When Immanuel entered the lobby to the Bermann Fischer family’s apartment in Gärdet, the entertainment had already begun. Loud piano music was pouring out of the sitting room. Resounding chords met him in the hall, where there was a throng of people around the door to the drawing room. An elderly woman took his heavy winter overcoat, crammed it into an already full cloakroom, and kindly told him, if he would like a drink, just to help himself. She pointed down a corridor that led to the softly lit kitchen.
Before he had gone more than a few steps, he caught sight of Tor Bonnier’s cheerful face. Mr. Bonnier was wearing a jacket of a brighter material than his gray trousers, and his trademark bow tie with blue spots on a green background. He had a youthful, relaxed demeanor, despite the rather heavy eyelids, his age hard to determine, maybe over fifty. To his surprise he could see the publisher, who was Bermann Fischer’s benefactor and co-owner of the publishing house on Stureplan, hurrying toward him. For a moment Immanuel thought there must be a misunderstanding.
With his right hand outstretched and in a tone that was quite effusive, Mr. Bonnier said, “Wonderful! I was just inquiring after you. I hoped you’d come this evening. I was asking our hosts a moment ago, and they promised you’d be here. Do you mind if we sit down in the kitchen for a while? It’s too crowded in the drawing room anyway, and I have a few questions it occurred to me you might be able to answer.”
He took Immanuel’s arm in a companiable but firm way and ushered him along the narrow passage to the kitchen. There were some children playing on the floor in the semidarkness, and in a small side room he could glimpse teenagers perched in a window facing the street. He remembered Bermann Fischer saying that the whole family was welcome. Perhaps he should have brought Lucia and the two boys after all. But there were reasons for not doing that tonight, for this particular evening held other plans. Next time he would definitely bring them. At least they would be able to speak their own language.
As a young man, Mr. Bonnier had worked for Karl Franz Koehler, the bookseller in Leipzig, and his German was so faultless, only those who knew his extraction could hear a faint Scandinavian accent that could equally have been a touch of North German, or a personal idiosyncrasy. Whatever the reason, he spoke quickly and effortlessly about all manner of things. About the publishing house and the winter darkness that could easily make one pretty gloomy. What did his family think of their adopted city? Had they already settled in, his wife and sons? Perhaps they might enjoy spending time with the older Bonnier boys? They were a bit too old, of course, but Lukas hadn’t taken the school-leaving exam yet, so there wasn’t much difference. Anyway, he said, they should all be introduced to one another. It would be nice.
“And now I have a question relating to my wife, Tora. You haven’t met Tora yet, regrettably. You’d get along. The thing is, she’s managed to break into the world of film. And her new novel—Mrs. Emma Smith’s Diamond, it’s going to be called—is a tremendously exciting story that might work for an American readership, and why not for a film audience?”
It was difficult to know where he was leading, this publisher who had not only made Bermann Fischer’s life in a new country possible but had also created the conditions for an entire exile culture, small but full of life, and with connections to writers spread the world over. Immanuel had been hoping to shake hands and at most perhaps exchange a few courtesies. Instead he found himself listening to these personal, maybe even private, reflections. Bonnier carried on talking about the boys in his new marriage, his sons Simon and Karl-Adam, the latter not yet of school age, and, with a troubled look, said he was asking himself how they would manage a journey of the kind he was now planning. How would this huge step affect such young people, who had scarcely been out of Sweden?
“Whether it’s feasible to risk this massive leap in these increasingly dark times, that’s what I want to talk to you about. Tora and the boys, they’d survive, of course. I heard about your efforts on behalf of our dear hosts. In some ways I regret their decision to leave us for America, to take the jump that Thomas Mann was so belligerent about in Dalarö last autumn. Mann took the plunge himself two years ago. But I understand, I completely understand. And now I think that maybe we ought to follow suit. It’s not at all simple, not at all, but it’s becoming imperative. Everyone can see it, and the pressure on me to sell the newspaper is getting harder to deal with.”
