128 LOS ANGELES, 12.1.1945
Los Angeles, 12 January 1945
My dears,
a thousand thanks for your letters and the alcohol parcel, as large and heavy as an unshapely hippo, which arrived today in the best condition, without any breakage, only a few minutes after the letter. It had been packaged with a love and care that would already have been touching in itself, even if the parcel had been empty – and it is anything but empty – considering the miserliness with which we guard all the alcohol you have ever sent us, it will be a long-lasting supply (guests are normally only served Californian booze or at the very most rum or whisky and your wine and schnapps are only opened on the most special of occasions). I really cannot tell you how happy we were. I am especially eager to sample the Bénedictine. Incidentally, we only discovered the giraffes on Gretel’s belt upon closer inspection, and hold the ornamental animals in particular esteem.
It is nothing short of a scandal that the Horkheimers did not drop in on you, an outrage for which there can be no excuse. Certainly Fritz is ill, with exactly the same thing – except for the most specific symptoms – that Gretel had, and is bedridden; and Max is kept busy by the Jews until late at night, and is evidently not at all content with his lot. But considering the relationship, all this is insufficient as an explanation, and Maidon should at least have found her way to you despite all hindrances. It is not out of ill will, simply stubborn self-centredness, the inability to deviate from one’s own path. I was on the point of writing a furious letter, and only refrained for the most basic material reasons. Such things are much better said than written, and also sharper, yet without becoming as objectified as they would in a letter. But you can believe me that I will give Max a thorough talking-to as soon as I am in New York. That is precisely why I would ask you not to let on when Maidon comes – vengeance is mine,1 spake Archibald. But there is more culture in the knots of the string wrapped around the wine package than in Maidon’s entire existence, and it is a mystery to me why Max lets her have her way. Our wine package from the Horkheimers has still not arrived, incidentally, despite having been announced countless times.
My current plans are – sauf imprévu, as a Louische would say – as follows: I will leave for Berkeley on 2 February, stay there for a week, go to New York on the 9th, should arrive there on the 13th. Pray that it works out and nothing gets in the way. –*
I need hardly tell you what satanic delight I derived from the news that you had terminated all relations with the brood, any more than I will divulge my reflections on Louis that followed your letter. You will see soon enough what a brood the brood is.
Allow me to pose my question about the Frankfurt building firm Cohn and Kreh (or vice versa) once more, for it is one that interests me a great deal. And, to give the dear Wondrous Hippo Sow something to do too: can you recall the name of a bank manager – possibly of a bank in Amorbach, or also one who lived there but worked at a different bank (Deutsche Bank?) – who hunted near Weckbach? And also: what is the name of the composer who wrote the Prayer of a Virgin?2 I argued over it with Brecht, during a very pleasant and animated evening here with a few very pleasant people.
New Year’s Eve at Salka’s place was rather lovely, a few truly beautiful film actresses were there and a few pleasant men and outstanding food; it was a picnic, and all the more or less Austrian ladies brought the best dishes they could cook. We stayed until almost 2 o’clock.
Do you recall, my Hippo Cow, the detective novel ‘The Key to Power’, which I (and the tigress) devoured voraciously in ‘Das Blättchen’ as a child? I made the acquaintance of its author, Georg Fröschel,3 who writes very successful scripts for MGM here, and he gave me a proper book copy of that novel. It is very strange to see a piece of one’s childhood move up in the world like that, and I was no less pleasing to him as his ‘first reader’ than the story, which has now become rather flimsy, was to me.
Ali Baba, of whom we enclose the latest photograph, was denounced by someone in the neighbourhood for roaming freely, and if we do not wish to pay a considerable fine we shall have to put him – the poor, good-hearted darling, our little Grecoesque Jesus – on a leash again, despite the act of mercy at Christmas, which does not offer any complete legal protection. We are naturally very sad about this.
I believe I wrote to you that I had completed a major philosophical text,4 but this is top secret, especially as far as Max is concerned, as it is to be a surprise for his 50th birthday.
Gretel will accompany me to San Francisco, though she will not be staying at Berkeley, but rather in town with the Alexanders,5 who were so charming as to invite her over for a week (we are on very good terms with them, especially the enchanting wife). Dr A., who phoned us especially for that reason, says that he could cure Gretel of her rheumatic troubles, which are still not entirely gone, and we would naturally be overjoyed if it worked. We will only be seeing each other in the evenings, as I will be rushed off my feet at the university during the day.
This has now turned into a frightfully long letter, but there was so much to tell. I hope it will not do the Wondrous Hippo Cow any harm to sit around indoors for so long – but do be careful – according to Maidon’s letter of yesterday, the weather in New York seems to be genuinely ghastly.
Heartiest kisses from your faithful and old
child
Teddie
My dearss,
a thousand thanks for the splendid parcel. I am especially proud of the crème de cacao, but all 6 bottles are magnificent, you good man. I had better not even start complaining about Maidon, or you might no longer want anything to do with me. We take matters concerning us very lightly, as she would never find out and even means well, by her standards. But with you it is a different matter, you can be sure Archie will make that clear. Many hugs and kisses from your
old Giraffe Gazelle
Original: typewritten letter with additional handwritten note by Gretel Adorno.
1 Romans 12: 19.
2 It was, as Maria Wiesengrund noted in the margin, the Polish composer Tekla Badarzewska-Baranowska (1834–61).
3 The Vienna-born writer and scriptwriter George Froeschel (1891–1979), as he wrote his name in America. Froeschel, who worked first for the UFA and then, in the 1920s, the Ullstein-Verlag, emigrated to the USA in 1936 and went to Hollywood in 1937. He enjoyed particular success as an author of anti-Nazi films (Mortal Storm, 1940; Mrs Miniver, 1942). The novel mentioned in the letter was first published in Vienna in 1919.
4 This refers to Minima Moralia.
5 Robert and Charlotte Alexander.
129 LOS ANGELES, 29.1.1945
29 Jan. 45
My dearss,
here is a sweet little farewell greeting. You can reach Teddie at Berkeley at:
Suite 402
2131 University Ave.
Berkeley, Calif.
Hopefully our good Hippo Cow will soon grow nice and fat again through the cod-liver oil. I am sad that Archie is going away, but it is a comfort that he is coming to you; I would truly frightfully have liked to visit you in Westend Ave. again. The hippo boy will bring his fur and a blue winter coat to make sure he stays warm.
Fond regards
your old
Giraffe
The very fondest regards, I am looking forward incredibly to seeing you and am keeping warm so as to arrive in good shape.1
Kisses from your child
Teddie
Original: handwritten letter.
1 good shape: EO.
130 LOS ANGELES, 21.3.1945
21 March 1945
My dearss,
I arrived here well after a pleasant journey, with a roomette the whole way, am looking after myself and have all but got rid of my stomach neuralgia. The few days in Chicago were quite interesting, and I achieved everything there that I had intended. Here, admittedly, I was met by exceedingly sad news: our dear friend Alex Granach, whom WK recently met at Max’s lecture, died suddenly in a
completely senseless fashion, an embolism following an appendix operation. We are indescribably sad about it.
I returned to find Giraffe looking good and generally in better shape and am full of hope that Robert Alexander will help her with thorough treatment.
I was infinitely happy to be close to you those four weeks, and only hope that it will be less hectic next time.
How did Maidon’s visit go? My energetic appeal to Max seems to have helped after all. He called me again in Chicago, incidentally.
Ali Baba is sweeter and more beautiful than ever.
We just heard on the radio that there is fighting in Mainz, and that there has been a mass exodus from Frankfurt and Mannheim.
Kisses, my two dear old animals,
from your old
Hippo King
Archibald
A thousand greetings Giraffe, who is very happy with her dear Archibald.
