MAX KADE CENTER FOR GERMAN-AMERICAN STUDIES

NOVEMBER 1998

In Memoriam Professor John Anthony “Toni” Burzle

On November 4, friends, col- At the end of his life he was a future wife, Muriel Wittmann. leagues, and students gathered for proud citizen of the United States, Their marriage in 1935 brought a memorial service honoring Pro- who proudly led fellow Kiwanis Toni to Canada, where he taught at fessor Toni Burzle, who died on Sep- members in singing a rousing cho- the University of Manitoba for ten tember 23 at the age of ninety. Wil- rus of “My Country, ’Tis of Thee.” years. liam Keel, Anita Herzfeld, Oscar In 1945 Toni accepted a posi- Haugh, Francis Heller, and Helmut tion as assistant professor of Ger- Huelsbergen and Ursula Arnold man at KU and within two years Huelsbergen spoke about the many became chairman of the depart- ways in which Toni Burzle touched ment. During the two decades of our lives at the University of Kan- his leadership he rebuilt the under- sas. We learned, for example, that graduate and graduate programs in Professor Burzle liked traditional German; strengthened the program German folk songs and played the in Russian; negotiated numerous guitar with the German Club at KU student exchanges for KU with uni- and in the summer institutes. At the versities in Germany and other Eu- end of his life, when he was hospi- ropean countries, and initiated sum- talized at Brandon Woods, one of mer language institutes for KU stu- his few pleasures was listening and dents to study foreign languages humming or singing along to re- while immersed in the foreign cul- cordings of these songs. At the ser- ture. vice Tom Schultz, graduate student Under the auspices of the State in German and librarian at the Max Department he directed the Foreign Kade Center, who played the guitar Born in Munich on May 20, Student Orientation Center at the and sang several of Professor 1908, Toni Burzle studied in University of Kansas from 1951 to Burzle’s favorites (“Am Brunnen Munich and Dijon and received a 1976. For years he was KU’s ad- vor dem Tore,” “Wem Gott will Ph.D. in German from the Univer- viser to the Fulbright program and rechte Gunst erweisen,” Du, du sity of Munich in 1932. There he served on the national screening liegst mir im Herzen,” and “Muss i taught courses in German for for- committee for Fulbright applica- denn”). eign students, one of whom was his tions to Germany. He was a con-

Newsletter of the Max Kade Center Editor: Frank Baron; e-mail: [email protected] Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures; The University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS 66045 Telephone: (785) 864-4803; Fax: (785) 864-4298 1 sultant for the Institute of Interna- Society for German-American would not now have a Foreign tional Education; the Council on Studies, stressed how much the so- Study Program. But the list is International Educational Ex- ciety owed to Toni, who played a much larger than that and would change; Inter Nationes; and the crucial role as the founding editor require a volume to enumerate. Now is not the time for me to Austro-American Institute of Edu- of the Yearbook of German-Ameri- express in any way the range of my can Studies. “At a critical stage in cation. From 1967 to 1972, Toni private and public debt to you for served as associate dean of the Col- the history of the society, he took the support that you have shown lege of Liberal Arts and Sciences on the challenge as editor of the new the Department of German, the and later as director of the Office of Yearbook. He placed this yearbook College, and—always in all mat- Foreign Studies, now the Office of on solid foundations, attracting a ters—the larger University. Oth- Study Abroad. He retired in 1976. worldwide readership, so that it has ers can speak more eloquently to Toni developed a friendship become the recognized flagship those achievements than can I, but with Max Kade, a German immi- publication in the field of let me say how much I appreciate grant whose cough remedy made German-American studies.” them personally and how much I him wealthy. A relationship with In recognition of his many ac- always shall. the Max Kade Foundation in the complishments in German-Ameri- Toni’s contributions to KU’s in- 1960s led to the establishment of a can educational and cultural rela- ternational programs and to Ger- distinguished visiting professorship tions, Toni was awarded the Grand man-American Studies were indeed for German in 1964, the addition of Cross of the Order of Merit by the monumental. I will cherish the valuable art works to the collections Federal Republic of Germany in memories of working together with in the Spencer Museum of Art, and 1967 and the Silver Medal by the Toni and with Helmut Huelsbergen the creation, together with his col- Alexander von Humboldt Founda- on the Yearbook of German-Ameri- league Erich Albrecht, of the Max tion in 1969. The Command and can Studies, as well as of our efforts Kade Center for German-American General Staff College at Fort to secure a permanent home for the Studies in 1968. Toni continued as Leavenworth conferred its Leaven- Max Kade Center. I know that Toni director of the center until 1989. worth Lamp Award on Toni in 1975 appreciated the richly deserved rec- Together with Albrecht, Toni or- for his pioneering efforts in making ognition he received during the ganized the first symposium on KU courses available to officers at dedication of the Max Kade Center German-American Literature and the fort. In 1985, the Society for in this room six years ago. Culture at the University of Kansas German-American Studies recog- Whenever I saw him in his last in 1976, a meeting that led to the nized his contributions as founding years, his first question was “How holding of annual symposia by the editor of the yearbook with a is enrollment in German?” or “How Society for German-American leather-bound edition of the Year- is enrollment for Holzkirchen?” He Studies. Toni was appointed first book during the annual symposium really never gave up. And that was editor of the Society’s Yearbook of held at the University of Nebraska. the secret of his success. German-American Studies in 1981. Toni’s lasting impact on KU, its In the five years of his editorship, programs and its students is William Keel the Society’s journal developed into summed up in the words expressed a recognized scholarly outlet for by the dean of the College of Lib- multidisciplinary research in the eral Arts and Sciences, Bob Cobb, field of German-American Studies. on the occasion of Toni’s retirement In his capacity as editor of the Year- in 1976: book, Toni also served on the ex- It is very difficult for me to con- ecutive board of the SGAS from template your retirement, . . . Your 1981 to 1985. contributions to the University When he learned of Toni’s have been monumental. I lose no occasion to assert that were it not death, Don Tolzmann of the Univer- for your tender administrations we sity of Cincinnati, president of the

