Interview
Dr. Werner Abel, Born in 1943, studied philosophy at the University of Leipzig after attending the Workers’ and Farmers’ Faculty (ABF), then worked as an assistant in the philosophy section of the Karl-Marx-Stadt Technical University. Banned from his profession in 1980 because of “Trotskyist views,” he supported himself by doing translation work. He was only able to work as a philosopher again in 1990 at the Chair of History of Political Ideas and Theories at Chemnitz University of Technology (until 2008). Abel’s books published on the book market include “The 20th Century between Resignation and Revolution”, “The Communist International and the Spanish Civil War” and the two-volume edition “You will not get through. Germans on the side of the Spanish Republic and the social revolution”. At the Leipzig Book Fair, like every year, he will visit the Red Antiquariat.
A book lover and book collector: Werner Abel
Photo: Philipp Dyck
Mr. Abel, you keep a unique, very specific book collection, called Sozialistica, that spans several eras and territorial areas. What does that mean?
All literature that is related to the history of the workers’ movement, but also avant-garde and literary exile from 1933 to 1946.
When did you become interested in this topic and when did you start collecting systematically?
In the 70s. In 1980 almost everything was confiscated by GDR organs. I de facto started all over again in the 90s.
Did your exclusion from the party in 1980 paralyze you from collecting bibliophile left-wing literature or, on the contrary, encourage you?
After a certain phase of paralysis, it is rather strengthened.
Do you owe your collection to chance finds or do you search systematically and purposefully?
I know most left-wing antiquarian bookshops, but also internet sources; a lot of things can be found at flea markets. I know a few dealers in Berlin, Leipzig and Dresden where you can always find something.
Have books ever found their way to you in strange ways?
Perhaps it is strange that I was able to buy the Soviet catalog of the Pressa Cologne 1928, an international press exhibition, with the Leporello by the Russian avant-gardist El Lissitzky for five euros from a wine dealer who occasionally received literature to sell from customers; It is now one of the most expensive pieces in my collection. And in Mallorca I met a woman at a flea market who was offering a book from Editorial Cenit, a left-wing publishing house that existed in Spain from 1930 to 1936. She phoned her son in Barcelona, who was setting up a used bookstore there. He offered over the phone the book “Hotelo America” by Maria Leitner, a German-speaking socially critical writer from Hungary who died while fleeing the Nazis in Marseilles in 1942; This book was published by Cenit as a licensed edition by Willi Münzenberg’s Neue Deutsche Verlag, with a dust jacket by John Heartfield. This antiquarian also gave me the so-called Blue Booklet, an A4 brochure about the bombing of Madrid during the Spanish War, which contains the first photos of the legendary Magnum founder Robert Capa. But the most bizarre find was probably the Malik edition of the children’s book “Ede and Unku” by Alex Wedding, who was actually called Grete Weiskopf. I bought the story of a Berlin proletarian boy and a young Sinti girl, which was published in 1931 (!), from a hairdressing supply store through Booklooker.
Like that?
Hairdressers there delivered books that customers left in their shops.
Do you have all the books and magazines in mind? And have you counted them?
They haven’t been counted, I have almost all of them in my head.
Which area is quantitatively most represented? Do you have a favorite department?
My Malik collection. This is also due to the fact that there can be up to eight or ten different editions of one title.
Which books would you describe as unique treasures?
As a rule, books that were banned immediately after publication, such as “As a Red Army soldier before Munich” by Erich Wollenberg, who survived the Nazi era in exile in France and Morocco; Incidentally, his story is said to have been the basis for the famous film “Casablanca”. Or from the Soviet Russian revolutionary and writer Larissa Reissner “Hamburg on the Barricades”. It may sound strange: the forbidden ones are my favorite. Books with dedications are also unique treasures, such as the first edition of the Karl Marx biography by Franz Mehring with a dedication to Berta Thalheimer, sister of August Thalheimer, the founder of the KPD opposition, who was in prison at the time, in 1918 .
Are there any gaps in your collection that you would like to fill?
Yes, some early editions of George Grosz and Dada as well as newspapers from Malik Publishing.
Are there any outstanding book titles in your collection?
Of course, books designed by Grosz, John Heartfield or Georg Salter.
How do you deal with so-called apostates who, disappointed, turned away from the communist movement?
In my opinion, this is insignificant for a collection because they belong to their time. Furthermore, it can be, and in many cases were, the “renegades” who achieved significant achievements in their time.
Which person or people represented in your collection would you have liked to have met in person?
Leon Trotsky and Willi Münzenberg.
Can historical titles still be relevant today?
The Marxist classics, but also authors who warned against Stalinism and criticized it, regardless of the danger to life and limb, for example Trotsky in “The Revolution Betrayed”.
Which authors in your collection should definitely be republished today?
Since politically unpopular phenomena are often referred to as “fascism” today, a new edition and discussion of the fascism theories of Thalheimer and Trotsky, especially “How will National Socialism be defeated?” and “What now? “Questions of the Fate of the German Proletariat” are necessary. And in order to counter the rampant Russophobia, I would advocate for a new, Malik-oriented complete edition of Maxim Gorky as well as for a new edition of Soviet Russian literature from the 20s and 30s of the last century, for example the “30 Narrators of the New Russia” or Isaak Babel.
You are actively involved as a publicist yourself. What are you currently working on?
I’m working on the second volume of »With Salud and a Handshake. Military censorship of the International Brigades in Spain«.
Do you have a favorite quote from one of the authors in your collection?
Yes, Friedrich Engels: The proof of the pudding is in the eating. Which corresponds to our saying: Trying is better than studying.
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