It began to make sense. Gradually it dawned on Immanuel what the conversation was about. Bermann Fischer, who had never expressed any gratitude for the relatively daring feat of the Soviet stamps in his passport, must have told him about the escapade. Perhaps in a way that exaggerated the extent of his contribution. It was possible Tor Bonnier believed that the German publisher family’s planned emigration to North America was something Immanuel had arranged and facilitated. Perhaps he was living in the hope that Immanuel, who was himself essentially trapped in this, for him, foreign city, held a secret trump card.
Immanuel could now see Bermann Fischer approaching in the passage from the hall. He was gently pushing an elderly lady in front of him. Mr. Bonnier was standing with his back to them amid the rowdiness of the kitchen and carried on in a slightly overwrought voice.
“Good Lord! To my ear it sounds a bit like Jules Verne. From Bromma to Velikiye Luki. Then Moscow, Vladivostok, Yokohama. In heaven’s name! A miracle that all the stamps and papers are in order. I’m told you even convinced our capricious madame at the Soviet embassy. If I may confide in you, I also have some support from the top—maybe you know that Günther is a friend of the family. He was a colleague on Dagens Nyheter for a long time, and will gladly help me, he says. He spelled it out: he’ll help me with the bank transaction.”
He was interrupted by Bermann Fischer, who squeezed in between them, eager to introduce his stately mother-in-law. Hedwig Fischer had recently joined the family in Stockholm. And this was the first time she had taken part in one of the musical evenings the family loved to arrange. Her late husband, Samuel Fischer, had started all the music-making and kept it alive for years in the villa on Erdener Strasse in Grunewald. Many a great pianist had performed there before an animated audience of mostly literati and artists, week after week, year after year.
Mrs. Fischer was no spring chicken, but she made an almost majestic impression in her full-length black dress, her hair up. She had finally managed to sell the villa but had lost virtually everything she owned. Paintings by Corinth, Liebermann, and the French Impressionists, the entire library, it had all gone. The only things she managed to save were a few pieces of furniture and the Bechstein grand piano. Thank heavens. It was the one now standing in the Stockholm drawing room and was used on evenings such as this. Happily, she had also brought all her personal correspondence with writers, family, and friends.
Unfortunately what she had left behind in Berlin, said her son-in-law only half in jest, was her previously excellent memory and her ability to recognize faces. It might therefore have been to avoid embarrassment that Bermann Fischer was herding his mother-in-law around among the guests himself and making sure unnecessary misunderstandings were averted.
“Where’s Brecht?” she asked her son-in-law in an imperious voice. “If he really is in Stockholm, he should make himself known,” she added, before Bermann Fischer had time to say that Brecht had sent his apologies.
Brecht, who lived only a short taxi ride away, had been very sorry he couldn’t attend. He would have loved to listen to Fritz Busch, the conductor who had resigned in protest from his post as musical director in Dresden, and was to work at the opera in Stockholm for a season. With his son, a young director who had already been hired for Glyndebourne, Busch was now going to perform Così fan tutti. Busch was the guest of honor this evening and would also answer questions and talk about the musical program for the spring.
“You’re not Mr. Brecht, by any chance?”
Hedwig had turned to Immanuel. With an apologetic glance in his direction, Bermann Fischer tried to set things straight. In a voice that betrayed no reproach but some degree of frustration, he explained once more to his mother-in-law that Brecht had sent his regrets, but there were lots of other interesting people he was eager to introduce her to, not least colleagues in the firm.
“Here we have Dr. B., the new editor I was telling you about earlier today, an excellent writer we all read in Basler Nachrichten, who’ll most certainly be an outstanding replacement for our friend Zuckerkandl. He’s only just started his new job, but already he’s a highly esteemed colleague. And what’s more, he has his family with him here in Stockholm, his very wise and beautiful wife, and his clever lads whom Gaby, Gisi, and Annette already know. What are they called again, the boys?”
“Karl and Henrik.”
“Of course, now I remember. Karl and Henrik. Clever boys, so smart in their new coats last time I saw them. They’ve learned Swedish in a few months, I heard from my girls.”