2 Professor Burzle and Max Kade

To appreciate how much Profes- The formula for Pertussin, the many, Austria, Switzerland, and on sor Burzle did for the University of cough remedy, which the young several U.S. campuses. The Max Kansas we must be aware of his Swabian had taken to the New Kadeheim in Munich still reserves success in persuading Max Kade to World from little Schwäbisch-Hall space for students from the Univer- support German studies and inter- on the Kocher at the turn of the cen- sity of Kansas studying at the Uni- national programs. Fortunately, in tury, had brought him fame and for- versity of Munich. a 1971 article we have Professor tune, and had enabled him to as- It remained one of the high- Burzle’s own words describing this semble one of the finest private col- lights of our trips to the east coast productive relationship. (Reprinted lections of graphic art in the world. that we could visit with the old from German-American Studies, Our friendship was maintained gentleman in his New York office, 1971, vol. 3, p. 3) through the years when he gave our listen to him recite poetry, and chat Museum of Art a copy of the splen with him about German literature The University of Kansas’s re- and the arts. lationship with the Max Kade foun- It was there that we met and dation, and our personal friendship became friends of Dr. Erich Markel, with the late Max Kade extends over then executive vice-president of the the past two decades. It began in Max Kade Foundation, and now its the fall of 1949 when my wife and I president. We found in Dr. Markel first visited Dr. Kade in his little the same wide interest in the hu- office near Battery Place in New manities and the arts, the same phil- York asking for, and receiving, aid anthropic spirit that had made Dr. for our first exchange scholarships Kade one of the great benefactors to Germany. of German-American education. I still remember our conversa- In 1970 the Max Kade founda- tion with the spry old gentleman; I tion gave our Museum of Art per- recall his agile mind, his quick wit, haps the most generous gift of its his energetic gestures, and his wide long association with the University knowledge in the sciences, the hu- of Kansas. A collection of ninety- manities, and the arts. Our brief Max Kade four outstanding master prints, courtesy visit turned into an ex- ranging from Albrecht Dürer’s tended stimulating conversation, did facsimile edition of the Ritter, Tod und Teufel to the twenti- particularly when he learned of our Weisskunig which the Max Kade eth-century from Dr. Kade’s per- interest in art and invited us to view foundation had published, when he sonal collection, was added to our the rare Albrecht Dürer prints which helped us establish the Max Kade museum holdings. he had just acquired. It was his en- Distinguished Professorship in Ger- gaging dry humor, his love for po- man, when he aided us with the J. A. Burzle etry that at once endeared him to us: University of Kansas Junior Year in “I really should not give you any Germany, donated funds for the an- money for Kansas” he replied to my nual Max Kade Lectures, and one request for aid, “I could never sell year ago established the Max Kade my Pertussin there.” My wife’s re- German-American Document and tort that “the Kansas climate is so Research Center, the only center healthy that we don’t need much dedicated to research in German- medication for coughs,” melted the American studies. His great inter- ice, and brought the first “Max Kade est in international education in- Scholarship” funds to the Univer- spired him to build Max kade Resi- sity of Kansas. dence halls and libraries in Ger-

3 Acquisitions of the Max Kade Center

Jimmy Morrison, a former undergraduate and graduate student in German at the University of Kansas, is president and chief executive officer of the Siemens Transportation Systems, Inc., in Iselin, New Jersey. His company’s generous contributions to the Max Kade Center over a period of five years will make it possible to intensify our lecture program and acquisition of books. The Max Kade Center recently became home for the works and writings of Fritz Blumenau, an exile artist from Berlin, who immigrated to the United States in 1937 and lived in Detroit until his death in 1983. Ms. Ruth Oberhänsli, a close friend of the artist during the last years of his life, entrusted the center with Blumenau’s art collection and diaries. Blumenau’s works record life in Berlin between 1904 until 1937. After his arrival in Detroit, Blumenau documented his impressions of America in doing landscapes and portraits.

Fritz Blumenau

September 20, 1889 Born in Berlin

ca. 1907-1909 Attended the Technical Uni- versity of Berlin (Char- lottenburg)

1909-1914 Worked for an architectural firm

1914-1918 Served in the German army as a communication special- ist, spending two years on the French front and later on the Russian front

1922 Married Angela Dudzinski

ca. 1925-1937 Advertising manager for the Hermann Joseph department store

1928 Birth of son, Frank In Exile (Oil, 1964) 1937 Immigrated to the United States

1937-ca. 1944 Worked as a free-lance graphic designer in Detroit

ca. 1944-1954 Worked as a designer for Fisher Body (General Motors) in Detroit

November 15, 1965 Death of wife

December 2, 1983 Death

4 Albert Bloch

Another recent acquisition of the Max Kade Center is a complete set of Albert Bloch’s manuscripts, lec- tures, papers, and correspondence. The rich collection of materials about the “American Blue Rider” was the documentary basis for the retrospective exhibitions in the Nelson-Atkins Museum, the Lenbachhaus, and the Wilmington Museum of Art in 1997. This new resource joins a growing archive of materials that includes Bloch’s extensive and newly discovered caricature work for the St. Louis newspapers. The Max Kade Center now also has Bloch’s original pen drawing of Dawn (Faust II, Act I, 1945), on display with the John M. Spalek Exile Collection. The Mirror, 1909

5 Symposium on Exiles in America October 16-17, 1998

The acquisition of the John M. from Chicago, and Honorary Consul Bolivian exile as “port in the storm” Spalek Exile Collection was the cata- Willard Snyder from Kansas City. We in the biography of emigrant Egon lyst for the symposium we organized also appreciated the contributions of Schwarz; the freethought history of this fall. We were fortunate to have colleagues from neighboring universi- 1848 in Baden and Lawrence; the freshened classical aesthetic of KU highly respected scholars participate. ties and colleges. Patricia and David students performing chamber music Professor Spalek, keynote speaker, was Brodsky, both of the University of Mis- from Central Europe; Erika Mann’s optimistic in assessing the role that the souri at Kansas City, wrote: political speeches during her exile in Max Kade Center could play as a re- We wanted to write and congratulate the United States! search center in immigration and exile you on the fine conference that you The conference brought together studies. organized recently, “The Legacy of scholars of astonishing creativity and Wolfgang Griep, librarian at the the 1848-1933-1945 Exiles in clarity. In combination, their synergy America.” The quality of the speak- Landesbibliothek in Eutin (Lawrence’s and strength had a buoyant effect. ers was very high. We especially ap- Those who attended will certainly be sister city), came to the symposium preciated the care that had gone into with a proposal. His presentation about looking toward KU’s German Depart- the organizing of the panels. We feel ment and the Max Kade Center as a Wilhelm August Otto was based on a that the combined focus on 1848 and generative force for the highest qual- previously overlooked correspondence 1933 worked very well; the juxtapo- ity advancement of German-Ameri- of about 200 letters. These letters tell sition made the audience reconsider can studies. The acquisition of the of the outbreak of the revolution in these events in a new context. Finally, Spalek exile collection has immensely 1848 and his later experiences as an we enjoyed the interdisciplinary na- enhanced the status of the Sudler immigrant in America, thus revealing ture of the papers, which ranged from House/KU Max Kade Center. It is a significant segment of nineteenth- literature to film, from European to now a nationally visible magnet for American history, from science to century German-American history. Dr. scholars and a new primary site for politics to personal memoirs. Griep is proposing that these letters be productive collaboration in this field. Charles Reitz, of the Kansas City Kan- published jointly by the Eutin Although we are not able to include all sas Community College, also com- Landesbibliothek and the Max Kade the presentations at the symposium, we mented: decided to present abridged texts of Center. The interdisciplinary dimension of the talks by Professors Jim Woelfel and Ri- Our symposium attracted distin- weekend was extraordinary: Brecht’s guished visitors: Barbara Johr and Gert poetry in and of Los Angeles; exile chard Schowen. Because of the impor- Sautermeister from Bremen, Erhard German film artists and Hollywood tance of these and other contributions Bahr from UCLA, Egon Schwarz and anti-fascism; the dialectic of 20th of the symposium, we expect them to Paul Michael Lützeler from St. Louis, Century German politics and its im- be published at a later date in an ex- Consul General Michael Engelhard pact on American natural science; panded and documented form.