Original: typewritten letter with a handwritten greeting from Gretel Adorno.
131 LOS ANGELES, 7.4.1945
INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL RESEARCH
429 WEST 117TH STREET
NEW YORK, N.Y.
Tel. UNiversity 4-3200
(Columbia University)
Ext. 376
7 April 1945
My dearss,
a thousand thanks for your Easter letter, which remained unanswered for a few days, as I suddenly had a pile of Jewish matters to take care of.
I am glad that old Hahn, who will be 87 this month, has done something for Hermann Levi. I discussed his entire case in detail with Norah, and learned such exceedingly peculiar things that I cannot refrain from sharing them with you – naturally with the utmost discretion – i.e. absolutely no one but you and the Hippo Cow must know anything about it. Neither the old Hahns nor Norah are willing to take on a serious material responsibility for Hermann. The official and entirely convincing reason is that Hermann was only a member of the investment bank for a very short time, around three years, and that they have extensive obligations to countless former employees. In reality, however, it is because of what happened when the association bank took over the investment bank. Messrs Kramer and Rosenstein,1 who represented the Wertheimbers’2 interests in the association bank, falsified the balance sheets when they handed over the bank. In reality the association bank was broke. Big Albert probably smelt a rat immediately, but still went in for the deal, and it was only after the bank had been taken over with those two gentlemen as directors that he fired them with reference to their manipulations. He kept Hermann, who was admittedly a friend of Kramer, but surely did not really understand the storms and atrocities at the top, because he represented the interests of the Michaelis firm in the bank and brought his own old clients with him. On the other hand, these goings-on explain why Albert demoted Hermann. The whole thing sounds like one of my made-up Louische stories, but is true. The situation is too confused to examine the moral aspects, but I cannot hold it against Norah if she does not show any great gusto over the whole business. She thinks, however, that the Michaelis firm might be willing to do something. The old South African nabob Michaelis3 has joined his forefathers. The general assignee of his heirs is: Frederick G. Chart, London E.C.2, London Wall 4910, Building 4. Chart has countless millions at his disposal. I would write to him on fine paper in excellent British English as an old friend of Hermann that the latter worked for the association bank for years, was taken over by the investment bank in connection with the Michaelis interests and is now in a tight spot, and ask him if it would be possible, giving particular consideration to his advanced age, to pay him a pension. The way things are in Belgium, one could already achieve a great deal with modest sums (rich people always like to hear that).
Meanwhile, our wishes are starting to be fulfilled. In Germany a general commotion has broken out that I am following with unmitigated joy. I was strangely moved by the sudden appearance of names that I had not heard since childhood, such as Idstein and Camberg, where two armies have joined forces.
I have resumed medical treatment due to my neuralgia, after the pains had wandered back to the head from the body. There is a centre of inflammation in the throat–nose system. I have noticed a decisive improvement in the last two days. Gretel is looking better than she has in years, and I entertain the hope that we shall truly be able to get her back to normal again (hold your horses, Giraffe).
We are very happy that spring has finally come to New York and that you are getting regular doses of fresh air. That, together with the news from Germany, should do your old heads some good.
Heartiest kisses
from your old Hippo King
Teddie
A thousand congratulations on your naturalization! The sweet and well-meant poem by WK does not make it clear, however, whether you had your examination or your final hearing,4 i.e. whether you are thus formally naturalized. If the latter were the case, you would already have had the examination before I was in N.Y. But if it was only the examination, then the actual naturalization could still take a long time – with us it took from June till November. At any rate, I am extremely happy that it worked out. The Hippo Cow as an American –
A thousand congratulations on the citizenship.5 How nice that you kept the whole procedure secret from us. You must have had your examination long ago if you have already been sworn in now. The papers are lovely. I am happy for you and would dearly like to celebrate it.
Many kisses from your
Giraffe Gretel
Original: typewritten letter with handwritten postscript and additional handwritten note by Gretel Adorno.
1 Unknown.
2 A Frankfurt banking family; no further information found.
3 Unknown. According to a different source, the bank was taken over by the firm of Jakob Michael.
4 final hearing: EO.
5 citizenship: EO.
132 LOS ANGELES, 1.5.1945
1 May 1945
My dearss,
we have just heard the news of Hitler’s death. Hopefully it is true – part of the horror of this world is that the truth always sounds like a lie and lies sound like the truth,1 and the fascist big shots2 are so much merely functions of their own propaganda machinery that even whether they live or die cannot be taken in itself, but only in the context of all the publicity politics. Nonetheless, there can no longer be any doubt as to the genuine defeat of the Boches – after I had still thought, until a few days ago, that they were drawing back in order to strain the Allied connecting lines and then, as in December, further postpone the end through a counter-offensive. But no, they could not go on any longer, and everything one has been wishing for all these years has taken place: the country reduced to rubble, millions of Hansjürgens and Utes dead, the neck of the German people probably broken in such a way that it will disappear from history as the Carthaginians did after the Second Punic War. Only one cannot be nearly as happy about it as one would think. I at least cannot shake off the feeling of ‘too late’ – in truth, the Germans have pulled the whole of civilization down with them, and what we are now witnessing is precisely that downfall which could have been prevented if Germany’s defeat had been 10 years ago. It is as if that yearning had consumed itself, and now that it has been fulfilled it lacks the ability to feel any joy. All the more so because there is every reason to believe that the principle upheld by the Nazis will outlast them – on a broader economic basis, and therefore all the more horrifically. In the face of the historical tendency, I do not feel able to hope for any more than breathing spaces and loopholes. I am nonetheless deeply grateful that you can experience this moment – for you in particular there is an element of that justice which cannot bring us nearly as much joy, and ultimately one has to say that, in reality, Hitler is the most dreadful thing there ever was, in relation to which everything else was a form of fear and expectation, but not yet real – so one can certainly be happy that it has ended. There will surely be a good few decisions facing us all soon – we shall keep you informed about everything, and would ask you to do the same. I still tend towards Europe (Austria? South of France? Italy?), not because I imagine it is ideal over there, on the contrary – but because I believe that, after what happened, there will be a greater chance of survival there. But perhaps that is also completely wrong – should there genuinely be a war between Russia and the Anglo-Saxons, that will be the end and the individual will be completely lost.
Robert Alexander was here (with Anita)3 and gave Gretel a thorough examination. And here I can truly give you good news: in the space of less than three months’ treatment her condition has improved deci- sively, subjectively and objectively – so much so that our good horse, in her own words, feels as if she has been reborn. The basal metabolism has increased from -22 to +5, i.e. to the normal level, her blood pressure is normal again, she has warm hands and feet, and above all her pulse has returned in her ankles – its absence was the most distressing symptom. She looks superb, 10 years younger, red-cheeked without any rouge, and is in better shape than she has been in 15 years. Robert said that, if there had not been any decisive intervention, one would have had to fear the severest of complications within 2 years (Burger’s disease and similar very threatening circulatory afflictions). I cannot tell you how grateful I am to him. Gretel does, incidentally, still have certain symptoms, such as headaches and lack of feeling in one lower leg, but they are certainly bearable, compensated for by her overall condition, and we hope that she will also shake those off completely. Robert is the first doctor in my life in whom I have truly had unlimited faith on account of the positive results. I think it would make him very happy if you wrote him a few lines regarding his heroic deed for Giraffe* – I can also act as ‘director’. Address: Dr. and Mrs. Robert Alexander, 54 Seventh Avenue, San Francisco, Calif.
