Hedi Stadlen | |
|---|---|
| Born | Hedwig Magdalena Simon 6 January 1916 |
| Died | 21 January 2004 |
| Education | Newnham College, Cambridge |
| Occupation | Teacher atCeylon University College |
| Notable work | "Under Nazi Rule" |
| Political party | Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB). United Socialist Party (USP) |
| Parents |
|
| Relatives | Nicholas Stadlen (son) Matthew Stadlen (grandson) |
Hedi Stadlen (6 January 1916 – 21 January 2004), better known inSri Lanka asHedi Keuneman, was anAustrianJewishphilosopher,political activist, andmusicologist. She was one of a handful ofEuropean Radicals in Sri Lanka.
She was bornHedwig Magdalena Simon inVienna to Else Reis and Hans Simon, an eminenteconomist andbanker. She was one of those whose life was deeply affected by the spread of virulentfascism inEurope in the 1930s.[1][2] Both her parents wereassimilated, non-observant Jews; her father had Hedi baptised to make sure that she would have protection fromantisemitic shopkeepers during the starvation caused by theFirst World War.
She was sent to a progressive school in Vienna founded by thePolish-JewishfeministEugenia Schwarzwald, at whose home Hedi met such figures as the painterOskar Kokoschka and the architectAdolph Loos.
She studied philosophy at theUniversity of Vienna. One of her lecturers, ProfessorMoritz Schlick was shot by a deranged student. The student was later paroled, acclaimed as a 'heroicAryan' and, became a member of theAustrian Nazi party after theAnschluss.[1]
Incidents such as this caused Dr. Simon to leave Vienna and take his family toSwitzerland and later to theUSA.
Through contacts inWhitehall, Dr Simon sent his daughter toNewnham College, Cambridge, where she continued her studies, but switched toMoral Sciences (philosophy) underLudwig Wittgenstein.[1]
She spent her weekends inLondon, working for the cause ofIndian freedom inKrishna Menon'sIndia League, withIndira Gandhi among others.[1] She later explained that "the racial discrimination suffered by the Jews in Austria made me feel sympathetic to the victims of colonial rule and strengthened my determination to identify with the fight for the freedom and independence of colonial peoples."[3]
Thecapitalist crisis, fascism and theSpanish Civil War attracted her to theCommunist Party of Great Britain. The historianEric Hobsbawm fell in love with Hedi Simon, but she, in turn fell in love with anothercommunist undergraduate,Pieter Keuneman, who was President of theCambridge Union and editor of the student magazineGranta. He was the son of aDutch BurgherSupreme Court justice in Ceylon.
Hedi Simon graduated withfirst class honours in 1939, but as a woman was excluded under university rules from the award of her degree. She married Pieter Keuneman in Switzerland in September 1939. The next year they went to Ceylon.
In Ceylon, the left had split in 1940, when theTrotskyists in theLanka Sama Samaja Party expelled the pro-Moscow faction, which formed the United Socialist Party (USP). The Keunemans joined the USP, which was fiercely anti-colonial until the invasion byHitler of theSoviet Union, thereafter advocating co-operation with the colonial regime against the common enemy, fascism.
Hedi Keuneman was elected president of one of theco-operative societies were formed to distribute affordable food, following the outbreak of war. She monitored food stocks and prices in centralColombo, popularising cheaper, local foodcereals such asbajiri, a locally grown sticky grain, earning herself the nicknamebajiri nona ('bajiri lady').
Between 1940 and 1942, Hedi Keuneman taught atUniversity College, Colombo and at the Modern School initiated by another communist emigrant and India League veteran,Doreen Young Wickremasinghe.
She was active in the Friends of the Soviet Union and, with shoulder-length black hair and sometimes barefoot in a redsari, distributed pro-communist literature and addressed meetings among English-speaking supporters. She also wrote a pamphlet publicising Hitler's tyranny,Under Nazi Rule.
In 1943 when the USP was dissolved and became theCommunist Party of Ceylon, Pieter became its first general secretary. He and Hedi subsisted on boiledbreadfruit andsambol, living modestly near the CP office in Borella.
Following end of the war in 1945, Hedi Keuneman returned to Europe to meet her mother—as a communist, she was barred from entering the United States (where her father had died in 1942). In London in 1946 she met an old friend from Vienna,Peter Stadlen a distinguished concert pianist who had premiered theWebernOpus 27 Variations. She chose not to return to Ceylon, and divorced Pieter.[1] While Hedi Stadlen never rejoined a communist party, she never renounced her socialist convictions.
She subsequently married Stadlen, with whom she lived inHampstead. In 1956, a hand injury obliged Stadlen to turn to music criticism, chiefly forThe Daily Telegraph, and academic study. Hedi collaborated with him, possibly influenced by her musical heritage, as grandniece ofJohann Strauss. They produced conclusive evidence that extensive sections ofAnton Schindler'sBeethoven conversation books were forgeries. She also played a crucial role in Stadlen's study of Beethoven's intentions with hismetronome markings.
On Stadlen's death on 20 January 1996, Hedi lied about her age and joined the charityVolunteer Reading Help, and for six years helped disadvantaged children in aNorth London primary school to strengthen their reading. She also worked withAnnette Morreau on a biography of the Viennese cellistEmmanuel Feuermann.
In 2002 she returned to Cambridge to receive the degree denied to her over five decades previously. At the same ceremony her son Nicholas received his M.A. and her grandson, Matthew, was awarded his B.A.
Hedi Stadlen was survived by her sonsNicholas, aHigh Courtjudge (who holds the record for the longest speech in British legal history—119 days), and Godfrey, a seniorcivil servant in theHome Office.[1]
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