Living and Thinking “On the Boundary”: Paul Tillich in America Jim Woelfel

Paul Tillich is one of the pre- modes of existence and ways of came to the U.S., and the “Autobio- eminent theologians and philoso- thinking. After he came to America graphical Reflections” he wrote in phers of religion of the twentieth he applied the metaphor of the 1952 for a volume of essays entitled century, and also a notable exile boundary to his relationship to his The Theology of Paul Tillich. who reflected a good deal on his homeland and his adopted land, and Paul Johannes Tillich was born exile. Immigrating to the United it still seems to me the most fruitful in 1886 in Starzeddel, a small town States in 1933, at the age of 47, he way to illuminate how he under- in Prussia. His father was a Lutheran wrote his major works and achieved stood his exile. I’ll begin my re- minister who became a superinten- his greatest influence in this coun- marks with a brief biographical dent or “bishop” of the diocese of try. While he was still in Germany, sketch, and then I want to look at Schönfliess-Neumark when Paul Tillich began defining himself and two short autobiographical writings was four. In 1900 the family moved his thought as occupying the by Tillich: On the Boundary, first from the small, medieval town of “boundary” between alternative published only three years after he Schönfliess to Berlin. After his

6 schooling at humanistic Gymnasia the religious-socialist movement in The distinguished American theo- first in Königsberg-Neumark and Germany. Although deeply influ- logian Reinhold Niebuhr had been then in Berlin, Tillich studied in the enced by Marx’s critical analysis of in Germany during the summer of theological faculties of Berlin, capitalism and bourgeois society, 1933, shortly after Tillich’s dis- Tübingen, Breslau, and Halle. In and active in advocating workers missal, and it was chiefly Niebuhr 1911 he received the Ph.D. in phi- rights and fundamental economic who persuaded a reluctant Tillich to losophy from the University of and political change, the religious emigrate. The dean and faculty of Breslau, and in 1912 the degree of socialists rejected economic mate- Union Theological Seminary in Licentiate of Theology from Halle. rialism, utopianism, and all forms New York City, at that time (He always considered him- America’s most prestigious self both a philosopher and a center for theological stud- theologian, and at different pe- ies, offered Tillich a posi- riods held university appoint- tion, and each of the faculty ments in one or the other.) contributed 5% of his sal- Tillich was ordained to the ary in order to pay Tillich’s ministry of the Evangelical salary until it could be ac- Lutheran Church the same commodated in the follow- year. In 1914, with the out- ing year’s budget. This was break of the First World War, no small sacrifice in the he volunteered as a chaplain depths of the Great Depres- in the German army and sion! served throughout the war. So Tillich, with his In 1919 Tillich was ap- family, began a new life in pointed to the faculty of the- the United States when he ology at the University of Ber- was 47 years old and, as he lin, where he taught for five relates it, “without even a years and developed what he minimum knowledge of the called a “theology of culture,” language.” He was a mem- lecturing on the relation of re- ber of the Union Seminary Paul Tillich ligion to politics, art, philosophy, faculty until his retirement in 1955. depth psychology, and sociology. During the 1930s and 1940s, in ad- He became professor of theology at of purely secular and doctrinaire dition to his teaching and substan- the University of Marburg in 1924, socialism in favor of a holistic and tial writing, he was actively in- where for the year he was there he broadly religious vision of society. volved in refugee work with the was a colleague of Martin Tillich was actively involved, par- Federal Council of Churches (now Heidegger. Having earlier con- ticularly in the theoretical work of the National Council) and partici- tracted a brief marriage that ended the movement, producing books pated in the 1937 Oxford ecumeni- in divorce, Tillich in 1924 married and articles on religious socialism cal conference of what would be- Hannah Werner. They later had a throughout the 1920s and into the come the World Council of daughter and a son. He went on to 1930s. (He was also a member of Churches. teach theology at the Universities of the Social Democratic Party.) It was Tillich continued to participate Dresden (1925-29) and Leipzig his long and outspoken association in the religious-socialist movement (1928-29), and then philosophy at with religious socialism, his active in the U.S., and chaired the Coun- the University of Frankfurt am Main support of Jews, and his anti-Nazi cil for a Democratic Germany dur- (1929-33). Tillich lectured and speeches and writings that led to his ing the war years. For fifteen years wrote extensively. The essay based appearing on the first list of German Tillich also chaired Self-Help for on lectures and addresses he gave academics, and the only non-Jew- Emigrés from Central Europe, an was Tillich’s favorite mode of writ- ish faculty member at Frankfurt, to organization that gave counsel and ing, and some of his major books be dismissed from their posts when help to the thousands of refugees, are collections of essays. Hitler came to power in 1933. most of them Jews, who were ar- Immediately after World War I, Fortunately, by then Tillich’s riving from Europe every year. In Tillich was one of the founders of reputation had crossed the Atlantic. 1938 at a rally in Madison Square

