckerkandl, interviews.
14 HE PULLED IT OFF THE WALL: Emile Zuckerkandl, interviews.
15 FRIEDELL HAD ONCE SUGGESTED: Szeps, My Life, p. 318.
16 “A DICTATORSHIP WITHOUT A GOSPEL OF HATRED”: Ibid.
17 HE WALKED
TO HIS OPEN WINDOW: Mahler and Ashton, And the Bridge Is Love, p. 220.
STEALING BEAUTY
1 “THOUSANDS OF JEWS WERE FLEEING”: Czernin, Die Falschung, pp. 166–67.
2 NOW HE COULD GET HIS HANDS ON: Petropoulos, “Report of Professor Jonathan Petropoulos,” p. 12.
3 LEOPOLD RUPPRECHT REPRESENTED: Ibid.
4 “DEGENERATE ARTISTS”: Magdalene Magnin-Haberditzl, Familien-Chronik aus dem europaweiten Österreich, 1678–1982 (Vienna: Christian Brandstätter Verlag, 2008), p. 435. Also see Stephan Koja, interview, Oct. 2006.
5 HIS WIFE’S JEWISH HERITAGE: Magnin-Haberditzl, Familien-Chronik, p. 17.
6 “RELIEVED OF HIS DUTIES”: Anselm Wagner, “Integrating Photography into History of Art: Remarks on the Life and Scientific Estate of Heinrich Schwarz,” Photoresearcher, no. 11 (April 2008): 15 (publication of the European Society for the History of Photography, Danube University Krems).
7 HE CLOSED THE MODERNE GALERIE: Magnin-Haberditzl, Familien-Chronik, pp. 17, 435. The Moderne Galerie opened July 15, 1929, and closed Mar. 22, 1938.
8 KAJETAN MÜHLMANN, A NAZI AESTHETE: Jonathan Petropoulos, The Faustian Bargain: The Art World in Nazi Germany (London: Penguin, 2001), p. 182.
9 “HE HAS NO CONSCIENCE”: Ibid., p. 198.
10 FOR NOW, ONE OF HIS FIRST TASKS: Petropoulos, “Report of Professor Jonathan Petropoulos,” pp. 11, 12.
11 “NEGOTIATION BETWEEN AGENCIES”: Ibid., p. 13.
12 “ALT AKTION”: Lillie and Gaugusch, Portrait, pp. 68–70.
13 HERMANN GÖRING: Ibid., p. 70.
14 “MOMENTARILY LORD OF THE WORLD”: Sultano and Werkner, Oskar Kokoschka, p. 12.
15 “I WOULD LIKE TO DO SOMETHING”: Letter from Carl Moll to Oskar Kokoschka, undated, early 1938, quoted in Sultano and Werkner, Oskar Kokoschka, p. 51.
16 “THERE ARE 75 MILLION PEOPLE”: Ibid.
17 “UNCLE FERDINAND HAS LEFT VIENNA”: Ibid.
THE LAST OF THE BLOCH-BAUERS
1 DOCTORS HAD “EUTHANIZED” SUSI: Rinesch, memoir.
2 ADA SAT ON A TRUNK: Rinesch, memoir.
3 “SO THE WHOLE BLOCH-BAUER FAMILY”: Rinesch, memoir.
HOMECOMING
1 BUT FORST THREATENED TO QUIT: Charles Higham, Marlene: The Life of Marlene Dietrich (New York: W. W. Norton, 1977), p. 68.