Henry Kreisel, OC (June 5, 1922 – April 22, 1991) was a

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

writer of novels and essays. Kreisel was born in

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

to a Polish-born mother and a Romanian-born father. The family, which was

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

, managed to reach Britain just before the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

, but, like many other German-speaking refugees, they were declared

enemy alien In customary international law, an enemy alien is any native, citizen, denizen or subject of any foreign nation or government with which a domestic nation or government is in conflict and who is liable to be apprehended, restrained, secured and ...

s after the war began. In 1940 Kreisel was relocated to

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

. He lived on a farm in

New Brunswick New Brunswick (french: Nouveau-Brunswick, , locally ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. It is the only province with both English and ...

until 1941. It was there that he began his career as a writer, deciding to write in English and modelling himself on the bilingual author Joseph Conrad. After Canada decided to release the refugees from the camps they had been assigned to, Kreisel decided to pursue his dream of writing and was educated at the

University of Toronto The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public university, public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park (Toronto), Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 ...

. He than denied any connection with or use of the

German language German ( ) is a West Germanic language mainly spoken in Central Europe. It is the most widely spoken and official or co-official language in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, and the Italian province of South Tyrol. It is als ...

, being the language of his persecutors. Kreisel became one of the first

writers to write about Jewish-Canadian issues. Later he spent time in Western Canada, and his essay "The Prairie: A State of Mind" is a frequently anthologized discussion of Western Canadian regionalism. He was made an

Officer of the Order of Canada The Order of Canada (french: Ordre du Canada; abbreviated as OC) is a Canadian state order and the second-highest Award, honour for merit in the system of orders, decorations, and medals of Canada, after the Order of Merit. To coincide with ...

in 1987. In order to honour him, the "Canadian Literature Centre" in

Edmonton Edmonton ( ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Alberta. Edmonton is situated on the North Saskatchewan River and is the centre of the Edmonton Metropolitan Region, which is surrounded by Alberta's central region. The city ancho ...

organizes an annual "Henry Kreisel Memorial Lecture". An inventory of his papers is existing at the

University of Manitoba Archives & Special Collections The University of Manitoba Archives & Special Collections is a department of the University of Manitoba Libraries which holds historical records related to and created by the University of Manitoba. It is also a collector of private records of indi ...

Bibliography

* ''The Rich Man'', 1948; reed. 1961, 2006 * ''The Betrayal'', 1964 ** ''The Betrayal, play'', 1965

Canadian Broadcasting Corporation The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (french: Société Radio-Canada), branded as CBC/Radio-Canada, is a Canadian public broadcaster for both radio and television. It is a federal Crown corporation that receives funding from the government. ...

TV production * ''The Prairie. A State of Mind'', 1968 (= Transactions of the Royal Society of Canada, Vol. 6)Reprinted in: ''Contexts of Canadian Criticism'', ed. Eli Mandel.

University of Toronto Press The University of Toronto Press is a Canadian university press founded in 1901. Although it was founded in 1901, the press did not actually publish any books until 1911. The press originally printed only examination books and the university cale ...

University of Chicago Press The University of Chicago Press is the largest and one of the oldest university presses in the United States. It is operated by the University of Chicago and publishes a wide variety of academic titles, including ''The Chicago Manual of Style'', ...

, 1971. pp. 254-66; ''Canadian Anthology'', ed. Carl F. Klinck, Reginald E. Watters. Gage, Toronto 1974. pp. 620-627
short excerpt
/ref> * ''The Almost Meeting'', 1981 * ''Another Country: Writings by and about Henry Kreisel.'' Shirley Neumann ed., Edmonton 1985 (including: ''Diary of an internment'', 1940 – 1941)
Complete bibliography
at athabascau.ca (and some essays about him)

References

* Michael Greenstein: ''Close Encounters: Henry Kreisel's Short Stories'', in ''Essays in Canadian Literature'' (Summer 1983), pp. 64–69 * Michael Greenstein: ''The Language of the Holocaust in "The Rich Man"'', in ''Études canadiennes - Canadian Studies'' (1978), pp. 85–96 * Carolyn Hlus: ''Henry Kreisel'', in ''Profiles in Canadian Literature, 5''. Toronto: Dundurn Press, 1986 * Robert A. Lecker: ''State of Mind: Henry Kreisel's Novels'', in

Canadian Literature Canadian literature is the literature of a multicultural country, written in languages including Canadian English, Canadian French, Indigenous languages, and many others such as Canadian Gaelic. Influences on Canadian writers are broad both g ...

, Summer 1978, pp. 82–93 * Klaus Stierstorfer: ''Canadian recontextualization of a German nightmare: Henry Kreisel's "Betrayal"'' (1964), in Heinz Antor, Sylvia Brown ed.: ''Refractions of

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 ...

and Culture.'' de Gruyter, Berlin 2003, repr. 2015, S. 195 - 206

External links

Henry Kreisel
at

The Canadian Encyclopedia ''The Canadian Encyclopedia'' (TCE; french: L'Encyclopédie canadienne) is the national encyclopedia of Canada, published online by the Toronto-based historical organization Historica Canada, with the support of Canadian Heritage. Available f ...

Kreisel
item at English-Canadian Writers, Athabasca University, with more Weblinks (texts from and about Kreisel) {{DEFAULTSORT:Kreisel, Henry 1922 births 1991 deaths Canadian male short story writers Jewish Canadian writers Jewish emigrants from Austria to the United Kingdom after the Anschluss University of Toronto alumni Officers of the Order of Canada Austrian emigrants to Canada 20th-century Canadian short story writers 20th-century Canadian male writers People interned during World War II

Bibliography

Further reading

References

External links