7 Garden Tillich gave his first politi- broad humanistic interests and in the fire of many ‘No’s’ and which cal speech in English, attacking philosophical and cultural approach unites the elements of truth pro- Nazi anti-Semitism and affirming to Christianity, Tillich during his moted in the discussion.” For the unity of Christians and Jews. He years in America communicated Tillich, inhabiting the boundary became an American citizen in both to reflective but troubled be- meant living and thinking in a con- 1940. Tillich, Reinhold Niebuhr, lievers and to secularized intellec- stant internal dialogue: existentially and others formed the executive tuals a renewed appreciation of re- and intellectually experiencing both committee of the Christian Council ligion as the dimension of “ultimate of two contrasting alternatives, in- on Palestine, which promoted un- concern” manifested in the many corporating and preserving what he derstanding of Zionism and urged and diverse aspects of human cul- believed was true in each while re- American clergy to support a home- tures. jecting what was false, and cre- land for Jews. I want to turn now to Tillich’s atively forging out of this “Yes” and A revealing footnote to own reflections on his exile, first “No” a new, mediating perspective. Tillich’s activities during the war shortly after he came to the U.S. and He interpreted the development not years that has been largely unknown then some twenty years later. In only of his thought but also of his in the U.S., except among Tillich 1936 he published The Interpreta- life in this dialectical manner. The scholars, is the fact that from 1942 tion of History. The introduction dialectical, mediating approach to to 1944 Tillich made 112 radio was a long autobiographical sketch everything completely defines broadcasts to Germany for the Voice that he called “On the Boundary.” Tillich’s thought and represents his of America, passionately calling his His book of the same title was pub- distinctive contribution to philoso- fellow Germans to repudiate and lished separately, in 1966. In 1929 phy and theology. liberate themselves from the Third he wrote that “The boundary is the On the Boundary, consists of a Reich with arguments based on both best place for acquiring knowl- series of twelve chapters, each of humanistic and Christian values and edge.” Now the metaphor of inhab- which begins with the word “be- on realistic political insight. Of iting the boundary can bear various tween” and deals with two contrast- course Tillich spoke out of his love interpretations. For example, it ing alternatives that have character- for the German people in condemn- could mean occupying a kind of “no ized Tillich’s personal and intellec- ing Nazism and anti-Semitism—an man’s land” between contrasting tual experience. Thus, for example, outlook which ironically got him ways of life and thought, in which we have “Between Two Tempera- blacklisted by the U.S. Army as there is no active engagement with ments,” about the influence on him “pro-German.” American bureau- either side. Or it might mean “fence- of his parents’ different back- crats and military officials were at straddling,” perched between alter- grounds and personalities; “Be- that time in no mood to appreciate natives without choosing either. Or tween City and Country,” contrast- the distinction between being pro- we could imagine a boundary as ing the small-town, rural world of German and pro-Nazi! In the years designating the fringes rather than his earliest years with his life in following the war Tillich traveled the heart of the territory on either Berlin; “Between Religion and Cul- to Germany several times to lecture side. ture,” in which Tillich’s immersion and receive honors. He was deeply But it is clear that Tillich under- in both the church and the larger gratified by his reception there, as stood his position on the boundary society lays the foundation for his well as by the fact that his books dialectically. Indeed, he used to de- view that “religion is the substance published in English were being scribe his entire intellectual project of culture, culture the form of reli- translated and published in Ger- as a “mediating theology” employ- gion”; and “Between Theology and many. ing a dialectical method that he Philosophy,” which describes the Following his retirement from characterized in its original roots of the dialectic that is the per- Union Seminary, Tillich held distin- Socratic sense. He wrote in the spectival and methodological heart guished professorships at Harvard “Author’s Introduction” to his 1948 of his thought. University until 1962 and then at the book of essays entitled The Protes- In keeping with the focus of this University of Chicago until his tant Era: “Dialectics is the way of presentation, I want to look only at death in 1965. At both institutions seeking for truth by talking with the last chapter, “Between Native he taught undergraduate courses to others from different points of view, and Alien Land,” in which Tillich overflowing classrooms, as well as through ‘Yes’ and ‘No,’ until a ‘Yes’ talks about his recent uprooting graduate-level classes. With his has been reached which is hardened from Germany and new beginnings

8 in the U.S. As in much of On the nationalism, such as had happened graphical Reflections,” by contrast Boundary, his reflections here are in Germany, as reflecting an inse- with On the Boundary, is a straight- heavily philosophical and theologi- curity about national identity. “I forward life narrative in which cal, and schematic rather than nar- have always felt so thoroughly Ger- Tillich’s dialectic of the boundary rative in character. He begins: “The man by nature that I could not dwell situation does not provide the over- boundary between native land and on the fact at length. Conditions of all structure but is embedded in the alien country is not merely an ex- birth and destiny cannot really be narrative rather than providing the ternal boundary marked off by na- questioned. We should instead ask: overall structure. ture or by history. It is also the What shall we do with this which is In 1952 Tillich looks back over boundary between two inner forces, given in our lives? . . . Accidents of two decades of life in the United two possibilities of human exist- birth do not constitute answers to States, reminiscing particularly on ence.” Tillich immediately invokes such questions, because the ques- what the community of faculty and the figure of Abraham, who is called tions presuppose them.” He states students at Union Seminary has to leave his native land, Ur of the that living through World War I meant to him and drawing thought- Chaldees, by a God who transcends shaped his attitude toward nation- ful contrasts between aspects of life all tribal or national boundaries and alism, revealing the “demonic and and thought in Europe and America. demands that his followers do so as destructive character of the national Significantly, he now describes his well. Tillich’s succeeding remarks will to power.” dialectical boundary situation no are permeated by the Christian It is only at the very end of his longer as between a “native land” themes of the transcendence and reflections that Tillich says anything and an “alien country,” but as be- universality of God, the unity of about his new “alien country,” the tween the “Old World” and the humankind, and the relativizing of United States. He speaks of it in “New World.” “Emigration at the national loyalties. lofty and symbolic terms that reflect age of forty-seven,” he writes, “In every sense of the word,” our own national rhetoric: “means that one belongs to two Tillich continues, “I have always I was happy to discover on the worlds: to the Old as well as to the stood between native and alien land. boundary of this new continent New into which one has been fully . . . I began to be an ‘emigrant’ per- where I now live, thanks to Ameri- received.” He enumerates the ways sonally and spiritually long before can hospitality, an ideal which is in which he has maintained his con- I actually left my homeland.” Dis- more consistent with the image of nection with the Old World. One has one mankind than that of Europe tinguishing between “physical” been the ongoing community of in her tragic self-dismemberment. friends who are fellow exiles from emigration and “spiritual” emigra- It is the image of one nation in Germany. Another has been his tion, he characterizes spiritual emi- whom representatives of all na- gration as a “break with ruling au- tions and races can live as citizens. work throughout the thirties and the thorities and prevailing social and Although here too the distance war years as chairman of the Self- political patterns” in either passive between ideal and reality is infi- Help for Emigrés from Central Eu- or active resistance, or even as an nite and the image is often deeply rope organization, which, he re- entirely inward “parting from ac- shadowed, nonetheless it is a kind marks, “opened to view depths of cepted lines of belief and thought.” of symbol of that highest possibil- human anxiety and misery and Tillich saw himself as a spiritual ity of history which is called ‘man- heights of human courage and de- kind,’ and which itself points to emigrant in both senses while he votion which are ordinarily hidden that which transcends reality—the from us.” A third avenue of continu- was still in Germany—as a Chris- Kingdom of God. In that highest ing contact has been his chairman- tian, an intellectual, and a religious possibility, the boundary between socialist. native and alien land ceases to ship of the Council for a Democratic Of his ties to Germany, Tillich exist. Germany. He also refers with great wrote, “My attachment to my na- Almost twenty years later, close pleasure to his visits to Germany tive land in terms of landscape, lan- to the end of his career at Union after the war to lecture at various guage, tradition and mutuality of Theological Seminary, Tillich wrote universities. historical destiny has always been another autobiographical sketch, Tillich describes the “New so instinctive that I could never un- this time for his collection of essays, World” much more knowledgably derstand why it should have to be The Theology of Paul Tillich, the and fully than he could have done made an object of special attention.” first volume in the Library of Liv- in 1936. Although he was always re- He saw an extreme emphasis on ing Theology series. “Autobio- alistic about the many faults and