I myself am feeling much better – today without headache pills for the first time. I am taking a very long time to recover, still feel shattered in the morning and by no means in full possession of my powers, but at least a human being capable of working once more. I am going to Berkeley again for a week on the 14th to direct my project, after my co-director was here two weeks ago. I will take the opportunity to let Robert give me a thorough makeover too. He thinks I have been suffering from a sort of overall poisoning.
Look after yourselves my two dear old animals. I can imagine how WK must be hanging on the radio – even I am doing so – and the Hippo Sow will be cursing, yet still rejoicing. Repulsive, incidentally, how the mob pounced on Mussolini’s mistress.4 The people’s revenge always seems to be directed less towards its oppressors than against beautiful actresses – out of sexual envy. The true revolution will succeed at the moment when this element is disabled.
Robert knew Villinger well, incidentally, Jenny too, whose youth movement clothes and flat-heeled shoes he recalled, but above all the lady friend of old Arnold, who is 20 years younger, called Hüpeden,5 supposedly a real beauty (believe it or not) and very pleasant. The world is amazingly small. Villinger used to play the music expert …
Heartiest kisses
from your old and faithful hippo
Teddie
Hugs and kisses from
your old Giraffe
Original: typewritten letter.
1 See the aphorism ‘Pseudomenos’ from Minima Moralia.
2 big shots: EO.
3 Anita Lothar, who married Robert Alexander following his divorce.
4 Clara Petacci and Mussolini had been captured while fleeing to France on 27 April, and shot the following day; their bodies were hung up on 29 April – the day of Hitler’s death.
5 Jenny L. Wiesengrund (1874–1963) had married Arnold Villinger in 1898. Their son is Franz Villinger (b. 1907). Nothing further is known about Frau Hüpeden.
133 LOS ANGELES, 10.5.1945
Los Angeles, 10 May 1945
My faithful dear old Wondrous Hippo Cow,
a thousand thanks for your very sweet letter. My silence has been purely a result of an extremely tense week in Berkeley and San Francisco and the hectic work following it. The state of stagnation you describe is dreadful – this continuation of a condition one can barely call living is almost more frightening than the catastrophe itself was. The only remaining comfort is that he is evidently not going through any subjective suffering, but rather existing as if beneath a veil.
I must tell you – and this is no empty phrase – how much I admire your bearing in the situation. Max, who is incidentally feeling better, was equally impressed by it. And I am quite especially touched that you continue to highlight and cut out the articles on Germany from the Times with your eighty-one-year-old Hippo Cow hooves (or paws) like poor WK. I send you my most heartfelt thanks.
I am much better; I am truly feeling back to normal for the first time in a long while. Max and I will go to San Francisco at the end of the month.
It might interest you to know that our ‘Philosophical Fragments’ are being published as a book, in German, by Querido in Amsterdam. The translation of the film book I wrote with Eisler is also finished, and is very worthy; that book is also supposed to be published this year. Ever more news is reaching us from Europe, especially Paris. One is no longer cut off from the world.
Who is now to look after our interests in Germany? I enclose the very loyal letter from Alois.1 Do you know if Schöne Aussicht 7 is still standing, and whether the firm BW2 still exists? Alois seems to presuppose a knowledge of these matters. How dearly I would have wished for WK to have the satisfaction of at least a formal restitution – but I daresay he is hardly aware of all this at the moment. Give him my heartiest greetings; he will no doubt understand.
And kisses to you, my old wondrous animal, from your faithful child
Teddie
Dear Hippo Cow, a surprise will be making its way to you in the coming week, and will hopefully give you some joy, but I shall not yet reveal what it is. I could put together another package of clothes if you had any use for it in Germany: a suit, a dress of mine, 2 blouses, 1 shirt. Many hugs and kisses from the old Giraffe.
We have given up our house-building efforts for the moment; it is impossible to get a permit3 if one did not serve in the war.
Tell Oscar that we are thinking of him a great deal
Original: typewritten letter with additional handwritten note by Gretel Adorno.
1 Alois Günther, whose address in Sachsenhausen [an area in southern Frankfurt] in the famous Klappergasse (no. 28) was included in Adorno’s address book, had worked as cellarer in the Wiesengrunds’ wine wholesale shop.
2 The headquarters of his father’s firm Bernhard Wiesengrund, whose liquidation – begun by Oscar Wiesengrund directly before his emigration in May 1939 – was completed in spring 1940.
3 permit: EO.
134 LOS ANGELES, 31.5.1945
31 May 1945
My dearss,
many thanks for your lengthy letter. I have meanwhile returned from Berkeley – or rather San Francisco, as I was living with the Alexanders and came over each morning. I was unable to attend the conference1 through lack of time, but I do not think I missed much; it was almost only the representatives of the South American states that were speaking during my stay. Molotoff and Eden were already gone, and Manuilski,2 who would have interested me most (he is acting as Ukrainian representative!), is evidently very inconspicuous there. My project is making lively progress and has spawned new offspring, a project dealing with the inception of anti-Semitism in early childhood3 (one of the central questions in my opinion), which I am carrying out there with money from the AJC together with the Child Welfare Institute. I get on very well with its director, Jones, one of the most powerful psychologists in the country. Things are also going extremely well with my closest staff members. I am currently working on a fundamental theoretical study for the project, as well as a new questionnaire.
Robert Alexander examined me thoroughly, and I also went through a considerable part of the tests, which are extremely advanced nowadays. The diagnosis is neuralgia on a rheumatic-infectious basis, the centres of inflammation probably the teeth (my wisdom teeth have been somehow inflamed for years) and throat, whether inflammatory due to the teeth or the tonsils themselves. Both are now being thoroughly examined, and I am determined to take the necessary steps to get rid of the stuff. My head is all but clear now and my overall condition is good, but the heart is affected, as the electrocardiogram also showed. For a number of weeks now I have been sensing my heart for the first time in my life, often a very strong pulse; one time in S.F., on a Sunday, I was outside with Robert, Charlotte and Anita, a real attack, so I can join the club too. Robert is quite convinced that it is nothing severe, but it does require attention, for though it is surely related to the infection it may also be due to my constitution, this absurd and inflated stomach on a body that is itself by no means fat. I am adhering to an exceedingly strict diet, and, as unpleasant as it is to abstain from potatoes, sauce and any kind of chocolate, I do as a result already feel much better on the whole. The neuralgia, however, is wandering across my whole body, even the most delicate parts, where it is asserting itself in a rather depressing fashion. But I am not seriously ill, as I had feared for some weeks, and think that I should definitely be back to normal soon. I am in good spirits, and will take things easy for the summer.
Fritz and Maidon arrived today, joyful to be back, and Max is hardly likely to be back before mid-July, perhaps only in August. But the overall situation of the institute and the Jewish things is more favourable than it has been in years, which also helps me get back in shape. The institute had two reports on Frankfurt. The institute building there was hit spot on, and is now rubble. There are still three large buildings standing in the city: the central train station, the IG administrative building (that is precision bombing)4 and the synagogue in Westend. Otherwise thousands of houses, but completely random. The university is totally burned out. I was unable to find out anything about Schöne Aussicht, but it seems that the whole of the old town centre was destroyed, including the Römer and the Goethe House. Apparently there is still such an abominable stench from the countless bodies buried under the ruins that it is impossible to take a walk through the streets.
Direct contact with German civilians is quite out of the question; even for such influential people as Norah, who is in Kitzbühl. We are not even trying it with poor Melly, who must be in Russian territory, regardless of whether she stayed in Berlin or fled to Vienna. I would advise you against seeking contact with anyone in Germany until you are naturalized. The only way to find anything out is through American friends in the occupation. This situation is expected to continue for another 6–8 months. The report on Frankfurt by Herr Rothschild5 would greatly interest me. In the case of some acquaintances, I learned that they are still living through the newspaper, like Radbruch,6 with whom I spent much time in Oxford, and also the loathsome Beutler from the Goethe Museum, who has yet again made a nationalistic appeal7 and should be hung.
