Buber, Martin, 1878-1965. Correspondence with Franz Werfel and Alma Mahler, 1913-1937. - View Resource (original) (raw)

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Buber, Martin, 1878-1965. Correspondence with Franz Werfel and Alma Mahler, 1913-1937.

Title

Correspondence with Franz Werfel and Alma Mahler, 1913-1937.

Abstract

The correspondence includes exchanges in 1915 pertaining to Franz Werfel's participatiion in meetings of a secret anti-militarist group, based in Berlin, consisting of Buber, Gustav Landauer, and Max Scheler, and communications from Werfel while he was serving in the military (1916-1917). During the latter period Buber published a selection of Werfel's poems in his journal, Der Jude, and prefaced them with an essay entitled "Vorbemerkung über Franz Werfel" (April 1917). Werfel's letters of 1917 concern in great part his thoughts on the relationship between Judaism and Christianity. The post-1917 letters from Werfel include appreciative words about Buber's writings; a poem "Herbstlied," dedicated to Buber; and a response concerning Buber's request for Werfel to recommend the writer Ludwig Strauss to Werfel's publisher Paul Zsolnay. Of the two letters from Buber in this later period, one concerns a visit to Vienna, and the other is a letter to Alma Mahler.