9 problems of the United States, in the treme individualism” of academic in New York Tillich was closely in- “Autobiographical Reflections” life in Germany. He liked American volved with the Philosophy Depart- Tillich speaks of his adopted coun- students. In the “Autobiographical ment at Columbia University as try with something of the same ide- Reflections”: “I loved them from well as with the theological faculty alism he exhibited in his brief re- the first day because of their human at Union Seminary. In “Autobio- marks in On the Boundary. He attitude toward everything human graphical Reflections” he describes writes that “the New World grasped (including myself); their openness how the monthly colloquia of the me with its irresistible power of for ideas, even if strange to them, Philosophy Club at Columbia assimilation and creative courage.” as my ideas certainly were; their se- played a large role in introducing He praises the lack of authoritarian- riousness in study and self-educa- him to American philosophy, which ism he has seen in the family, tion. . . . The lack of linguistic and was dominated by pragmatism, schools, politics, and religion in historical preparation produced naturalism, logical positivism, and America. “But beyond this,” he con- some difficulties, but these were analytic philosophy. Tillich always tinues, “I saw the American cour- overbalanced by many positive claimed that he had learned impor- age to go ahead, to try, to risk fail- qualities.” He also loved the city of tant things from American philoso- ures, to begin again after defeat, to New York, which he called a phy—chiefly its insistence on clar- lead an experimental life both in “bridge between the continents”: a ity and precision and its uniting of knowledge and in action, to be open thoroughly cosmopolitan environ- theory and practice—and we can toward the future, to participate in ment in which he got to meet and see him increasingly incorporating the creative process of nature and talk with people from all over the these emphases in the books he pub- history.” world and in various fields of study lished during his American years. Tillich often pondered the con- and artistic endeavor. He particu- The structure, themes, and methods trast between the American orien- larly remarks on his fruitful asso- of his thought, however, always re- tation to the future and the European ciation with leading representatives mained within the traditions of Eu- sense of the past. In the “Autobio- of the depth psychology movement, ropean idealism and existentialism. graphical Reflections” he writes, some of whom were fellow exiles. Paul Tillich not only understood To grow up in towns in which ev- He himself was a major figure in himself as inhabiting a dialectical ery stone is witness of a period bringing the insights of depth psy- boundary between European and many centuries past produces a chology into theological reflection. American cultures, but to a remark- feeling for history, not as a matter The philosopher William able degree really did embody that of knowledge, but as a living re- Barrett, in his 1982 book of remi- dialectic in his life and thought. He ality in which the past participates niscences, The Truants: Adventures mediated between the “Old World” in the present. I appreciated that Among the Intellectuals, describes and the “New World” in numerous distinction more fully when I came the community of New York intel- ways, both theoretical and practical. to America. In lectures, seminars, open houses, and personal conver- lectuals in which Tillich moved dur- Tillich truly loved and identified sations with American students, I ing those intellectually and artisti- himself with his native Germany found that an immediate emo- cally exciting decades of the 1940s and with European culture; and he tional identification with the real- and 1950s in New York. His de- just as truly loved and identified ity of the past was lacking. . . . It scriptions of the excitement gener- himself with his adopted country is the European destiny to experi- ated by the successive visits of the and its culture. With the breadth and ence in every generation the leading French existentialists— mediating power of his thought, his wealth and the tragedy of histori- Sartre, Beauvoir, and Camus—in wide participation in poliltical and cal existence, and consequently to the years following the war are par- cultural life, his sheer delight in think in terms of the past, whereas ticularly interesting. Indeed, it was people and in living, and his open- America’s history started with the loss both of the burden and of the the “discovery” of existentialism by ness to change, Tillich continued to richness of the past. She was able Americans during the postwar, Cold expand the horizons of his life and to think in terms of the future. War period, through the mediation thought in America, reinterpreting Tillich appreciated the genuine of such people as Barrett, that his German heritage from the per- community that existed at Union helped make Tillich widely known spective of the “New World” and in Seminary among the faculty and and appreciated outside theological turn interpreting his American ex- their families and their students, in circles. perience in the context of all that contrast to what he called the “ex- From the beginning of his years he brought to it from Germany.