Immanuel nodded and prepared to make polite conversation with Mrs. Fischer. He was about to ask how the move from Berlin had gone, but the grand lady had already spotted other guests farther down the kitchen and marched toward them, intent on finding out if they happened to know where Mr. Brecht was. Neither Bermann Fischer nor his wife could understand what had awakened her new interest in this man of the theater, Brecht. It had begun at breakfast, he explained, when Brecht’s name was mentioned for the first time. The dramatist and his wife, Helene Weigel, had left Denmark some time ago and were now living in a large wooden villa on Lidingö with their two teenage children.
Bermann Fischer hadn’t published any of Brecht’s plays, but he had made his acquaintance many years previously, through his colleague Peter Suhrkamp. He had recently invited him up to the office on Stureplan. It had been a warmhearted reunion, and despite the seriousness of the situation and the darkness of the Swedish winter outside, a lively conversation had ensued in the half-light of the office. Brecht had already decided to go to America. It was the only conceivable salvation, he said. If one wanted to survive and perhaps even continue writing, at any rate. He was still living in the hope that it would be possible to leave Europe by boat from Lisbon. Or maybe from Gothenburg direct to New York. He had looked askance when Bermann Fischer had revealed his by then advanced plans to escape Europe with his entire family by going east. That anyone would choose the rot of Moscow, Vladivostok, Yokohama, hadn’t even crossed his mind.
Bermann Fischer laughed when he mentioned Brecht’s skepticism.
“Are you serious?” Brecht had asked. He was stunned into silence lasting what must have seemed an eternity, staring out over the people hurrying across Stureplan in the cold. After a moment or two of staunchly holding his tongue, he burst out laughing and proceeded to utter the word Vladivostok at speed, in a pronunciation that was presumably supposed to sound Russian, but mainly sounded comical. This was followed by a torrent of puns and onomatopoeic constructions he obviously kept in reserve for any occasion that might demand the invention of something about traveling by train.
“Vladi, Vladi, Vostok, Vostok, Vostok. Aha! Such a pleasure to travel on a train that sounds like that, all the way across Siberia. My little Stefan will love it. He’s always adored railways, large and small, even the miniature variety.”
Bermann Fischer had brightened up with this conversation and at that moment decided to get to know Brecht properly. For various reasons, that had never happened. Their similar situations might smooth the way to what had seemed impossible in Berlin. So it was a pity Brecht couldn’t come. The only consolation, he told Immanuel, was that there were sure to be subjects that interested him more than the topic of the discussion here tonight. Which would be Fritz Busch’s reluctance, never spoken but well known in inner circles, to perform Wagner’s opera in Stockholm.
The music in the drawing room had come to an end, and to follow, after a brief interval, there would be a discussion interspersed with short musical intermezzos. A number of guests took this opportunity to stretch their legs. Some made their way to the kitchen in search of refreshments. Immanuel, who had given up the thought of a meaningful conversation with the hostess’s mother, seized the chance to find a space in the drawing room, which wasn’t very large. The ceiling was comparatively low in this modern building, and there was only room for a dozen chairs around the huge grand piano. Some of the audience had been standing behind the black instrument, leaning against the wall, and at once he saw Josephson, the librarian, who was politely listening to one of Zuckerkandl’s expositions. These had a tendency to be lengthy. This one concerned the music critic Eduard Hanslick’s significance as an arbiter of taste, and his waning relationship with Franz Liszt and Richard Wagner, whom he had hitherto much admired, which had culminated in a critical review of the first performance of Lohengrin in Vienna. The fact that Hanslick was later to emerge as a caricature of the small-minded Jew incapable of understanding German art was clearly something that interested Zuckerkandl so greatly, he could talk about it for hours. Josephson, who had a passionate but less intellectual affinity with the composers he happily revisited, listened patiently to the monologue, which had now reached Wagner’s revenge.
