50th anniversary of Erich Kästner’s death: Today the men also make coffee

The fact that the story of Emil, who with the help of Berlin boys is able to catch the thief who stole 140 marks from him, has withstood the test of time quite well was evident from the fact that E. listened and went along with the story. It was me who had trouble reading. The spontaneous fraternization of the boys around Emil irritated me, and to be honest, I was a little frightened. This matter-of-factness with which some subordinate themselves “for the cause” and others say where things are going. For example, one of the boys, Little Tuesday, grumbles because he is not allowed to watch the thief with the others, but instead has to sit at home on the phone and coordinate the action; but in the end he too takes his place. Comrades, everyone knows where they have to stand and what they have to do.

The fact that I was so confused by all of this was also due to “Kästner and Little Tuesday” by Wolfgang Murnberger, a recommended TV film that I saw some time ago. It’s about the friendship between Erich Kästner and Hans-Albrecht Löhr, a boy who enthusiastically wrote to the famous author in 1929, immediately after the publication of “Emil and the Detectives.” He even visited him, and Kästner was so impressed by the boy that a friendship developed between the two and Löhr was allowed to play the role of Little Tuesday not only in the play that was performed at the Theater am Schiffbauerdamm in 1930, but also in the 1931 film . In the credits of “Kästner and Little Tuesday” it says, and that’s what I thought of when I read “Emil and the Detectives”, that all but two of the child actors, including Hans-Albrecht Löhr, were soldiers in the Second World War Wehrmacht were killed.

Dorothee Schön, who wrote the screenplay for “Kästner and Little Tuesday,” has published details of Löhr’s death on her website. In a letter that one of his comrades wrote to his mother it said: “Hans-Albrecht was given a scouting party task on August 22nd, which he did well. It was difficult because a scouting party rarely went there. It was near Schrenac (?), a small town occupied by Russians. He had to avoid this place. Everything was successful and on the way back the damn Russian had sealed off. He fired from all cylinders – Hans-Albrecht pulled his scouting party back in a fabulous way and he himself secured the way back for his comrades. As he followed, he was fatally shot in the liver. He had a pleasantly quick death, but above all he saved the lives of his comrades, precisely through his exemplary attitude.”

It’s spooky: The comrade tells about the circumstances in which Hans-Albrecht Löhrs was killed, almost like Kästner tells the story of “Emil and the Detectives”, except that Löhr is no longer Little Tuesday and is on the phone in the stage coordinated the operation, but – now 20 years old – a scout troop leader in the role of “professor” who usually gives the commands in “Emil and the Detectives”. A scout troop leader who ultimately sacrifices himself in an exemplary manner for his comrades when retreating. But the war of aggression against the Soviet Union was not about eliminating an injustice, but rather about committing an injustice, namely devastating a country and killing its inhabitants.

Dorothee Schön, who was able to speak to Hans-Albrecht Löhr’s 88-year-old sister in 2008, suspects: “The comrade’s letter seems to be intended primarily to comfort the mother and to give the people back home the feeling that this death is not pointless be. There probably isn’t much truth in it, because Hans-Albrecht’s sister Ruth Finkenstädt remembered in our conversation that ‘the little boy’ – having barely arrived in Russia – died a very quick and senseless death. Hans-Albrecht probably didn’t lead a scouting party.”

Emil irritated me, and to be honest, I was a little frightened. This matter-of-factness with which some subordinate themselves “for the cause” and others say where things are going.

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When “Emil and the Detectives” was confiscated from the publishing house in January 1936 and the book was no longer allowed to be distributed in Germany, Kästner tried to save himself and his book with a letter to the Propaganda Ministry. In »The Double Erich. Kästner in the Third Reich,” Tobias Lehmkuhl quotes from this letter, in which Kästner writes that the confiscation would particularly hurt him, “because it affects a book that most Germans, if they have read it, regard as a distinctly German book is seen”. Referring to the numerous translations of “Emil and the Detectives,” he says that it “gives children from other countries an idea of ​​the camaraderie and sense of family of the German child.”

“But the book is an expression of solidarity, of the fight between David and Goliath,” a friend said angrily when I told him about my irritations and the research. It’s true that in “Emil and the Detectives” Kästner is basically talking about a utopia: that the powerless, the children, together and if everyone takes their place, have the power to win against an adult. Kästner was also a pacifist and opponent of the Nazis; his books were burned in 1933 on what is now Bebelplatz next to the State Opera. But “Emil and the Detectives” was the only book by Kästner that was published and read under his name in Germany after the Nazis came to power.

Contrary to his post-war claims, Kästner was able to continue writing light novels under a pseudonym, which were published abroad and imported into Germany. When that was no longer possible from the beginning of 1936, he was left with the scripts that he wrote for the UFA in cooperation with others and under a pseudonym. For the script of “Münchhausen”, a monumental film with Hans Albers, he received 115,000 Reichsmarks, which corresponds to today’s purchasing power of more than 500,000 euros. After his total publication ban in 1943, he was able to live well on the money until the end of the war.

One day after I had finished reading the book to my daughter, then a new “Emil and the Detectives” irritation. Like in a feminist textbook, E. suddenly said: “Women make the coffee and butter the bread rolls, right?” That was the role of Pony Hütchen, Emil’s cousin from Berlin. A supporting character that girls can still identify with today because she is argumentative and self-confident. But like the boys, she emphatically fits into her role and brings breakfast to the boys’ concerted action. At least E. formulated her impression as a question; apparently there seemed to be a contradiction between the book and her current reality.

Then a few days later it occurred to me that I was the reason she asked that. I was already excited about Pony Hütchen’s role during the reading and said: “Of course, the women make the coffee and butter the rolls.” E. didn’t understand the irony in my voice. I had completely forgotten that at first. But I think she understood when I said to her: “Yes, there were times when people saw it that way. But the book is old, almost 100 years, and that is no longer the case today. Today the men make the coffee too.«