10 American Science and European Emigration Richard Schowen

In the land of the lemon trees, yellow tion, held in the Yale Art Gallery on founders of modern chemistry, and yellow were the afternoon and evening of No- Justus von Liebig. Yellow-blue, yellow-green, pungent vember 4, 1949. He read the poem Delbrück entered the relatively with citron sap, himself during the evening session, new field of quantum physics as a Dangling and spangling, the mic-mac preceding a concerto for trumpet doctoral student in Göttingen. He of mocking birds. and bassoon with string orchestra spent a postdoctoral year abroad in composed for the Academy by Paul 1931 in Denmark with Neils Bohr. In the land of the elm trees, wandering mariners Hindemith, then in exile as chair of A critical event in his association Looked on big women, whose ruddy- the Yale Music Department. The with Bohr was an interest in Bohr’s ripe images afternoon session had featured two concept of complementarity, the Wreathed round and round the round scientific presentations: a review of idea that the two alternative descrip- wreath of autumn. cosmic rays by Thomas Johnson of tions of reality that quantum theory the Brookhaven National Labora- permits are in fact both necessary They rolled their r’s, there, in the land tory, and an address entitled A and complementary for a complete of the citrons. Physicist Looks at Biology, by Max description of nature. Delbrück be- In the land of big mariners, the words Delbrück of the California Institute gan to think about the implications they spoke of Technology. of this concept for biology. Were mere brown clods, mere catching My general theme is the role of In 1932, Max Delbrück returned weeds of talk. three emigrant scientists, Max to Berlin as the theoretical assistant Delbrück, Erwin Chargaff, and to Lise Meitner, the collaborator of These are the first three verses Erwin Schrödinger, in what now Otto Hahn in work on radioactive of the final part of Wallace Stevens’s tends to be called the molecular-bio- elements that culminated in the dis- poem An Ordinary Evening in New logical revolution, or the biotech- covery in 1939 of nuclear fission. Haven. You will be pleased to know nological revolution. The science I Meitner’s laboratory was located in that, toward the end of my talk, I refer to underlies the mapping of the the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for will read to those of you kind human and other genomes, the cur- Chemistry in Dahlem, the garden enough to endure the rest of what I rent attacks on cancer, AIDS, suburb of Berlin where the scien- have to say the remaining three Alzheimer’s disease, and other se- tifically various institutes of the verses. I have read you these verses, rious disorders, and is related to Kaiser Wilhelm Society had been first because in a self-serving vein, cloning and other controversial deliberately clustered to foster in- I felt the reference to the land of the technologies. It has begun to affect terdisciplinary cooperation. A main lemon trees might strike a resonant the lives of all of us, and in the fore- attraction of the position, Delbrück tone with this particular audience seeable future it will produce such later said, was the opportunity to and thus win me some undeserved deep-seated changes in the nature nurture his new interest in biology sympathy. Second, I maintain the and organization of human life that at seminars in the biological insti- encounter described by Stevens of it can be compared with the agri- tutes. the elm tree mariners with the won- cultural and industrial revolutions. This last ambition, and much ders of lemon tree land mirrors in Max Delbrück (1906-1981), else, was frustrated by the Nazi as- some degree the atmosphere of the the physicist who looked at biology sumption of power in early 1933. encounter of European emigrants for the Connecticut Academy in The requirement for Gleich- with American culture in the era 1949, was born in Berlin- schaltung, or alignment with Na- 1933-1945. And finally, there is the Grünewald September 4, 1906, into tional Socialist policy including occasion of the writing of this poem a most distinguished academic fam- most importantly its anti-Semitic by Wallace Stevens. ily. His father, Hans Delbrück, was core, fell upon the Berlin scientific Stevens composed his poem for professor of history at the Univer- community along with the rest of the Thousandth Meeting of the Con- sity of Berlin, and his mother was German society. Because of the con- necticut Academy of Arts and Sci- the granddaughter of one of the troversial political maneuvering of ences, its Sesquicentennial Celebra-

11 Max Planck, the president of the Scientific history owes a good which they wrote up, rather as Kaiser Wilhelm Society (which to- deal to the inner exile at this point something of a proposal for re- day is called the Max Planck Soci- of Max Delbrück and two of his search, in a paper issued in 1935 in ety), the Society won the right to Berlin colleagues, K. G. Zimmer Göttingen with a bright green cover. practice Selbstgleichschaltung or and the Russian exile, N.V. It was entitled “On the nature of “voluntary alignment” and was thus Timoféef-Ressovsky. In the Kaiser mutations and the structure of able to attenuate the immediate im- Wilhelm Institute for Brain Re- genes.” The paper, in spite of the pact of Nazi policy on its employ- search, the latter two were attempt- obscurity of its publication, did be- ment of Jewish scientists, including ing to understand X-ray induced come known and was variously re- Meitner. genetic mutations in the fruit fly ferred to as the “green pamphlet” In all public matters, however, Drosophila. Delbrück joined them or the Dreimännerwerk, or “three- Nazification was powerfully appar- man paper,” triple authorships be- ent and nowhere so instantaneous ing unknown in German science at as in the seminar program at the the time. Harnackhaus, the Society’s main The “green pamphlet” leads us site for important lectures. In Feb- directly to another exile-to-be, al- ruary 1933 and thus in the first ready in 1933 a scientist of interna- weeks of the Nazi regime, the po- tional reputation: Erwin Schrö- dium of the Goethesaal was occu- dinger, the originator of quantum pied by one E. Fischer of the nearby wave mechanics and professor of Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Anthro- theoretical physics at the University pology, Human Heredity, and Eu- of Berlin, whose simple four-letter genics, who spoke on “Racial mix- equation H = E summarizes the ing and mental accomplishment.” relationship of matter and energy His was the institute of the notori- with astounding simplicity and ef- ous Otmar von Verschuer, teacher ficiency. Schrödinger was not Jew- of Josef Mengele. Verschuer was to ish, but he was immediately repelled lecture just a year later in the by the Nazi barbarism. When he was visited in Berlin by Lindemann, Goethesaal on “Routes to the ge- Max Delbrück netic health of the German people.” the professor of physics at Oxford, In an autobiography prepared for his in ten-hour sessions of discussion in April 1933 he asked Lindemann Nobel Prize, Max Delbrück re- at Timoféef-Ressovsky’s house. to find him a position in England. marked of this period simply that These intense private seminars un- Lindemann, later to become “the rise of Nazism . . . made offi- der normal conditions might well Churchill’s wartime science advi- cial seminars less interesting.” have been replaced by polite and un- sor, worked quickly, and in Octo- The result of the Nazification of productive conversational ex- ber 1933, Schrödinger was elected the seminar program was the retire- changes within the normal seminar Fellow of Magdalen College. In ment of a number of Dahlem scien- context of the institutes. November 1933, he was awarded tists from the public seminar scene The subject was how to use X- the Nobel Prize in Physics. into small, private scientific meet- radiation to probe the nature and Somewhat amazingly, in what ings at which the participants could particularly the size and location of he later described as “an unprec- trust each other for free discussion. the gene, the crucial element of he- edented stupidity,” Schrödinger, an One might mark this kind of event redity. It must be remembered in our Austrian national, in 1936 accepted as the beginning of inner exile, a current days of mapping genes, and a professorship at Graz and returned concept that played such a role in seeing photos of them on the to Austria. After an adventurous es- the tortured postwar apologetics of evening news, that the gene was in cape in 1938, in October 1939 he the physicist Werner Heisenberg, 1933 an abstract concept, and even accepted a standing invitation from who not only remained in Germany its existence as a physical entity was the Irish government to take up resi- throughout the Nazi period but was debatable. So it was an adventurous dence and scientific work in Dublin. the leader of the German atom- project in the extreme that The prime minister of Ireland, bomb research project. Delbrück, Zimmer, and Timoféef- Eamon de Valera, had arranged for Ressovsky were discussing, and the creation in Dublin of an Insti-