“He certainly meant to retaliate in any way he could. You’re familiar with Beckmesser, the fop in Die Meistersinger, the one who sings like a cantor in the synagogue. Wagner talks about a gurgling, yodeling, gabbling racket. It’s the Jew’s musical contortions he’s talking about. It’s as clear as day it’s a portrait of Hanslick. Hans Lick he was called in the first draft, then Veit Hanslich, so there’s no doubt who Wagner modeled his caricature on. All this is sure to come up as an example in our discussion this evening. There aren’t any earlier examples of Jew-hating in music, as long as we stick to a certain level of music, at least. I’m eager to hear what our German colleague from the opera has to say about the matter. Everyone knows Busch is opposed to staging Wagner.”
Immanuel had made his entrance to the drawing room without Zuckerkandl seeing him, but as he approached, Josephson caught his eye and looked decidedly relieved at the prospect of a welcome interruption to the harangue. He held out his hand and said in his usual affable way, “How nice to see you! I didn’t see you arrive. Weren’t they wonderful pieces they performed? And what volume!—almost deafening if you’re standing here right next to it.”
He was leaning against the gleaming grand piano, stroking it tenderly, as if it were a large, motionless animal.
Zuckerkandl, who fortunately had broken off and didn’t seem inclined to continue his thread, turned enthusiastically to Immanuel, slapped him on the shoulder, and said, “But above all, this evening is about your father’s achievement! About how Jewishness sounds.”
Immanuel didn’t know what to say.
“Sorry, what do you mean?” Josephson said.
“Exactly what I say. How does Jewishness sound, in the temple, in the ghetto? In the markets from Kiev and Warsaw to Paris? How do these notes resound within Christianity? And conversely, how do the strains of Haydn and Bach enter the great synagogues and Jewish homes all over Germany? In a nutshell, Germans and Jews in music. Their acoustic lives. This subject has long fascinated me, but I’m an amateur. No one knew more about it than Immanuel’s father.” Zuckerkandl laid a reverent hand on his colleague’s shoulder. “Do you know about this, Josephson? This young man’s father succeeded Zvi Hirsch Weintraub as the main cantor in the synagogue in Königsberg. He was the greatest expert on Jewish music after Salomon Sulzer, maybe greater. Both as historian and compiler. Just imagine if he’d been here this evening.”
“Unfortunately my father’s dead,” Immanuel said tersely, feeling rather embarrassed about being thus drawn into a discussion on something he knew so little about, and which basically had never interested him. That his father’s musical archive was now in a university on the other side of the Atlantic was not something that preoccupied him. But Zuckerkandl had brought it up on numerous occasions, and he ought to perhaps feel happiness and pride rather than the mild discomfort that beset him whenever he was expected to say something about his father’s work. This time, however, he got away with it, as their hostess was tapping a wineglass and in a few kind words asked everyone to take their seats again.
Without warning, and before the murmur of voices had subsided, a powerful, glorious music burst from the grand piano, which seemed to be playing itself. Someone must have been sitting hidden behind the music stand all the time. Or this diminutive person had managed to hoist himself onto the stool behind the magnificent instrument without Immanuel noticing. Whatever the case, someone was now playing with a vigor so intense that the music filled the room, laying siege to the listeners’ thoughts and minds.
As abruptly as it had begun, the music ended. The imposing figure of Fritz Busch was now sitting in front of the piano. Although Immanuel had never had the pleasure of meeting him, he knew of his import for continental music. But it was a different, younger man in a checked jacket and bow tie who spoke first.
“The Jew speaks the language of the place where he has lived from generation to generation, but he speaks it as a foreigner. Let me explain what this can mean for the musical situation today, and why it is in no way a pejorative characteristic, as everyone seems to think.”
The well-groomed young man, obviously Swedish but with excellent German, was perched on a high stool next to the piano, his legs crossed. There was an open book on a music stand in front of him, and he was flicking impatiently through a bundle of papers on his knee. He spoke rapidly with barely a pause. It wasn’t clear whether he was speaking freely from the heart, or possibly paraphrasing what was in the manuscripts he kept glancing at nervously.
“Virtuoso figures. A kaleidoscope. An ever-changing play of colors. But is Mendelssohn essentially void? Do his compositions lack deep intrinsic value? He is so interesting, always interesting, but does he go beyond the skilled entertainer’s tricks and devices? Does his music ever touch soul and heart? Let us now hear a piece by this equilibrist. And I will return to the concept of soul and heart and what they can mean in a time of division.”