One is now only gradually getting around to being glad that the worst thing in the world no longer exists. The death of Himmler was a symbol of that. After that, I am also starting to believe in Hitler’s death: if he had escaped in a submarine, there would also have been room for Goebbels and Himmler. I have not given up the hope that I shall one day write down the things that occupy me most in a little house in Amorbach.
You must make sure that the soon 80-year-old keeps up her strength. How happy Agathe would have been to witness the end of the Nazis, quand même!
But something has happened that does in fact symbolize the demise of the world of my experience: the Würzburg residence has been destroyed.
Heartiest kisses
from your old, now truly old child
Teddie
Many hugs and kisses from your
Giraffe
Original: typewritten letter with a handwritten greeting by Gretel Adorno.
1 The founding conference of the United Nations was held in San Francisco during that time; the UN Charter was signed there by fifty-one nations on 26 June.
2 Dimitri Manuilski (1883–1959[?]) had been first secretary of the Komintern from 1929 to 1934.
3 The psychologist Harold E. Jones (1894–1960) was professor at Berkeley from 1931 onwards, and from 1935 also director of the Institute of Child Welfare. The planned ‘Study of Antisemitism among Children’, which formed one of what were originally nine part-projects of the study on anti-Semitism, was not concluded.
4 precision bombing: EO.
5 ‘The letter from young Rothschild’, as it is referred to in the following letter, does not seem to have survived. It is unknown whether it was written to Maria Wiesengrund or circulated in New York.
6 Gustav Radbruch (1878–1949), who lost his post – the first professor to do so – at the start of May 1933, went on study trips to Oxford in 1935 and 1936.
7 Ernst Beutler (1885–1960), director of the Freier Deutscher Hochstift from 1925 and of the Goethe Museum from 1931, had lost his honorary professorship at Frankfurt University in 1937 due to lack of political reliability and his wife’s Jewish descent. The ‘appeal’ is presumably the following notice signed by Johann Georg Hartmann and Ernst Beutler: ‘Appeal to our members! The 22 March 1944, the anniversary of Goethe’s death, also marked the death of the city of his youth.’ Adorno was probably sent this appeal in 1945 after the Allies’ victory. The phrase ‘yet again’ in Adorno’s letter refers to Beutler’s ‘Appeal’ of March 1931: ‘Deutsche Volksspende für Goethes Geburtsstätte – Ehrenschirmherr Reichspräsident von Hindenburg’ [German people’s donation for Goethe’s place of birth – honorary patron Reichspräsident von Hindenburg].
135 LOS ANGELES, 21.6.1945
21 June 1945
My dearss,
a thousand thanks for your cheque, which I used to buy myself a lovely playsuit.1 We spent my birthday very quietly – on Saturday afternoon Maidon, Pollock and Norah Andreae came for tea, on Sunday just the two horses to dinner with old Hahn and Norah.
On Monday (18th) Archie had his wisdom teeth on the right side pulled, which was quite a tough job – the lower tooth had to be chiselled out – and he had severe pains for the first two days after that. Thanks to Sulfen, however, there were no complications, and today he is still a little swollen, but is working energetically again. –
I am still feeling well – without any particular efforts –, and I am receiving compliments from all sides about how well I am looking, a very nice change for me. – The left side of our little house has now finally been rented again, and the people will be moving in around the first of July; hopefully the relationship will be pleasant this time too. –
Today Archie was at the Federal Court to register as a potential juror, as his name was drawn. The time of his possible jurorship would only be from February 46–47, however. –
When are you going on holiday? – I read in the newspaper that it is already very hot in New York. Hopefully it is not causing you too many problems.
The very fondest regards and kisses
Your old Giraffe
(please turn over! Archie!)
My dearss,
so one half – the right – of the dental orgy is behind me; there was a great and unexpected commotion, as the x-ray did not show that the tooth was not in its pulp cavity, but had rather grown deep into the jawbone and had to be broken before the root could be removed. But the local anaesthetic helped, and whenever he was labouring too wildly inside my mouth I imagined I was Lujche,2 which made me feel better immediately. Sulpha is truly a miracle: today, the 3rd day after what the doctor termed an exceptionally difficult matter, almost no pains, except for feeling as if someone had smacked me in the gob, on the outside also coloured as after a blow. On 9 July there will be the same procedure on the left – but I am happy to go through it all if it gets rid of my neuralgia once and for all. My overall condition is incomparably better since following Robert’s instructions.
I am at work again – all sorts of work, am making good progress and feel fully capable of action again for the first time in half a year – not such a troubled animal as in New York. Am also making music once more. I am having to spend a lot of time assisting the translation of the book I wrote with Eisler (‘Music for the Movies’).3 It is coming along well, and the translator, Prof. MacManus4 from the university here, is a charming fellow and is making an enormous effort, but calls me about every trifle. Next time I shall write in English to begin with, the only reason for not doing so this time was the collaboration with Eisler, whose English is too poor.
The letter from young Rothschild is very interesting in its factual part, and I would have a burning interest in anything similar you might read or hear. The same goes for reports on Germany in your major newspapers. The ones here are pathetic, and so far out of the way that they hardly print anything about Europe.
I hope you are well and will soon have a pleasantly cool holiday. Heartiest kisses from your faithful hippo
Teddie
Original: handwritten letter.
1 playsuit: EO.
2 Translator’s note: a different spelling of ‘Louische’.
3 The title of the English edition published in 1947 was Composing for the Films.
4 George MacManus.
136 LOS ANGELES, 2.7.1945
DR. T.W. ADORNO
316 So. Kenter Avenue
Los Angeles 24, Calif.
2 July 1945
My dearss,
I was sent the newspaper cutting1 from the ‘Frankfurter Presse’ enclosed here by Robert de Neufville, who is over there as a lieutenant in the American Army. It transpires that Helene (Louis’s wife) was deported to (the supposedly bearable) Theresienstadt, but was saved, so both good and bad news.
Robert was in Frankfurt and writes that it is horrific.
We are well enough, up to our necks in work. Holidays are supposed to start around 1 August.
Heartiest kisses
from your old child
Teddie
Original: handwritten letter with printed letterhead.
1 On 14 June 1945, the newspaper Frankfurter Presse – published by the American 12th Army Group – printed a list of survivors, under the title: ‘Lebendig in Theresienstadt: Frankfurter wurden befreit’ [Alive in Theresienstadt: Citizens of Frankfurt Were Freed], which included the name of Helene Calvelli-Adorno. Helene Calvelli-Adorno (née Katz; 1883–1945) was the second wife of Louis Prosper Calvelli-Adorno; she had been deported to Theresienstadt at the end of February 1945 and died in December of the same year, a mere six months after being freed.
137 LOS ANGELES, 27.7.1945
Los Angeles, 27 July 1945
My dears faithful old WK,
this is to send you the heartiest, best possible wishes on this solemn occasion, that of the three-quarter century. Even if, after the crisis of last year, we have every reason to be grateful that you can celebrate it in such good spirits and health, and in the knowledge that the worst thing imaginable has left the world for now, I still view it merely as the threshold to the next notable date, the eightieth, and wish for you and for us that your condition will continue to improve, and that you will carry on being as sensible and careful as you have been this last year. And I cannot refrain from hoping that precisely the next five years will continue the change for the better, also objectively. The English elections are a good omen – they show, as Max put it, that fascism did not triumph after all, and the days of the Francos, Umbertos e tutti quanti should now be numbered.1 At the same time, it means an era of undreamed-of social reforms in England.2 And although I do not overlook the danger that, faced with a more or less socialist world, American capitalism will be pushed in the direction of fascism, with the conflict with the Soviet Union in the background it is still difficult, on the other hand, to imagine that the masses here will stand for the madness if there is full employment in the Europe that has been bled dry, yet 9 million unemployed people in the richest of all countries. – Incidentally, the question of a return to Europe strikes me as more relevant than ever. –
I was in San Francisco from the 17th to the 24th, and stayed with the Alexanders, as there was no hotel room available either in S.F. or over in Berkeley. I now have two big projects running there, the old one with Berkeley University, on which the first report has just been finished, and the new project about children (examining the inception of anti-Semitism in children), with the Child Welfare Institute, the largest such research centre in America, with whose director, Jones, I work for hours every day.