12 tute for Advanced Studies, having script is, of course, too narrow. been able, in the course of normal noted the emigration of Einstein in The chromosome structures are at scientific careers, to develop the 1930 to the newly formed Institute the same time instrumental in paper that inspired it. for Advanced Studies at Princeton. bringing about the development But let us turn our thinking back De Valera’s Institute had two they foreshadow. They are law- again to the basement laboratory of code and executive power – or to schools, Celtic Studies and Theo- Lise Meitner in the Kaiser Wilhelm use another simile, they are retical Physics, and de Valera had architect’s plan and builder’s craft Institute for Chemistry in Berlin- made a somewhat spooky under- – in one. Dahlem where, in 1935, Max cover trip to Geneva to meet Schrödinger’s biographer Walter Delbrück was continuing to serve Schrödinger and offer him the foun- Moore cites testimonials of the de- as Meitner’s assistant in theoretical dation professorship in theoretical nuclear physics. As the excesses of physics. racism became more common, Membership in the Dublin In- Delbrück recognized that, although stitute entailed the responsibility for he was not Jewish, his views and statutory public lectures, and his associations left no future for Schrödinger agreed to present these him in Germany. In addition, his in February 1943. He had a copy of private seminars on the applications the Dreimännerwerk of Delbrück of physics to the genetics of the fruit and his colleagues in which they fly Drosophila had given him a laid out their project to map the site powerful urge to turn his theoreti- and size of the genetic locus by cal capacities from nuclear chemis- means of X-rays. From the basic try to what would now be called idea of the “three men,” molecular genetics. He therefore Schrödinger took up the general seized the opportunity of a problem of how to account for the Rockefeller Fellowship to leave occurrence and properties of living Germany in 1937 for the California matter in terms of the new physical Institute of Technology, a rising cen- principles he had been instrumen- Erwin Schrödinger ter of Drosophila research. tal in developing over the preced- Arriving in Pasadena, Delbrück ing two decades. His lectures were cisive influence of What Is Life? on met and began work with the biolo- duly presented and then issued in their thinking by James Watson, gist Emory Ellis. Ellis had recog- print in 1944 by Cambridge Univer- Francis Crick, and Maurice Wilkins, nized some similarities between the sity Press as a small volume entitled commonly named as the founding fertilization of an egg – a genetic What Is Life? triumvirate of molecular biology. event – and the infection of a bac- This tiny book has had a gigan- Other such testimonials abound. terium by a virus of the type known tic influence on modern develop- Gunther Stent called the book the as bacteriophage, or simply “ph- ments in biology. It contains a cru- “Uncle Tom’s Cabin of the revolu- age.” Thus Max Delbrück was cial passage in which Schrödinger tion in biology.” Moore says “There launched into the world of phage lays out the idea that the chromo- is no other instance in the history research. He recognized that ph- some, or genome, must be a mes- of science in which a short ages, standing somewhere between sage written in code: semipopular book catalyzed the fu- a mere aggregate of chemical com- In calling the chromosome fibre a ture development of a great field of pounds and a living organism, of- code-script, we mean that the all- research. The influence of the book fered the best opportunity to reduce penetrating mind, once conceived to manageable proportions the ques- by Laplace, to which every causal continues to be felt, and many people who know nothing else tion What Is Life? and in particular connection lay immediately open, the question, what is a gene, and could tell from their structures about Schrödinger will immediately how does in work? whether the egg would develop recognize What Is Life?” It is quite under suitable conditions, into a doubtful that Schrödinger, in his In 1940, Delbrück’s fellowship black cock or a speckled hen, into busy life as Berlin professor, would had expired, and he accepted a po- a fly or a maize plant, a rhododen- have found the leisure or the occa- sition teaching physics at Vanderbilt dron, a beetle, a mouse, or a sion to write this book, nor indeed University. This was a more strin- woman . . . But the term code- that the “three men” would have gent form of exile. That Southern 13 outpost of the Ivy league offered his research. Chargaff later de- Chemical work was not easy at few opportunities for forefront re- scribed his years in Berlin as “the the Pasteur: there were no thermom- search in physics. However, this happiest time of my life.” eters, for example. This too was a enabled Delbrück with a clear con- Some feeling for Chargaff’s piece of considerable good fortune, science to concentrate his powerful personality can be gathered from his since it prompted Chargaff to con- intelligence on phage genetics. Fur- description of scientific life in Ber- sider finding a position in the USA. thermore, his gregarious and irre- lin at this time. After listing many He thus proceeded for a brief time pressible personality found in the of the reigning luminaries, he wrote: to the Mount Sinai Hospital in New USA a nation of joiners, a fertile I met most of these men and many York City, and in 1935 joined the ground for organizing and inspiring of their collaborators, for the free- Biochemistry Department of Co- his fellow scientists. With Salvador masonry of science was never lumbia University where he was to Luria, an Italian émigré teaching wider open than at that time, and remain until his retirement. biology at Indiana University, he never again would I have the feel- As Chargaff settled into the organized a loose club of like- American academic routine, the minded scientists as the “phage work of his laboratory continued his group.” Thus in manifold ways, the previous interests and developed exile status of these scientists into new fields, always with the guided them into directions that rigor and depth that Chargaff con- might never have been taken in the sidered an ethical necessity. But a structured and restricted environs of scientific sea change came in 1944. their homelands under normal con- Two publications appeared that year ditions. that deeply influenced Chargaff. Max Delbrück and Erwin One was a cautious, thoroughly Chargaff both spent the year 1932 Edwin Chargaff documented scholarly study of bac- in Berlin. I do not know if they met, terial genetics, the kind of resolutely ing of belonging to a worthy and and I suspect they did not. Delbrück, professional science that was near reasonable community of schol- a born Berliner of a well-to-do fam- ars. It is absurd to say – but I can- to Chargaff’s heart. Oswald Avery ily, occupied a comfortable assis- not help it – as I look back on those and his colleagues announced their tantship in leafy Dahlem. The Aus- days, I get the impression that the conclusion with acerb technicality: trian émigré Chargaff lived a sparser last rays of the setting sun of the The evidence presented supports life, having arrived in Berlin from civilized nineteenth century were the belief that a nucleic acid of the Vienna in 1930 with no position and falling on my head. And this in desoxyribose type is the funda- no contacts. Chargaff had carried 1931 or 1932, when the “long mental unit of the transforming out and published excellent work on knives” had begun growing at a principle of Pneumococcus Type the chemical components of the tu- frightening speed. III. This translates to: “The gene is bercle bacillus during a two-year Chargaff, who later remarked DNA.” And Chargaff had done fellowship (1927-1929) at the Yale that he was “Jewish, but not aw- other reading as well: Medical School. His publications, fully” had no trouble recognizing . . . I had at about that time been it emerged, were known and ad- the nature of events in Germany in deeply impressed by a little book mired by Julius Hirsch, professor of 1933. Once again, his scientific ac- complishments came to his rescue. written by the great Austrian bacteriology at the University of physicist Erwin Schrödinger His work in Berlin on the chemical Berlin. At Hirsch’s instance, the di- which carried the modest title rector of the Institute of Hygiene in composition of the diphtheria bac- What Is Life? Great scientists are the Dorothéenstrasse, a moment’s terium had come to the attention of particularly worth listening to walk from the Reichstag, installed the very eminent bacteriologist when they speak about something Chargaff first as a voluntary and Calmette at the Pasteur Institute in of which they know little; in their later as a stipendiary assistant. Paris. Calmette, surely well aware own specialty they are usually Chargaff and his wife occupied an of the circumstances in Berlin, great and dull. apartment in the Institute, and his wrote in March 1933, offering Chargaff then cites the passage from talent so impressed his superiors Chargaff a position in Paris, and on What Is Life? that you have already that he was given full freedom in April 15, 1933, the Chargaffs left heard, identifying the gene as a Berlin, not to return for 40 years.

