Erich Bernhard Gustav Weinert (4 August 1890 in
Magdeburg
Magdeburg (; nds, label=Low Saxon, Meideborg ) is the capital and second-largest city of the German state Saxony-Anhalt. The city is situated at the Elbe river.
Otto I, the first Holy Roman Emperor and founder of the Archdiocese of Magdebur ...
– 20 April 1953 in
East Berlin
East Berlin was the ''de facto'' capital city of East Germany from 1949 to 1990. Formally, it was the Allied occupation zones in Germany, Soviet sector of Berlin, established in 1945. The American, British, and French sectors were known as ...
) was a
German
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
**Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ger ...
Communist
Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a s ...
writer and a member of the
Communist Party of Germany
The Communist Party of Germany (german: Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands, , KPD ) was a major political party in the Weimar Republic between 1918 and 1933, an underground resistance movement in Nazi Germany, and a minor party in West German ...
(KPD).
Early life
Weinert was born in 1890 in
Magdeburg
Magdeburg (; nds, label=Low Saxon, Meideborg ) is the capital and second-largest city of the German state Saxony-Anhalt. The city is situated at the Elbe river.
Otto I, the first Holy Roman Emperor and founder of the Archdiocese of Magdebur ...
to a family supporting the
Social Democratic Party of Germany
The Social Democratic Party of Germany (german: Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands, ; SPD, ) is a centre-left social democratic political party in Germany. It is one of the major parties of contemporary Germany.
Saskia Esken has been the ...
. He attended a boys' school in
Magdeburg
Magdeburg (; nds, label=Low Saxon, Meideborg ) is the capital and second-largest city of the German state Saxony-Anhalt. The city is situated at the Elbe river.
Otto I, the first Holy Roman Emperor and founder of the Archdiocese of Magdebur ...
and, from 1908 to 1910, he visited the arts, crafts and trade school in the city and went to an art school in Berlin in 1912. He later joined the military, where he participated as an officer during
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
. It was during his time as a soldier that he was attracted to the revolutionary ideology.
After the war, he went to
Leipzig
Leipzig ( , ; Upper Saxon: ) is the most populous city in the German state of Saxony. Leipzig's population of 605,407 inhabitants (1.1 million in the larger urban zone) as of 2021 places the city as Germany's eighth most populous, as wel ...
and worked as an actor and lecture artist, joining the
Communist Party of Germany
The Communist Party of Germany (german: Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands, , KPD ) was a major political party in the Weimar Republic between 1918 and 1933, an underground resistance movement in Nazi Germany, and a minor party in West German ...
in 1929. Meanwhile, he made various works.
Literary career
Weinert started writing in 1921. From the very beginning, his poems were thoroughly
anti-imperialist
Anti-imperialism in political science and international relations is a term used in a variety of contexts, usually by nationalist movements who want to secede from a larger polity (usually in the form of an empire, but also in a multi-ethnic so ...
. In the second half of the 1920s, Weinert's work leaned towards portraying the struggles of the German proletariat. In 1929, he joined the Communist Party of Germany. Weinert's works were always political, and the role of political poet, agitator, and satirist were gradually assumed, as best seen in his collections Theater of the Apes (1925) and Erich Weinert Speaks (1930).
Exile and fight against fascism
Following the
Nazi assumption of power, Weinert fled to Switzerland. From 1933 to 1935, Weinert, with his wife and daughter, Marianne Lange-Weinert, went into exile in the
Saar protectorate
The Saar Protectorate (german: Saarprotektorat ; french: Protectorat de la Sarre) officially Saarland (french: Sarre) was a French protectorate separated from Germany; which was later opposed by the Soviet Union, one side occupying Germany like ...
. From there, he went to
Paris
Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...
,
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
, and so he would be able to arrive in the
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
. Working in the Soviet Union, he published an anthology of anti-fascist poems in 1934, 'The Cobblestones and The Day Will Come'. He became a member of the
International Brigades
The International Brigades ( es, Brigadas Internacionales) were military units set up by the Communist International to assist the Popular Front government of the Second Spanish Republic during the Spanish Civil War. The organization existed f ...
in the
Spanish Civil War
The Spanish Civil War ( es, Guerra Civil Española)) or The Revolution ( es, La Revolución, link=no) among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War ( es, Cuarta Guerra Carlista, link=no) among Carlists, and The Rebellion ( es, La Rebelión, lin ...
from 1937 to 1939, where he was active as a front correspondent and wrote battle poems. In July 1937 he attended the Second International Writers' Congress, the purpose of which was to discuss the attitude of intellectuals to the war, held in
Valencia
Valencia ( va, València) is the capital of the Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Valencian Community, Valencia and the Municipalities of Spain, third-most populated municipality in Spain, with 791,413 inhabitants. It is ...