He gave a signal to the invisible pianist. Josephson was sitting right at the front, next to the grand piano, and his eyes lit up. Immanuel now recalled that the librarian had spoken about concerts organized by the family in Gamla Stan. Of course, it must be Josephson’s son who was sitting hidden behind the keyboard, producing these swelling notes. It was quite uncanny to experience a concert like this, without the pianist himself being visible. The boy must be uncommonly short, he thought. No one else in the drawing room appeared to find it strange, so Immanuel assumed the little musician had been introduced earlier, before he had climbed onto the piano stool in his hiding place.
It seemed the young man in the bow tie had prepared a kind of musical essay, with short illustrations performed by the musical wonder child. After one or two observations, the lecture was broken by a few minutes’ piano playing, before the man anxiously cleared his throat and carried on.
“The Jewish musician reverses the styles and forms of all eras and all past masters, in favor of the most perplexing ragbag of chaos. Let us illustrate that now with a few passages from Meyerbeer’s Le prophète, which according to Wagner displays all the weaknesses we’re speaking of, and which in this case demonstrates that the composer is conscious of the deception. I quote: ‘This composer has made it his life’s work to maintain this deception.’ And finally, the view that exemplifies the author’s critical finesse and insight: ‘In truth, Jews are far too astute not to know what has been happening with their music.’ ”
A wave of protest broke out in the drawing room, and for some time it was impossible to distinguish what anyone was saying.
“Finesse? Incredible!” shouted an elderly gentleman from the back. And other voices joined in a chorus of loud disapproval.
“Ladies and gentlemen, dear friends, we will all have the opportunity to discuss what has been raised here. Please be so kind as to calm yourselves. This is a musical lecture which is more deliberate than some of you might suppose.”
Fritz Busch’s rich voice was heard above all the others in the room and did indeed have a calming effect on the gathering. He, the great conductor, had the principal role this evening, not the young music critic, who seemed intent upon provoking the audience. The context to this evening was Busch’s reluctance to perform pieces by Wagner at the opera house, where his plan for the season was to present a program consisting of Hindemith, Berg, and some local composers, notably Berwald, alongside Così van tutti. The Concert Society’s committee had recently expressed a special wish to have some of the German guest’s famed interpretations of Wagner as part of the new season’s repertoire, if only some of the most loved overtures? But up to now this had led nowhere, giving rise to a certain irritation that was growing and had even reached the press.
Busch had only performed in Bayreuth once. That was many years ago, but his version of Die Meistersinger had made such an impression on this most particular of audiences that he was instantly regarded as worthy of note. Obviously during Busch’s time in Dresden, Wagner had frequently formed part of the repertoire; his Tannhäuser was legendary. Entirely different, but still in the same class as William Furtwängler and Bruno Walter, everyone said. Considerably better than the young Austrian Herbert von Karajan. But here in Stockholm they were being denied all that. There was great disappointment, and people demanded an explanation. Was it a political stand?
“Steigerung is the excellent German word to best describe my way of reading Wagner.” The young debater in the bright jacket had started speaking again. He was a pupil of Wilhelm Peterson-Berger, who was very influential in Stockholm, he worked for the Concert Society, and he was chairman of the committee of a new friends’ association that was organizing conversations and lectures on the art of opera. Clearly he knew about the great German conductor’s relationship to the composer and interpreted it as a reaction to Wagner’s currently oft-cited anti-Semitism. Now it seemed he had decided to take the bull by the horns and resolve the issue from the inside. His tactic appeared to be to construe Wagner’s most controversial statements such that they were turned into something positive. Not by dialectics, he stressed again and again, but by reinforcing and enhancing the concepts. Only by intensifying the arguments and by forcing Wagner out of himself, as it were, could his ideas about sensory catastrophes and stimuli be transformed into what must be perceived as positive attributes for a new era, an era that was most definitely not Wagner’s and whose music he could not have imagined.