Meanwhile Max has returned, and we had meetings all day on Wednesday and Thursday, together with his assistant from New York and mine from Berkeley. He is in good spirits and achieved a great deal, but is totally overworked and more than ripe for a holiday. I am hardly any less so. Following my dental business I contracted tonsillitis, which I managed to keep temporarily at bay with Sulpha etc. to avoid having to postpone the trip to Berkeley; suffered a relapse there, was patched together by Robert, and feel much better now, after three nights of decent sleep. The neuralgia has disappeared, except for some very slight traces. The remaining wisdom teeth will be slaughtered on
1 August, and then I will get on the case of my tonsils, a chronic centre of inflammation, to finally get rid of all this stuff.
Luli is here with husband – and has taken our child, Ali Baba Fenichel de Goertz zu Onkelsmülle, with her for the duration of her stay (21½2 months), swearing a sacred oath to restore him to us before her return to New York – but we doubt whether she will part with our little Jesus again once she has got used to him. Gretel is naturally dreadfully sad about it, for the animal is as dear to us as if it were truly our child. Aside from that, Giraffe is still feeling splendid.
I have a peculiar feeling about your 75th birthday – namely that, at both our ages, the feeling of an age difference, with all that accompanies it – almost the difference between parents and children3 – is no longer present – even less so if one considers that, in the face of today’s infantile collectivist world, we have long become one generation. There is something deeply comforting in that.
Hopefully you will both enjoy a good, thorough rest, so that the Wondrous Hippo Cow will be able to celebrate her 80th birthday in all good cheer. We shall be on holiday from 1 August.
I embrace you, my dear WK – ‘abundant well-being and blessings’4 – and many, many yet to come. With hearty and fond regards from your meanwhile almost equally old child
Teddie
Hugs and kisses from
Your old Giraffe
Original: typewritten letter with handwritten ending.
1 Umberto II had become general governor of the kingdom in 1944, following the abdication of his father Vittorio Emanuele; he was crowned king of Italy in May 1946, but left the country after a referendum in favour of the republic. The political reign of Franco only ended with his death over thirty years later.
2 The Labour Party had won the general election, and in the following years placed the coal-mining industry, the railways, and the iron and steel industries under state control – as well as the Bank of England; in addition, the Labour government under Clement Richard Attlee (1883–1967) introduced a uniform national insurance system and the National Health Service.
3 See the aphorism ‘Rasenbank’ [Lawn-bench] from Minima Moralia.
4 The original [‘lauter Heil und Segen’] is the closing line of the second stanza of ‘Frühlingslied’ [Spring Song] by Heinrich Hoffmann von Fallersleben.
138 LOS ANGELES, 19.8.1945
19 August 1945
My dearss,
I feel very guilty for not writing to you for so long. Meanwhile we have some peace and quiet. From Tuesday on we were no longer amid the bustle of Hollywood, but rather alone in our little house, and thought of you a great deal. On Wednesday – a public holiday in California – we made immediate use of the petrol derationing and drove 43 miles south along the ocean to Oxnard for a stroll. (We went on the same outing on 7 December 1941.) Aside from that, the last weeks in particular have been rather full of work; next to some quite important meetings with Max also a seminar and work on the anti-Semitism project. Last Friday we had a big victory party with the Thomas Manns, the whole institute, Palfis, Hanns Eisler (Lou was in San Francisco at the time), Lily Latté1 (it turned out that she went to the same school as I did, and that all of us there fancied the young Latin teacher Rommel (!)). – I still miss Ali Baba as much as on the first day. He was here the other day with Luli, and when we said goodbye – she had just taken us to her new estate2 – he absolutely wanted to get out of her white Cadillac into our modest Baldchen. The estate is a dream, high up in the hills of Beverly Hills and with an indescribable view, and despite the Spanish style it has a slight air of a German fairytale castle. She is having it modernized, and they want to move here in the spring and spend at least eight months of the year over here. The separation from us has not done Ali Baba any good; he has heart attacks, coughs and generally seems rather sad. Luli is ill herself at the moment, apparently poison oak poisoning.
Hopefully you are finding it pleasant in Rhinebeck again and can take your walks. It truly would be so very lovely if we could show you the West Coast next year.
Hugs and kisses from
your
long-necked Giraffe
My dearss, today just these few words before the holidays start in a few days. The 2nd dental operation went very smoothly and painlessly, except that it bled like mad for 5 hours, and I am somewhat weakened and generally worn-out as a result. The last weeks have been all right; except for correcting the 2nd part of a big philosophical study I have almost only been at meetings with Max – we both have more on our plates than ever, and are trying to do it as well as possible. The day before yesterday we had a big peace party in honour of Lix (who had thrown one for us before that), with Thomas Mann e tutti quanti – Giraffe had ordered an incredible amount of meat, and it proved a succès fou both for the belly and for the spirit. – No headache etc. at all; I think I am truly cured. Thanks to the diet I weigh only 59 kg – am as thin as I was 15 years ago, and feel good for it; only badly in need of a holiday. Hopefully you are having a good rest. I shall write to you properly soon. My assessment of the Japanese war as a colonial one has proved as accurate as my verdict about Germany. We are thinking of Europe because of the danger here! Speaking of which: what do you think about the atomic bomb?
Heartiest kisses from your old and faithful child
Teddie
Original: handwritten letter.
1 Elisabeth Lily Latté (1901–84), née Schaul, came from Berlin and had been together with Fritz Lang since the mid-1920s. She emigrated to Paris in 1933 and went to the USA in 1935. Latté and Lang bought a house together in Beverly Hills in 1945. She worked as Lang’s assistant and secretary.
2 estate: EO.
139 LOS ANGELES, 30.8.1945
30 August 1945
My dearss,
your sweet letter gave me an acutely guilty conscience, and I can do no more than ask you to forgive me. I was not actually ill during my weeks of silence, but nonetheless so exhausted and worn-out1 that something as simple as writing a letter or even picking up the telephone cost me an entirely disproportionate effort. That sounds like a very pathetic excuse, but perhaps you can indeed imagine such a state. There was absolutely no other reason. My dears Giraffe Gazelle is still feeling well, looks splendid and can even drive for long stretches once more with the help of the now freely available petrol. Yesterday we went on a big driving tour to the South, to Laguna Beach, a bathing resort situated in truly enchanting surroundings that one can only compare to the most beautiful spots on the French Riviera, and during the holidays, which have just started with a vengeance, we intend to take advantage of our car and the now radiantly fine weather to the fullest extent. Max is away, was in Berkeley for a few days and is now going to the mountains, but will be back here around the 20th. As all the hotels are outrageously full, however, we find it more comfortable to spend our holidays here. I also have to play director a little for our projects on the side. Meanwhile, incidentally, I have advanced to the position of official director of all scientific activities2 of the American Jewish Committee on the West Coast, and can already hear WK saying that that is worth about as much as tuppence ha’penny, but tuppence ha’penny is certainly nothing to sneeze at for a half-descendant of the Colonna family,3 after all.