,
Barcelona
Barcelona ( , , ) is a city on the coast of northeastern Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within ci ...
and
Madrid
Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the second-largest city in the European Union (EU), and ...
and attended by many writers including
André Malraux
Georges André Malraux ( , ; 3 November 1901 – 23 November 1976) was a French novelist, art theorist, and minister of cultural affairs. Malraux's novel ''La Condition Humaine'' (Man's Fate) (1933) won the Prix Goncourt. He was appointed by P ...
,
Ernest Hemingway
Ernest Miller Hemingway (July 21, 1899 – July 2, 1961) was an American novelist, short-story writer, and journalist. His economical and understated style—which he termed the iceberg theory—had a strong influence on 20th-century fic ...
,
Stephen Spender
Sir Stephen Harold Spender (28 February 1909 – 16 July 1995) was an English poet, novelist and essayist whose work concentrated on themes of social injustice and the class struggle. He was appointed Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry by the ...
and
Pablo Neruda
Ricardo Eliécer Neftalí Reyes Basoalto (12 July 1904 – 23 September 1973), better known by his pen name and, later, legal name Pablo Neruda (; ), was a Chilean poet-diplomat and politician who won the 1971 Nobel Prize in Literature. Nerud ...
. He turned his experience on the Spanish front into poems, which were published in the book Camaradas (1951).
After
Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
attacked the Soviet Union, Weinert sided with the Soviets and began creating
propaganda
Propaganda is communication that is primarily used to influence or persuade an audience to further an agenda, which may not be objective and may be selectively presenting facts to encourage a particular synthesis or perception, or using loaded ...
to encourage soldiers in the
Wehrmacht
The ''Wehrmacht'' (, ) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the ''Heer'' (army), the ''Kriegsmarine'' (navy) and the ''Luftwaffe'' (air force). The designation "''Wehrmacht''" replaced the previous ...
to abandon their positions
using methods such as poems printed on handbills that were thrown off behind the German lines as well as making pleas to them via the radio and shouting slogans from the rubble of Stalingrad.
[Tremlett (2020), p.525] In 1943 he was selected as the president of the
National Committee for a Free Germany
The National Committee for a Free Germany (german: Nationalkomitee Freies Deutschland, or NKFD) was a German anti-Nazi organization that operated in the Soviet Union during World War II.The Russians in Germany: A History of the Soviet Zone of Occ ...
. Once again the time spent on the front lines found literary expression. Weinert published his war diary under the title 'Remember Stalingrad' in 1943. Two short stories – 'Death for the Fatherland' and 'Expediency' – came out in 1942. A collection of leaflet poems written during the war came out in 1944 as 'Against the Real Enemy'. In 1947, he also published 'Chapter Two of World History: Poems About the Land of Socialism', an anthology of poems about the Soviet Union.
Return to Germany
In 1946 he returned to Germany in a sickly state. Regardless, he served actively as vice-president of the Central Administration for National Education in the
Soviet Occupation Zone
The Soviet Occupation Zone ( or german: Ostzone, label=none, "East Zone"; , ''Sovetskaya okkupatsionnaya zona Germanii'', "Soviet Occupation Zone of Germany") was an area of Germany in Central Europe that was occupied by the Soviet Union as a c ...
. In recognition of his work, he was awarded the National Prize in 1949 and 1952. He was also elected into the position of a member of the German Academy of Arts. He continued to publish works until his death at the age of 62 in 1953.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Weinert, Erich
1890 births
1953 deaths
Politicians from Magdeburg
People from the Province of Saxony
Communist Party of Germany politicians
Socialist Unity Party of Germany members
Communists in the German Resistance
German Army personnel of World War I
International Brigades personnel
German people of the Spanish Civil War
Refugees from Nazi Germany in the Soviet Union
National Committee for a Free Germany members
Recipients of the National Prize of East Germany
German Communist poets