It was obvious from the first moment that his reasoning didn’t convince the present small company, who had made up their minds to show even greater appreciation for the pianist’s intermezzo. Applause filled the room after each interlude, even though the little pianist remained hidden behind his well-polished instrument. On the other hand, the audience showed an increasingly marked hostility toward the debater, who assiduously continued to develop his convoluted argument.
“Music that doesn’t unsettle, that doesn’t stimulate the senses, can no longer be viewed as relevant in an age when our senses are permanently overstimulated. And the music that succeeds best at stimulating is Jewish music. Wagner makes this oh so clear.”
An angry murmur rippled through the drawing room. Somewhere at the back an elderly man was shaking his head vigorously and muttering something inaudible. Bermann Fischer looked quizzically at Fritz Busch, who had remained quiet so far. Would there be any reaction to this peculiar address? Immanuel could see Zuckerkandl, who basically loved any kind of polemic, preparing to launch himself into the discussion. He had some phrases scribbled down on a piece of paper in readiness. Now he stood up and waved the piece of paper in the air.
At that moment Immanuel felt someone gently nudge his left arm, which was resting on the back of the chair. When he turned, he discovered that Tor Bonnier had been sitting right behind him the entire time.
The publisher leaned toward him and whispered, “This isn’t going to lead anywhere, I’m afraid. Why don’t we have another drink in the kitchen while they sort this out? It was a very fruitful conversation we were having just now, I thought. Before we were interrupted by our host and his somewhat one-track-minded mother-in-law.”
Immanuel nodded, but at the same time tried to imply that he would like to wait for a suitable moment to leave the drawing room without calling attention to himself. He was actually quite curious to see how the stern Fritz Busch would react to these tirades about Jewishness in music. They sounded horrendous to Immanuel, but the young critic clearly saw them as somehow useful in making sense of modern-day progressive music. If Immanuel stood up and left the room, it might be taken as some kind of signal.
The atmosphere in the room was tense. Would Busch enter into the argument, or would he choose a more conciliatory path and say that he simply preferred different composers now, and there were others more suitable than he to impart the enchanting light of Das Rheingold to these latitudes? It was something in that vein Busch had hinted when he presented the season’s repertoire. Immanuel recalled Zuckerkandl explaining this, when he had indicated in the office what this evening’s conversation would revolve around.
“A question. I have a question.” There was no mistaking the voice. Only one person here spoke with such a strong Viennese accent. It was Zuckerkandl, of course, who couldn’t stop himself and didn’t intend to wait for what Busch had to say. He had taken a step forward toward the speaker, and with one hand on the grand piano and the other motioning wildly with the piece of paper, he began speaking in a way that suggested a lengthy comment was to be expected.
“I can guess where you’re going with this. Let me quote from the text that forms the basis of your observations. Might one in fact see certain changes in direction concerning artistic catastrophes and sensory stimulus as positive characteristics of the music of our age, even though they were originally framed to be pejorative? It’s possible, it’s possible. But consider the discussion of pathology, of how, basically, the Jew harms music. I paraphrase.”
Zuckerkandl was gaining momentum. He clearly intended to present what he had to say as if he were on a stage. Everyone acquainted with him in the drawing room knew the risk was high that his speech would be weighty in all respects. Bermann Fischer looked around anxiously, but all faces were turned expectantly to the young Austrian, who after all was known as a powerful speaker. His unruly hair had a life of its own, though he tried to keep the wildest curls in check by pushing them behind his ears. He cast a quick glance at the piece of paper in his left hand.
“As I said, I paraphrase, but I stay close to the wording in the medical metaphor that I believe more profoundly defines Wagner’s ideas. He asks: How did the Jew become a musician at all? His answer is: through decay. Yes, decay.”
Zuckerkandl paused for dramatic effect, and for a moment the drawing room was silent. Immanuel heard someone breathing heavily behind him and cautiously turned to look. It was the elderly gentleman sitting next to Tor Bonnier, who only a few minutes earlier had objected so loudly and who had now fallen asleep. The publisher’s seat, however, was empty, and Immanuel saw him in the hall, gesturing insistently and repeatedly that they should carry on their conversation. He pointed in the direction of the kitchen and disappeared from view. Immanuel took the plunge, endeavoring not to make a sound as he carefully rose to his feet and made his way out into the hall. Behind him he heard Zuckerkandl resume, his dialect giving an impression of both playfulness and sarcasm.