Luli was quite ill, had contracted streptococcus poisoning through an insect bite, but is more or less back to normal. We were at the beach with her yesterday (without husband). She has aged peculiarly, and although she constantly declares how happy she is, and throws her money away generously in small amounts, one has the feeling that something is amiss, without being able to say exactly what it is. At any rate, she has lost a considerable amount of the radiance she had as a princess in the mouse-fortress since becoming the wife of her precision engineer nabob.
Ali Baba is healthy again, and we shall get him back in approximately four weeks when Luli goes back to New York, until she moves to her estate here once and for all, which will supposedly happen in the spring. She wants to have him back then, but will give us a little Afghan puppy as compensation. Ali Baba, our little Jesus, is decidedly happier with us than with his mistress, where he has to play the wild Afghan hound, which he is not at all, just as she frantically plays the lively young baroness, which she no longer is either.
Aside from that we are seeing a lot of Fritz Pollock and Felix Weil, who has been showing a touchingly trusting nature. We are being invited a little too much for our ideal of horse-peace, but it is difficult to avoid if one is to stay here.
I am genuinely worried about the Wondrous Hippo Cow, both because of what WK wrote and because of her own somewhat resigned words. I demand energetically that my most royal mother, by her Bauchschleifer honour, not entertain such foolish thoughts as ‘a rich life lies behind her’ and continues to live life with the same energy that got her through fascism, emigration and war.
Purely out of egotism, because I have the greatest yearning to see her again in good health and spirits. Unfortunately I cannot yet fix a date for it this time either, because I have so many things on my plate at the moment, above all the responsibility for my two big projects, so I cannot simply go away in the middle of everything. But it goes without saying that I shall come as soon as I can find some pretext, and Max knows that.
September is generally a very pleasant month in New York, not so oppressively hot any more, and I hope that Marinumba is sensible enough to avoid going on any par force tours and instead take a sit as peacefully as possible on Riverside Drive.
I have been spared any headaches at all for weeks now, and have every reason to assume that the dental operation genuinely fulfilled its purpose. One will have to see about the tonsils.
Heartiest kisses from your old child, who is rolling in the mud as the massive Hippo King.
Ever your child
Teddie
Fond regards ever your Giraffe Gazelle. What are Marinumba’s birthday wishes?
Original: typewritten letter with additional handwritten note by Gretel Adorno.
1 worn-out: EO.
2 activities: EO.
3 The details of Adorno’s complicated lineage are not entirely clear. There were unquestionably members of the Genoese family Colonna in Corsica; it was impossible, however, to ascertain when these encountered the Calvellis and Adornos.
140 LOS ANGELES, 13.9.1945
Los Angeles, 13 September 1945
My dears, a thousand thanks for your lengthy birthday letter and the munificent cheque, which my cousin Franz Villinger would unquestionably term a ‘noble present’. Speaking of which, I am glad with all my heart that Jenny survived the Nazi disaster, but I am also somewhat glad that family contact came about through Fritz1 in particular. One could almost call it a national community – one from which I am glad to be excluded.
The main thing: there is a good chance, albeit no certainty, that I will be coming to New York soon. Max should be there at the start of October, and I will join him about four weeks later; he would then go back again earlier, while I plan to stay approximately until Christmas.* The plan is entirely confidential for now. Naturally I would rather have been there for the Hippo Cow’s 80th birthday, but with the enormous distance and the complicated arrangements I simply cannot fix it so precisely – you will understand that. I need hardly tell you that I will do my utmost.
Max put in a surprise appearance on the evening of my birthday: he had ended his holiday prematurely, as the burden of the current responsibilities left him no peace. Incidentally, he is now also being treated by Robert Alexander, who cured Gretel and also helped me a great deal, though I have had some traces of neuralgia again these last few days. The dental operation seems to have offered my body great relief. (Heart!)
I had to smile at your remark about Lix – the only problem is how to avoid his sitting around all day and preventing any decent work, not his ‘reserve’.2 He had somehow found out that it was my birthday and immediately came to us with all sorts of wine. He takes a touching part in the work, unfortunately with more zeal than understanding.
As I hardly got around to any holidays – I urgently had to write a new typology of the anti-Semites for Berkeley – I do intend to relax genuinely and radically, though only once Max is gone. But we at least went on a few very nice driving tours; but Gretel does find it exhausting to drive for very long (we once drove 180 miles, i.e. around 300 kilometres, in a single day), and I also have the feeling that the train does not do my neuralgic disposition any good. There should be an article coming out within the next few days in the journal ‘Commentary’ by James Rorty;3 it is essentially (without naming names, with good reason) a report on a big unpublished study of mine. Besides that, my Theses on Art and Religion4 will also be appearing in the autumn issue of the Kenyon Review.
Our house has been sold; after the very unpleasant, xenophobic previous owner, the new one is a friendly Sicilian by the name of Vita (I have given him the name ‘Mr Landlord-life’), and there is a chance that we can stay here in peace, at least until we have bought or built something with the help of the institute. The feeling of not being exposed to any housing shortage is exceedingly reassuring and a moral uplifting.5
I am glad you are both well rested. The pictures are a great joy, WK truly looks excellent; the Hippo Cow a little sad – but perhaps I can soon put her in good spirits.
Heartiest kisses from your old Hippo King
Archibald
Many hugs and kisses from
Your old Giraffe Gazelle
Original: typewritten letter with additional handwritten note by Gretel Adorno.
1 The historian Fritz T. Epstein (1898–1979), who had obtained his postdoctoral qualification [Habilitation] in 1924 with a dissertation on Russia and world politics 1917–20, and emigrated first in 1933 to England then in 1937 to the USA, where he acted as research assistant and belonged to the faculty until 1943; he worked for the US State Department until the end of the war. Epstein returned to Germany in 1969. He was the older son of the mathematics professor Paul Epstein and Alice Epstein (née Wiesengrund).
2 ‘reserve’: EO.
3 See James Rorty, ‘American Fuehrer in Dress Rehearsal’, Commentary: A Jewish Review, vol. 1, no. 1, November 1945, pp. 13–20. Rorty refers to Adorno’s 1943 study ‘The Psychological Technique of Martin Luther Thomas’ Radio Addresses’.
4 See now GS 11, pp. 647–53.
5 moral uplifting: EO.
141 LOS ANGELES, 27.9.1945
27 September 1945
My dears faithful old Wondrous Hippo Cow,
so Monday is the big day, and I am already writing today, to make quite sure that my congratulations reach you, even at the risk of arriving one day too early. I need hardly tell you how infinitely sad I am that I cannot spend the day with you both. Initially I could have come by a hair’s breadth, but then Max had to go to New York after all and I did not, and aside from the fact that I would now be superfluous for the work in New York, I have so many commitments here that I cannot possibly leave everything as it is, especially as Fritz has gone to Berkeley for a few weeks and I thus have to look after Lix all by myself. So there is no alternative but to hope that it happens somehow later on in the year, although all the arrangements are still so uncertain that I cannot with the best will in the world promise anything.
