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Stefan Heym | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Heym in 1982 | |
| Born | Helmut Flieg (1913-04-10)10 April 1913 |
| Died | 16 December 2001(2001-12-16) (aged 88) |
| Pen name | Stefan Heym, Melchior Douglas, Gregor Holm |
| Occupation | Writer |
| Citizenship | German, American |
| Alma mater | University of Chicago |
| Period | 1938–2003 |
| Notable awards | Heinrich Mann Prize 1953 National Prize of East Germany 19592nd Class Jerusalem Prize 1993 |
Helmut Flieg (10 April 1913 – 16 December 2001) was a German writer, known by his pseudonymStefan Heym (pronounced[ˈʃtɛfanˈhaɪm]ⓘ). He lived in the United States and trained atCamp Ritchie in 1943, making him one of theRitchie Boys of World War II.[1] In 1952, he returned to his home to the part of his native Germany which was, from 1949 to 1990, theGerman Democratic Republic, or East Germany. He published works in English and German at home and abroad, and despite longstanding criticism of the GDR remained a committed socialist. He was awarded the 1953Heinrich Mann Prize, the 1959National Prize of East Germany (2nd class), and the 1993Jerusalem Prize.
Stefan Heym | |
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| Father of the House | |
| In office 10 November 1994 – 31 October 1995 | |
| Preceded by | Alfred Dregger |
| Succeeded by | Alfred Dregger |
| Member of theBundestag forBerlin-Mitte – Prenzlauer Berg | |
| In office 10 November 1994 – 31 October 1995 | |
| Preceded by | Wolfgang Thierse |
| Succeeded by | Hanns-Peter Hartmann |
| Personal details | |
| Political party | independent |
Flieg, born to a Jewish merchant family inChemnitz, was anantifascist from an early age. In 1931, he was, at the instigation of localNazis, expelled from theGymnasium in his home town because of ananti-military poem. He completed school inBerlin, and began a degree inmedia studies there. After the 1933Reichstag fire, he fled toCzechoslovakia, where he took the name Stefan Heym.
In Czechoslovakia, the only remaining democracy in Central Europe at that time, he worked for German newspapers published in Prague such asPrager Tagblatt andBohemia and also managed to have some of his articles published in translation by Czech newspapers. During this time he signed his articles under several pseudonyms, including Melchior Douglas, Gregor Holm and Stefan Heym.[2]
In 1935, he received a grant from a Jewish student association, and went to the United States to continue his degree at theUniversity of Chicago, which he completed in 1936 with a dissertation onHeinrich Heine. Between 1937 and 1939 he was based in New York as Editor-in-Chief of the German-language weeklyDeutsches Volksecho,[3] which was close to theCommunist Party of the USA. After the newspaper ceased publication in November 1939, Heym worked as a freelance author in English, and achieved a bestseller with his first novel,Hostages (1942).[4]
From 1943, Heym (who had become a U.S. citizen), contributed to theWorld War II war effort. He was a member of theRitchie Boys, a unit forpsychological warfare under the command ofémigréHans Habe. His work consisted of composing texts designed to influenceWehrmacht soldiers, to be disseminated by leaflet, radio and loudspeaker. These experiences formed the background for a later novel,The Crusaders, and were the basis forReden an den Feind (Speeches to the Enemy), a collection of those texts.[5]
After the war Heym led theRuhrzeitung inEssen, and then became editor inMunich ofDie Neue Zeitung, one of the most important newspapers of the American occupying forces. Because of his refusal to soften his critical stance toward Nazism and the German elites that had collaborated with it and his refusal to begin to discreetly weave doubts about Soviet intentions into his editorials,[6] Heym was transferred back to the U.S. toward the end of 1945 and in 1951, fearing investigation by the House Un-American Activities Committee as the hunt for Communists led by Senator Joseph R. McCarthy reached a crescendo, Heym left the United States with his American wife, Gertrude Gelbin, whom he married in 1944.[7]
In the following years he worked as a freelance author once again. In 1952 he gave all his American military commendations back in protest against theKorean War and moved first toPrague, then in the following year to theGerman Democratic Republic, after the GDR government had restored his former German citizenship.[8]
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In the GDR, Heym initially received privileged treatment as a returning antifascist emigre. He lived with his wife in a state-provided villa inBerlin-Grünau. Between 1953 and 1956, he worked at theBerliner Zeitung, thereafter primarily as a freelance author. In the early years of his life in the GDR, Heym supported the regime with socialist novels and other works. Heym's works, which he continued to write in English, were published by a publishing house founded for him (Seven Seas Publishers). In German, translations were printed in large numbers.
Conflicts with the GDR authorities became apparent from 1956 on, as despite thedestalinisation of the leadership, the publication of Heym's book on the17 June 1953, uprising,Five Days in June, was rejected. Tensions increased after 1965, whenErich Honecker attacked Heym during anSED party conference. In 1969, Heym was convicted of breaching the exchange control regulations after publishing his novelLassalle inWest Germany. He was nonetheless able to leave the GDR on foreign trips, such as his two-month visit to the U.S. in 1978, and his books continued to appear, albeit in lower print runs, in the GDR.
In 1976, Heym was among those GDR authors who signed the petition protesting against the exile ofWolf Biermann. From this point on Heym could only publish his works in the West, and he began composing works in German. In 1979, he was again convicted of breaching exchange controls and excluded from the GDR Authors Association. Heym expressed support forGerman reunification as early as 1982, and during the 1980s supported the civil rights movement in the GDR, contributing a number of speeches to theEast Berlin demonstrations in autumn 1989.
In the years after reunification, Heym was critical of what he saw as the discrimination against East Germans in their integration into the Federal Republic, and argued for a socialist alternative to the capitalism of the reunited Germany. At the1994 German federal election, Heym stood as an independent on the Open List of the thenParty of Democratic Socialism (PDS), but won direct election to theBundestag by winning the seat ofBerlin-Mitte/Prenzlauer Berg (discontinued after 1998,Berlin-Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg – Prenzlauer Berg East being one successor).
AsPresident by right of age of the Bundestag he held the opening speech of the new Parliament in November 1994, but resigned in October 1995 in protest against a planned constitutional amendment raising MP expense allowances. In 1997, he was among the signers of the "Erfurt Declaration", demanding a red-green alliance (betweenSPD and Greens) to form a minority government supported by the PDS to end the 16 year reign of Chancellor Kohl after the1998 German federal election (which saw a decisive SPD win with a stable red-green majority).
Heym died suddenly of heart failure inEin Bokek in Israel whilst attending aHeinrich Heine Conference. He was honoured withhonorary doctorates from theUniversity of Bern (1990) andUniversity of Cambridge (1991), andhonorary citizenship ofChemnitz, his birthplace (2001). He was also awarded theJerusalem Prize (1993) for literature 'for the freedom of the individual in society', and the peace medal of theIPPNW. Previously he had won the Heinrich-Mann-Prize (1953), and theNational Prize of the GDR, 2nd class (1959). He died in 2001, aged 88, and was buried in theWeißensee Cemetery.
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