Emil veha-balashim [= Emil and the detectives][Original German title: Emil und die detektive]

Descripción

In Hebrew. 184 pages. 19 x 14.5 cm. Illustrated. Additional scans available. In the autumn of 1928, Kastner published his best-known children's book, Emil und die Detektive, illustrated by Walter Trier. The owner of the Weltbühne publishing house, Edith Jacobsen, had suggested to Kastner the idea of writing a detective story. The book sold two million copies in Germany alone and has since been translated into 59 languages. The novel was unusual in that, in contrast to most children's literature of the period, it is set in contemporary Berlin and not in a fairy-tale world. Kästner also refrained from overt moralizing, letting the characters' actions speak for themselves. Its sequel, Emil und die Drei Zwillinge (1933; Emil and the Three Twins) takes place on the shores of the Baltic. The Emil books may have influenced the creation of other books in the sub-genre of literature about child detectives. Emil und die Detektive has been adapted for the cinema five times between 1931 and 1964: Three times in Germany (1931, 1935; Twice in the UK (1954, 1964) and once in the USA 2001). After the horrors Kastner experienced as a soldier in WWI, he became a pacifist, but unlike many who, like him, opposed the Nazi regime, he remained in Germany with the benefit of being able to travel to Switzerland, which he managed to escape to when the Russians were closing in on Berlin. He despised the Nazis, was interrogated by the Gestapo and had his books burned, but he would not leave Germany though he was able to. He was grieved by the destruction of Dresden but was apparently not moved enough by the mass murder of the of Jews which all Germans knew about, to distance himself from genocide by moving to Switzerland. Until the war turned against Germany the Germans, including Kastner, benefited from the spoils of Europe flowing to them. Perhaps he stayed because he wanted to remain on the side he thought would win. He died an alcoholic. Kastner's biological father was probably the family doctor, who was a Jew. Had the Nazis known that, Kastner would likely have died in the gas chambers in the 1940s and not of alcoholism in the 1970s. N° de ref. del artículo 015113

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