So I wish you, my now eighty-year-old Wondrous Hippo Cow, as much good and fair fortune as anyone could ever wish another person, let alone their own dearest mother. And that you continue to retain your intellectual faculties, remain healthy and still experience as much joy as this life could possibly yield. It is not only out of egotism that my foremost concern is to see you, for I know that it is as important to you as it is to me. If I look at the lives of almost all the other people I know, it seems to me that yours, despite the ghastly emigration, has altogether been one of the most fulfilled, untroubled and happy ones, and I hope with all my heart that it will also continue in this fashion, now that you are a true old hippo lady, which I never recognized before this eightieth birthday, essentially because I could never imagine that you have meanwhile become an old woman. Sometimes I envy you for your eighty years and for everything they encompass – not for the number of years, but rather, I mean to say, for all the suffering you have been spared during so long a life, despite Agathe’s death and the exile. Yet it is only due to you, however, that you were spared it, you of whom no truer claim could be made, in the language of astrologers, than that you were born under a lucky star. May it light your evenings long and faithfully, while my own landscape is already beginning to resemble that of Baudelaire:1 ‘sans ces étoiles dont la lumière parle un langage connu’.
I was very pleased to hear of Franz Adorno’s appointment2 – he is thus the first of us all to be in an exalted position once more, and perhaps he owes it to the ponderousness with which he stayed, and which I can understand only too well. Incidentally, I may be not entirely innocent in the matter, as I was asked about reliable people in Frankfurt a few months ago, and named him as my first choice. I already knew about Lanskoronski (the husband of Maus Wertheimber)3 through Norah.
Commentary is the new journal of the American Jewish Committee, replacing the previous one, Jewish Record. My name and that of Leo4 (it deals with both our studies) are not mentioned because these are analyses of highly dangerous agitators on the West Coast who could otherwise cause us great personal strife – c’est tout. Typology literally means the study of types, and refers to the division of a subject or group of people into dominant types. My one, then, lists the basic psychological types among anti-Semites.
Our good WK’s concerns regarding Lix are entirely unfounded – on the contrary, he has attached himself to us very strongly, and is a deeply good-natured and friendly, but weak, person with a horrible wife. He comes to me for advice about everything, even the most private matters.
Tonight we shall be at the house of Thomas Mann,5 who asked me to read to him from the manuscript of my book of aphorisms; tomorrow evening is the farewell party for Lix, who is going back via San Francisco at the start of next week. Next week we plan to take a trip to the mountains with the very pleasant illustrator Eva Hermann,6 a friend of the Manns.
And now, my dear faithful old mother-animal, accept these unshapely embraces, sniffs, kisses and congratulations
from your
infinitely loving child
Teddie, alias Archibald, m.p.
My dears good Wondrous Hippo Cow,
as an honorary hippo I would like once again to thank you for beating time to the passing of the ages with your tail so selflessly (together with the other hippo cows at the Nile sources). Sadly I cannot fill in for you with my giraffe nature. But I am doing my best with my little horns. I send you all my best and fond regards, and hope that you will continue to be the jewel of the hippos for at least another twenty years, that you are feeling well and that we will see each other again as soon as possible. Due to the three hours’ time difference and the frequently poor connection we will not call, unfortunately. With eighty hugs and kisses from
from your old tall-legged Giraffe Gazelle
Our birthday present, a cheque for a hundred dollars, is enclosed. Use it to buy yourself something that you can genuinely have fun with.
Original: typewritten letter with additional handwritten note by Gretel Adorno and handwritten postscript by Adorno.
1 The quotation is from the first trio of the sonnet ‘Obsession’, which reads: ‘Comme tu me plairais, ô nuit! sans ces étoiles/Dont la lumière parle un langage connu!/Car je cherche le vide, et le noir, et le nu!’
2 Franz Calvelli-Adorno had been appointed chairman of the Reparations Committee.
3 Unknown.
4 Leo Löwenthal’s study was entitled ‘Prophets of Deceit: A Study of the Techniques of the American Agitator’, the fourth part of Studies in Prejudice.
5 Mann wrote about the reading from Minima Moralia in his diary entry of 26 September.
6 The illustrator Eva Hermann (1901–78), a friend of Erika and Klaus Mann, lived in Santa Barbara.
142 LOS ANGELES, 31.10.1945
31 October 1945
My dears,
a thousand thanks for your sweet letter. I am so infinitely sorry that poor WK is having unexpected trouble with his eyes. I can empathize with his mood all too well – it is a particular blow, after the treatment had helped for decades, that it is suddenly no longer working properly. Hopefully, with today’s extremely advanced methods, they can be restored to normal working order again. We sent you a little book by Huxley that Gretel had bought me for my own use.
There is nothing mysterious about my workload here; sometimes it is simply difficult at this distance, if one is not spending every day together, to convey an impression of everyday events. It is simply that I have to devote myself very energetically to the two Berkeley projects, at the same time as having spent all my energy keeping the theoretical work going that was interrupted for a year through Max’s departure to New York, so that not only can we pick up where we left off, but also I will have made serious progress during that year. I think I have succeeded on that count, in the form of a very long manuscript written in the Nietzschean aphoristic form, relating to a relatively wide range of philosophical objects, but above all the question of what has fundamentally become of ‘life’ under the conditions of monopoly capitalism.
Max returned on Monday after an evidently very successful stay in New York, but is horribly exhausted. The institute continues to exist unchanged,1 and I do not understand at all why you thought it might no longer exist. The Jewish matters are continuing, but we are determined to organize them so that we do not spend our most productive years on things that, after all, are only of peripheral interest to us.
I am not in especially good health; after three months’ rest the neuralgia has returned, no longer as bad as it was, but still irksome enough, and above all with additional drowsiness. I am now fairly determined to have my tonsils out too, after all sorts of people have told me that they got rid of similar complaints entirely by doing so. It is only a question of time, as I may have to go to Berkeley now, and certainly will in December.
I expect you know that Norah Andreae’s husband died in Germany. A few days ago we received word that Anton von Webern was murdered in the street about four weeks ago by his son-in-law,2 a fanatical Nazi. I am so ineffably sorry – the artistic loss, together with that of Bartok, is a blow to the music I stand by, the greatest imaginable loss.
I hope to hear good news from you soon, and am glad that the Hippo Cow is swimming so cheerfully into her 81st year.
Heartiest kisses
from your old child
Teddie.
Many hugs from your old Giraffe and your old Ali Baba. What would you like for Christmas?
Frau Herz3 called, we will be meeting her once. A thousand thanks for the newspaper cuttings – I was just about to repeat my request for such news when they came. The newspapers here are of a pitiful standard; even as far as pure news is concerned – a cross between the Miltenberger Anzeiger and Filmkurier.
The New School advertisement4 is wonderful – a veritable trouvaille. We can indeed be very grateful to be spared such sell-offs of the intellect.
Fond regards again!
Archibald
Original: typewritten letter with handwritten postscript.
1 Surely not ‘unchanged’!
2 Webern had in fact been shot dead on 15 September by an American soldier who had mistaken him for an armed black marketeer.
3 Unknown.
4 Its place of publication could not be ascertained.
143 LOS ANGELES, 18.11.1945
18 November 1945
My dears,
a thousand thanks for your letter and the news about Louis and his loved ones. I enclose the letters. It must be terrible in Europe, the reports one hears are gruesome – the only oasis seems to be Monte Carlo.
Pollock went back again today; I am sure he will call you, perhaps also find you and tell you about us.
Your Christmas wishes will be fulfilled, I am very proud already to have acquired the presents despite the great material scarcity, especially here in California.
We are in the following situation: we naturally value WK’s apricot brandy extremely highly, but with the ban on sending alcohol from one state to another we do not want to encourage you to do so, though nothing has ever happened so far, or perhaps Pollock could bring it with him. Otherwise something like a nice big bar of bath soap (a few years ago it was one with a magnificent sandalwood fragrance) would be most welcome. – Archie is not in particularly good shape, but is soon going to San Francisco to have Robert Alexander check and fix him.