“Let us listen to Wagner’s diagnosis. Listen to this! Only when a body’s inner death is manifest do outside elements take possession of it, but merely to destroy it. Then the flesh dissolves into a teeming diversity. At this point can anyone believe the body is still alive?”
Immanuel found Tor Bonnier in the kitchen with a cup of tea in his hand. He was standing by himself beside one of the windows, staring out into the darkness. When he heard Immanuel come in, he turned to him with a friendly gesture and suggested they sit down on a little bench behind the table, where all the drinks and snacks had been laid out. They were alone now; the staff had withdrawn and the children were playing quietly in a small room between the kitchen and the hall. There were so many children in the house, they couldn’t possibly all belong to the host family. Now and then some of them looked out into the corridor, and it was as if Bonnier could read Immanuel’s thoughts.
“Yes, isn’t it lovely with all the children? We all help to take them in. There’s been a steady flow of them arriving in Sweden since last summer. Without their parents, poor little things. My brothers and sisters and I join forces. We can’t house an endless number ourselves. But thank heavens there are families with close ties to the Jewish community who are prepared to help. The Bermann Fischers have little Fritz Cohn, the girls’ cousin, living here. He was the one with the tie and the horn-rimmed spectacles who was doing such a good job helping with the cloakroom. Did you see him? His parents haven’t been given an entry permit. Who knows if Fritz will ever have his family here. Bermann Fischer had the sense to have the girls baptized by Pastor Niemöller in Wilmersdorf. That way they avoided the J-stamps. The pastor has made life easier for several Jewish children we know.”
Immanuel hadn’t noticed little Fritz in the cloakroom, but that was no doubt because he had arrived when the music program was in full flow. On the other hand, he did know a great deal about stamps and visas and entry permits. If he wasn’t mistaken, this was the very subject into which the affable grand publisher wanted to delve more deeply. In the drawing room, thoughts had whirled through his already slightly addled brain. Had he heard correctly—were they intending to move the entire Albert Bonniers Förlag to the United States—or was it only Tor Bonnier who was wondering about moving with his immediate family to a part of the world where they could live at a safe distance from the German demand for Aryanization? Was he thinking of selling Dagens Nyheter?
Sure enough, Bonnier promptly came back to his main focus, the question of itineraries and the necessary consular preparations. Evidently Bermann Fischer had recently informed him of his precise travel plans, as yet undisclosed to anyone in the office on Stureplan. At the end of the month, or in April at the latest, the couple and their three daughters would be on their way eastward. First by plane, then train, and finally ship. A journey lasting three weeks. His mother-in-law and other members of the extended family would join them later, all being well by summer. But the publishing house in Stockholm would not be dissolved; the activity would continue. There were no plans to stay in California, where Thomas Mann had settled. New York was the destination.
Apparently Tor Bonnier was toying with the same thought. Perhaps it was his wife’s fascination for the film world and her success as a screenwriter that had sown the seed. Anyway, their travel plans were solid enough for repeated pressure from the government to sell off Dagens Nyheter to strike home. Selling the newspaper was an opportunity, a possible avenue.
“You understand these aren’t easy decisions,” he said, with a serious expression that was at odds with the lighthearted amusement that had marked their conversation up to now, but was more consistent with his tired eyes. “You must keep this to yourself. I know Bermann Fischer has the utmost confidence in you and has already entrusted you with important matters. What I’m telling you now cannot be mentioned outside our little circle, but Günther has guaranteed ways to transfer the capital that will be freed up by the sale. To be honest, he’s started to insist, and he brings it up every time he has a chance. Seemingly pressure has increased from the German side—we read statements like this every day.”
He took a folded newspaper page from his inside pocket, opened it, pointed to one passage, and asked Immanuel to read the final sentence. Immanuel went through the Swedish word by word: “It is important to note that Jewish people are not desirable, whether it be as branch managers, commission agents, or directors of our German subsidiaries.” Before Immanuel could grasp the context or even what newspaper it was from, the publisher folded the article up again and quickly slipped it back into his jacket pocket.
