Chapter 15 A Heart Attack in Sweden

For over twenty years, since the Swedish translation of And the Crooked Shall Be Made Straight in 1925, Agnon’s friends in Sweden had been pursuing the No- bel Prize in Literature for him, both secretly and openly; Agnon himself deeply coveted the prize, which he needed to reinforce his narcissistic grandiose self, as well as a symbol of the mother’s love that he had never really received. His Nobel Prize ambitions had received a blow in 1937, when the American sales of his novel declined. In 1947 they received another blow when Salman Schock- en’s lobbying for him in Sweden failed, and when Agnon’s foes at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem foiled his candidacy. In 1948, during the Arab-Israeli war, the forty-eight-year-old Rabbi Dr. Kurt Wilhelm, a former employee of the Schocken Library in Jerusalem, succeeded the seventy-nine-year-old Marcus Ehrenpreis as chief rabbi of Stockholm.1 Like his predecessor, Rabbi Dr. Wil- helm, who had been lobbying for Agnon winning the Nobel Prize two years earlier, began translating some of Agnon’s books into Swedish, with a view to advancing Agnon’s candidacy.2 The violent emotions around the candidacy for the Nobel Prize in Literature, which had burst out in the intrigues at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem of late 1946 and early 1947, were revived in late 1950, when Agnon’s chief rival for the prize, the American Jewish poet Zalman Shne’ur, visited Israel. Shne’ur met Selig Brodetsky,3 the president of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, urging him to have the university propose his candidacy for the Nobel Prize to the Swedish Academy. Brodetsky put the hot potato in the lap of the university’s executive committee, which, together with the university’s senate, appointed a six-member subcommittee to decide the issue.4 The subcommittee’s mem- bers were the British scholar Leon Simon,5 the philosopher Hugo Bergman, the Hebrew writer David Shim’oni, the university’s rector Max Schwabe, the

1 Ehrenpreis lived for another three years. 2 Tramer 1970; Jütte 1991, pp. 195–196. 3 Selig Brodetsky (1888–1954), Russian-born second president of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. 4 Hebrew University of Jerusalem archive, Minutes of the Nobel Prize subcommittee, January 3, 1951; cf. Laor 1998, pp. 438–439. 5 Sir Leon Simon (1881–1965), British Jewish Hebrew scholar and Zionist leader who co- authored the Balfour Declaration of 1917.

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456 Chapter 15 chairman of the university’s executive committee, David Werner Senator, and the Hebrew scholar Simon Halkin. Agnon offended some people he met with his irony, sarcasm, and put- downs. Was it their personal dislike for Agnon that determined the votes of the subcommittee’s members? They voted four to two to recommend Zalman Shne’ur to the Swedish Academy; only Bergman and Senator voted to recom- mend Agnon’s candidacy. Prof. Halkin drafted a letter to the Swedish Academy about Shne’ur’s candidacy, reminding them of Prof. Klausner’s letter of 1947, while Prof. Schwabe drafted another letter to the Israeli envoy in Stockholm, Avraham Nissan,6 asking him to lobby the Swedish Academy for Shne’ur’s can- didacy. Neither letter was sent, however, for a week later the university’s execu- tive committee reversed its subcommittee’s decision.7 The competition for the Nobel Prize nomination at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem was fierce. The complex relationships between academics derive from the unconscious “transference” of powerful emotions of parent-child and sibling relations in childhood.8 The rector, Prof. Hugo Bergman, and the chair- man of the university’s executive committee, David Werner Senator, mobilized Agnon’s supporters on the committee: Dr. Arnold Barth,9 the general manager of Bank Leumi,10 and future governor of the Bank of Israel; the ophthalmologist Dr. Albert Ticho; and the chief justice of the Israeli supreme court, Dr. Moses Smoira. On January 11, 1951 the plenary of the executive committee discussed the subcommittee’s recommendation to submit Zalman Shne’ur’s candidacy. The candidacy of Martin Buber was proposed as well as Agnon’s. Bracing them- selves for a fierce fight, the twenty members of the executive committee de- cided to cast their votes by secret ballot, in order to avoid personal damage to themselves.11 The vote of the executive committee reflected the deep divisions within the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the fierce intrigues that had preceded the session. In the first-round secret ballot, after a heated ad-hominem ­debate,

6 Avraham Nissan (Katznelson, 1888–1956), Russian-born Israeli diplomat, envoy in Stock- holm, where Israel at that time had a Legation rather than an embassy. 7 Hebrew University of Jerusalem archive, Minutes of the Nobel Prize subcommittee, Janu- ary 3, 1951; cf. Laor 1998, pp. 438–440. 8 Loewenberg 1972. 9 Dr. Arnold Aron Barth (1890–1957), German-born Israeli banker and Zionist leader. 10 The Israeli successor of the Anglo-Palestine Bank. 11 Hebrew University of Jerusalem archive, minutes of the Executive Committee meeting of January 11, 1951; cf. Laor 1998, p. 439.