Many hugs from your
old lanky Giraffe
My dears, your letter made me unspeakably happy, and I am equally grateful for the newspaper cuttings. Ley’s will,1 for example, which is extremely interesting, was not printed in its original wording in any of the papers here. And the poor Hahns!2 What a horrific world! When one hears such things one can only regret that the atomic bomb was not tried out on Germany. Nonetheless, I did not prove entirely well behaved with the lines written by Franz, which I could have made up myself. I expect you know that all the Adelaers3 in Holland are dead. Also Ludwig v. Gans.4
I am feeling so shaky that I can hardly postpone the tonsil operation any longer, but you should not worry.
Heartiest kisses from your old child
Teddie,
and cuddles from Ali Baba!
Original: handwritten letter.
1 From 1933 to 1945, Robert Ley (1890–1945) had been director of the Deutsche Arbeitsfront [German Workers’ Front] (DAF), which forced all free and independent trade unions to conform to the party line. Ley, a furious antiSemite who had been a party member since 1924, was captured by American troops in 1945 and was to be put on trial in Nuremberg. He committed suicide on 25 October 1945 and left behind his ‘Political Testament’, which he had written in his prison cell. ‘In his political testament Ley admitted, for example, that anti-Semitism had been wrong, that Germans and Jews had to be reconciled – yet stated in the same breath that anti-Semitism is legitimate as long as it is purely defensive, and that now the Jew has won the war. His image of an enemy was evidently unshaken. Ley prophesied that anti-Semitism would erupt more strongly than ever if the Jew sought retribution, and the occupying soldiers would come up against the “Jewish problem”; the coming “show trials” would bring this problem to the world’s attention. If the Jews refrained from seeking retribution, however, then Germany would become their homeland. Ley even recommended the founding of a committee of Jews and anti-Semites to work out the necessary conditions for Jews and Germans to live together, as well as an organization for “schooling and propaganda” in order to disseminate these ideas’ (Ronald Smelser, Robert Ley – Hitlers Mann an der ‘Arbeitsfront’. Eine Biographie [Robert Ley – Hitler’s Man at the ‘Workers’ Front’: A Biography], [Paderborn, 1989], p. 288).
2 It could not be ascertained what happened to the Hahns.
3 Unknown.
4 It could not be ascertained whether this refers to the major industrialist Ludwig von Gans (b. 1869), who, according to other accounts, died only in 1946.
144 LOS ANGELES, 1.12.1945
1 December 1945
My dears,
my very warmest congratulations on your citizenship;1 it is really a very pleasant feeling. But I would almost congratulate WK even more on his enterprising spirit, for which I have unlimited admiration. We and Ali Baba will cross our fingers and paws that his efforts succeed.2
On Thursday Archie had his tonsils out. The doctor, Dr Kully, was extremely deft, the whole thing took only just over half an hour with a local anaesthetic. In that time, Teddie spoke to the doctor and the nurses. He was in hospital for one day, has been back in his own bed since, felt no pain during the operation, now feels as if he had a severe throat infection, cannot speak and swallows only with difficulty, but he has no temperature and is entirely satisfied. They have allowed him to get up a little on Monday and eat more solid food.
We have meanwhile heard through my cousin Gertrud Bohm3 in Poughkeepsie that Melly is alive. She went to Vienna in 1943 and later to her brother in Krems.4 Unfortunately I do not know which zone Krems is in.
My brother-in-law5 is still in Manila and is hardly likely to be released before the spring. Lottchen has a very unpleasant bowel complaint and has to mind her health very carefully.
Please forgive my brevity, but I have to go and make Archie’s lunch.
Hugs and kisses from
Your old Giraffe Gazelle
My dears, your letter made me incredibly happy. I got through the operation in good shape, and it was not terrible at all, except that one already had to be at the clinic at 7 in the morning (an hour’s drive from here!), and that I received a penicillin injection every 3 hours for 24 hours, even at night, which was very irksome with all that codeine. But it would be a lie for me to call it an affair – it is amazing, after all, what things one can do nowadays. I now feel quite well – hardly any more sore throat or trouble speaking and swallowing – and am enjoying lying in bed in joyful anticipation of the butter soup.
Congratulations on your naturalization – it is one of those things that mean little once one has them, and are very unpleasant if (like numerous acquaintances of ours) one does not!
I am very happy that Melly was saved. We know about the Adelaers’ deaths from Viktor Palfi, the ex-husband of Lotte Mosbacher.
Our good WK must not overdo it!
Heartiest kisses from your old child
Teddie
Original: typewritten letter with additional handwritten note by Adorno.
1 citizenship: EO.
2 Unknown.
3 No further information.
4 A town in Lower Austria, where the river of the same name joins the Danube.
5 Egon Wissing.
145 LOS ANGELES, 7.12.1945
7 December 1945
My dears,
a thousand thanks for your letter. You really need not worry about Archie, as I am looking after him very carefully. He is already eating normally again and has recovered his voice. – Otherwise, we have been having quite an exciting few days, as our new landlord has now also told us that we should seek housing elsewhere. Old houses have disappeared almost entirely from the market, and after putting our heads together with Max and Fred at great length we all decided that it would be best, despite the high prices, to build a new stable for the horses. The location is in Pacific Palisades, about 5 miles further outside than we are living now, so 21½2 miles west of Max, whereas we are currently living to the east of the Horkheimers. It will be a little house, divided roughly the same as now, 2-storey: downstairs a little forecourt, garage, kitchen, savic [?]1 porch,2 living room, upstairs 2 bedrooms, den3 (study) and sunporch.4 We have a splendid view of the mountains and the ocean from there. It could be magnificent, and we are extremely happy and grateful that the institute is enabling us to finance it. – Father Christmas is equally welcome with different soap (lavender or lily of the valley or Gilly [?] fleurs or violets). Many hugs and kisses from your old Giraffe, who is well (touch wood)5 despite a great deal of work.
The very fondest regards from your convalescent, proud – as a future house-owner – slightly ashamed and self-amazed child
Teddie
Original: handwritten letter.
1 Difficult to read; unfortunately, the consultation of reference books and dictionaries did not produce any better result.
2 porch: EO.
3 den: EO.
4 sunporch: EO.
5 touch wood: EO.
146 LOS ANGELES, 23.12.1945
23 December 1945
My dears,
a thousand thanks for your lovingly prepared package, the soap, the perfume, the calendar, the meat-extract, and the little blanket. Today I enclose the photo of Giraffe so that you can see she is truly well. Two days of frightful rain here, and as poor Ali Baba, with his long coat, was no longer getting dry at all, I made him a green rain cape from an old oil-cloth and some curtains, which he now takes proudly on his walks. – Archie has a quiet disturbance of the cardiac muscle, is resting a great deal and working mostly in bed, and has already made a very good recovery during the week following his return from Berkeley. – The house contract will probably be signed next week, and I will give you all the details then.
A happy New Year kisses from your lanky Giraffe
Warm regards from dear Julie
My dears, do not worry about me at all – I am in the best hands, and Robert says my heart will get entirely back to normal. Ad Elisabeth: Franz, as I learned positively in San Francisco, received his appointment because of my recommendation to one of the primary bodies concerned, and there would be no harm in his knowing that he owes it to me. Best wishes for the New Year. Kisses from your Teddie
Original: handwritten letter on the reverse of a giraffe card (see fig. 4).
* [Marginal note in Adorno’s hand along the edge of six crossed-out lines:] there was nothing bad written here, simply more outrage at your being left out, and I should not curse too much, as things are going well enough otherwise.
* [Marginal note in Gretel Adorno’s hand:] I think that will only be necessary once he has also brought Archie into such splendid shape.
* [Marginal note:] The whole thing only if Max goes at all; if he decides not to return, which is not out of the question, I would also stay here. This is just to make quite sure that you are not disappointed! Nobody must know that Max might not come, because of the Jews.