“We’re going to experience blockades by the Germans. And not just with respect to companies owned by Jews. Any Jewish element in the staff will be enough. This is already in full swing. Günther keeps saying he wishes me and my family well. He’s an old friend to us and wrote some fine reviews when he counted himself a writer. And you have to understand the challenge he faces. Our family is a thorn in the Germans’ side, no doubt about it.”
Only now did it dawn on Immanuel who Tor Bonnier was talking about. The Günther referred to wasn’t a business acquaintance or a colleague in the publishing house, but Christian Günther, for several months now the foreign minister. This was remarkable. Shocking, in fact. Was the country’s leading publisher, personal friend of the foreign minister and surely other members of the government, turning to Immanuel and asking for help? Help from him, an immigrant who was grateful for having just been given the most lowly employment and who was in a state of deep uncertainty about his own family’s prospects? Bermann Fischer must have massively exaggerated his contribution; that was the only explanation he could think of. Or Tor Bonnier had got it all wrong and confused him with someone else entirely, someone who could broker diplomatic contacts not even Günther could offer. Christian Günther, the foreign minister with the characteristic rimless spectacles. This taciturn and, according to the press, reclusive Günther, who wanted to help should Tor Bonnier feel compelled to move the family’s presumably significant fortune out of the country.
Clearly the new minister saw no opportunity to observe the same distance from the Germans as his predecessor had done. Immanuel had himself quoted the speech that Rickard Sandler had given to the students’ union in Gothenburg. Günther would never make a speech like that; he was more cautious, many would say more tactical, in his moves. The directives from Berlin, often delivered by the German chamber of commerce, had also become harsher in tone. Immanuel had followed all this with interest, and he had already attempted to describe the altered mood in politics in a short article for Basler Nachrichten.
Old Mrs. Fischer appeared in the kitchen again, and she had Zuckerkandl’s wife, Mimi, with her. Mrs. Fischer wished to be driven home to the villa in Grunewald. She wasn’t always in this state of confusion; she had days of absolute lucidity too. But this evening she had taken it into her head that they were in the publishing house offices on Bülowstrasse in Schöneberg. The fact that she had left Berlin almost five months previously and now had her own home very close to the young family’s apartment on Asrikegatan was neither here nor there. Mimi Zuckerkandl, who had translated the book about Marie Curie and was a close friend of the family, listened patiently, despite having good reason not to be in the best humor herself. She and her husband should have left for New York several weeks before, but everything was delayed and now they were nervous about their visas. Nevertheless, she chatted amiably with the elderly lady, who spent a long time expounding the villa’s virtues. It had been architecturally designed by a friend of her husband’s.
“An objective art nouveau style, no unnecessary flourishes or artistic trappings. In a word, no frivolity, but a considered and in some ways low-key form in which the people who occupy the rooms can express themselves.”
Mimi Zuckerkandl remembered the villa in Grunewald well. It was a much publicized work by the architect Muthesius. She had visited it herself many years ago and recalled its charm. It wasn’t at all strange that Mrs. Fischer dreamed of being back there. But of course the fact that she now wanted a taxi to take her home to the villa at once made the situation difficult to handle. Mrs. Zuckerkandl was hoping for rescue, preferably by the son-in-law.
“A taxi will be arriving very shortly,” she said, to keep Mrs. Fischer happy. Mrs. Fischer was actually in excellent spirits and was recalling her friend Henry van de Velde’s accolade after his first visit to the villa. The architect, he declared, had succeeded in embodying his hostess’s hairstyle in the very conception of the house. It was a funny idea that appealed to her, and now she really did want to go home.
It had become crowded in the kitchen, and Tor Bonnier was now involved in another conversation. Immanuel seized the chance to slip out into the hall. He found his coat in the cloakroom and decided to sneak away before the evening ended and everyone said their farewells at the same time. The powerful music was still flowing from the drawing room when he opened the front door and stepped outside into the cold.