14 coded message, in Schrödinger’s The structure was worked out of prattle. The other, quite unde- phrase, “architect’s plan and in a collaborative effort between veloped at twenty-three, a grin, builder’s craft – in one.” Chargaff Francis Crick and James Watson. more sly than sheepish; saying combined this concept with the new Crick was a British physicist and little, nothing of consequence; a, result that the molecular code was, war veteran who had returned to “gawky young figure, so reminis- cent of one of the apprentice cob- chemically speaking, DNA and he Cambridge to attempt to understand concluded: blers out of Nestroy’s Lumpa- the phenomenon of life in terms of zivagabundus.” The hereditary code-script? The physics. Watson was a young cryptographer hidden in every Chargaff explained, with appar- American biologist who had just ently little-concealed contempt, his soul was intrigued. “Chromo- received his Ph.D. at Indiana with somes!” I exclaimed. “DNA, already published one-to-one pair- Salvador Luria, Max Delbrück’s builder’s craft! Let’s work on the ing rule, and Crick, who had read companion in the organization of nose of Cleopatra!” little, described the moment as I believe I have never elsewhere in the “phage club.” Watson’s disser- “electrifying.” He realized that the writings of Chargaff seen a para- tation subject had been phage ge- Chargaff’s pairing rule meant that graph with three exclamation points netics and he was a card-carrying the bases of DNA contain the code in it. member of the club. Needless to say, and that it is written in one coding Chargaff turned the now consid- both Watson and Crick had read strand, with a second, paired strand erable manpower of his laboratory What Is Life? protecting the precious message onto the chemical description of Together Watson and Crick, by until it can be copied – also by one- DNA in the absolute, numbingly Watson’s account, set out to deduce to-one base pairing. The rest, as they documented style he preferred and somehow the structure of DNA. say, is history. which made his work reliable be- With some perhaps ethically ques- By almost any account, molecu- yond any doubt. By 1950-1951, tionable use of X-ray data obtained lar biology and biotechnology con- Chargaff and his colleagues had by Rosalind Franklin and Maurice stitute a revolutionary scientific shown some remarkable regularities Wilkins, and as we shall see with change that began with the 1953 in the DNA obtained from various some help from Chargaff, they suc- publication of Watson and Crick. organisms, which they published in ceeded in obtaining the structure, Their deductions relied intimately the form of three generalizations and published a breathtakingly bril- on the base-pairing rule of Erwin that have become known as liant account of its implications in Chargaff. The role of Delbrück’s “Chargaff’s Rules.” The most rel- Nature in 1953. Watson, Crick, and phage studies in the origins of mo- evant of these for us describes the Wilkins later received the Nobel lecular biology, not merely as occurrence of the so-called DNA Prize for this result. handed down through Watson but bases, which are four in number. A somewhat supercharged far more generally, has been criti- Chargaff’s work showed that the meeting took place between cal. The enormous influence of four can be divided into two pairs Chargaff, Crick, and Watson in May Schrödinger’s What Is Life? and, of and that the pairs always occur to- 1952. Chargaff was lecturing in course, the “three-man paper” that gether. Britain and on the Continent and was its seed can hardly be overesti- The story of the discovery that was asked by an eminent mated. These contributions to a sci- DNA is in three dimensions a two- Cantabrigian to speak with his two entific revolution that is going to stranded structure, the famous younger colleagues who were said transform human life, and which double helix, and the fact that this to be “trying to do something with has already had a transforming ef- explains the genetic code and thus the nucleic acids.” Chargaff’s rig- fect in American science, were ones gave birth to molecular biology and orous scientific sensibilities were that would probably have not oc- biotechnology is certainly, along outraged. His impressions of first curred without the circumstances of with the invention of the atom bomb Crick and then Watson: exile in which all the figures found The impression: one, thirty-five and the trip to the moon, the best themselves. years old; the looks of a fading known narrative of science and racing tout, something out of Now I would like to return to technology of our era. Let me re- Hogarth (“The Rake’s Progress”), Wallace Stevens’s An Ordinary mind you of its outlines and then Cruikshank, Daumier; an inces- Evening in New Haven and allow attempt to illuminate it from an sant falsetto, with occasional nug- you the pleasure of his last three angle different from the usual one. gets glittering in the turbid stream verses about the voyage of the elm-

15 tree mariners to the land of the Of words that was a change of nature, Hitler ist’s gewesen: “It wasn’t me, lemon trees. more it was Adolf Hitler.” I believe any American scientific practitioner, When the mariners came to the land of Than the difference that clouds make looking back at the decades of the the lemon trees, over a town. scientific explosion of molecular The countrymen were changed and At last, in that blonde atmosphere, biology and biotechnology, must bronzed hard, each constant thing. Their dark-colored words had re- say with the playwright, “It wasn’t They said, “We are back once more in me, it was Adolf Hitler.” the land of the elm trees, described the citrons.

But folded over, turned round.” It was There is in the Berlin alterna- the same, tive theatre a long-running favorite Except for the adjectives, an alteration piece entitled Ich bin’s nicht, Adolf

Max Kade Center for German-American Studies Nonprofit Organization Sudler House U.S. Postage Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures PAID Lawrence, KS The University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS 66045-2127 Permit No. 65 Parking

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