Love in times of exile.
Love in times of exile.
Vienna, 1938. A crazy idea to find an escape route to America. A desperate act. A mail correspondence that becomes a love story for life. The true story of Kurt Kleinmann and Helen Kleinman.
On 12 March 1938, after months of tension between Berlin and Vienna - with political assassinations, ultimatums, confidential negotiations, even a desperate appeal by the Austrian government to the world - German troops crossed the German-Austrian border.
This is the beginning of the 'Anschluß', the complete annexation of Austria into the German Reich. The Wehrmacht troops meet no resistance, on the contrary. It is the enthusiasm of the Austrian population that convinces Hitler to go beyond the planned union of independent states and turn it into a complete annexation. The German Reich proclaimed it on 13 March 1938. Two days later, over a hundred thousand people cheer Hitler on Vienna's Heldenplatz.
The persecution of Jews and political opponents begins immediately, at a frantic pace. Jewish homes and businesses are looted or destroyed as early as March. Then, starting in April, the property of Jews and political opponents is confiscated and seized by the Nazi authorities and administration. Finally, with the ordinance of 27 April 1938, all Jews are obliged to disclose their entire assets to the Nazi authorities by submitting a declaration of assets. Declaring actually means handing over: real estate, bank accounts, luxury cars, jewellery and works of art. This handing over is the 'tax' to be paid in order to finally leave the country in search of a place to at least save one's life.
For many Austrian Jews, the desperate attempt to flee begins in May. Huge queues form in front of foreign consulates to leave for the few places that might accept them, even if they are far away: Trinidad, Shanghai, the Dominican Republic, Argentina, the United States. Being accepted is like winning a lottery. Many countries apply admission quotas, others have long and tortuous procedures. The United States, still emerging from the Great Depression in 1938, has strict immigration laws inspired by strong anti-Semitism: the quota of admissible immigrants in 1938 from Germany and Austria is less than thirty thousand. But in 1938 that quota was not even reached, despite tens of thousands of applicants, because every applicant had first to have an affidavit in hand: a letter from an American resident - relative, friend, employer - guaranteeing that the immigrant would not be a burden on the state coffers.
Letters to strangers.
This is the story of Kurt Kleinmann, a 28-year-old middle-class, working-student, aspiring lawyer and piano lover. Despite the difficulties, he decides that his future must be over there, in the land of the free: the United States of America.
The story begins with an idea poised between naivety and chutzpah: writing to Americans with the same surname and asking for help in obtaining an affidavit:
Vienna, 25 May 1938.
Dear …, I am obliged to leave Austria now, you understand. I do not know my relatives who have emigrated to America and it is possible that you are a relative of mine.
Please help a young Austrian Jew... who has the same name as you... by getting him a security affidavit in America.
I assure you it is not easy for me to write like this. But I have no other chance of receiving permission to emigrate to another country.
I assure you once again that I will not be a burden to you.... Would you kindly accept my petition and reply as soon as possible. Thank you in advance.
With all due respect, Kurt Kleinmann.
The month of June passes without a reply. Kurt continues to write to strangers, sending dozens and hundreds of letters. One Sunday in July, Helen Kleinman (with a "´n´ only!) returns home to her Greenwich Village flat and finds a letter waiting for her. It is a letter from Kurt.
Helen is only twenty-five, but already lives alone. She has an independent spirit and has chosen to live in a bohemian neighbourhood earning a living as an accountant. She has few close friends to go to the cinema or theatre with, and spends many evenings reading books.
Helen opens the mysterious envelope and reads the letter. The girl does not live off the grid, quite the contrary. She knows what is happening in Europe, especially to the Jews. She knows that the story told in that letter is credible. And she does not back down. Helen loves adventurous stories and is also as cunning as the protagonists of the novels she reads. She enters the game and responds.
Dear Kurt, Since we are cousins, I suppose it is all right for me to call you by your first name.
I suppose all this time you have been worried that your letter had been lost or mislaid. Before I go any further, please let me impress upon you the fact that my whole family is anxiously awaiting the day you will arrive in New York... I'll send you the affidavit you need as soon as I can get it, which I hope will be within the week...
I don't really know what else to tell you - except don't lose heart - and please write regularly so that I know you are well and able to write. How long will it be before you are here? I don't know, but even if it takes a few months, we will try to make the time seem less by corresponding.
Lastly, a request:
Please send us a picture, so we will know what you look like, and be able to recognize you when you come… Affectionately, Helen Kleinman.
Kurt:
Dear Helen, I received your dear letter just now. You cannot imagine how much pleased I was to get it. This is the first joyful promising event in months.
Knowing each other by correspondence.
An almost daily correspondence begins between the two, complicated by the timing of intercontinental mail of course. Letters cross back and forth, each at different times, but they have a strong desire to write and describe each other. They tell of their work and passions, and discover they both love classical music. Kurt tells of having recently seen Aida: it is one of Helen's favourite operas. Both have few friends:
Helen:
I used to have many friends, but I don’t have them any more. But that is part of the story that I will tell you about - and the story is sad - perhaps some day I'll tell you…
Kurt:
I have never had many acquaintance, always for the quality and not the quantity was authoritative for me, as well for man friends, or for girl friends.
The correspondence continues between anecdotes and intimate confessions, with discussions about the smoking habit that Kurt asks Helen to give up. They do not dwell on the Austrian or European situation. Meanwhile, while waiting for the coveted affidavit, Kurt decides not to wait any longer and quickly moves to Basel: the risk of being arrested in Vienna is too high.
Kurt:
August 12th, 1938. You will be very surprised that I am in Switzerland, but…I was frightened to be arrested every moment. I fled illogically without visa, for it was impossible to get it.
A settembre, Helen si accorge che la richiesta di Affidavit non è ancora stata accettata perché, semplicemente, le carte sono rimaste dal corriere, che non le ha mai inviate. Helen è affranta, si sente in colpa e arrabbiata con se stessa.
Helen:
I suppose that by now you can tell that I'm angry with myself and with everyone else. But I'll get over it as soon as you get the papers and the visa and tell me when you will come here. If you think that you are anxious to be here, you have no idea how anxious I am to have you here.
Helen sends the Affidavit again. Meanwhile, the correspondence becomes more intimate. Helen:
When you can’t sleep and think of 151-8th avenue, remember also, that the girl that lives there can’t sleep either, and she thinks of what you are doing, and where you go and whom you speak with, and keeps hoping all the time that the boy (you) will someday soon be with his friends and relatives again.
An even crazier idea.
At one point, it is Helen who launches an idea, if possible, even crazier than Kurt's idea in writing to a stranger: get married, to solve the migration issue once and for all.
And Kurt confesses what he has been feeling for a long time:
My darling…Far from you, I have fallen in love to you and I am happy that we both have the same thoughts. You are right, it is not good to stay alone in life. I would be happy if I could take your hands in my hands and then I would relate you my sorrows, cares, and last but not least our plans for the future. I’ll write you again soon and remain with kissing of hands, Your Kurt.
Kurt writes more letters in the following days, waiting for the answer to his declaration of love. The answer arrives, but it is not as he expects: Helen does not want to be married out of gratitude, but out of true love.
The letters keep crossing each other with the always wrong timing of the mail sent by ship. It is weeks of inner confusion. How can they really understand if their feelings written in reality can become a life in common, between two people who do not even speak the same language, nor have similar customs and way of life: conservative Vienna and bohemian Greenwich Village? An ocean, indeed, separates them.
A mountain to climb.
The fifth of October is a difficult time for Helen. She discovers that her affidavit has not been approved and a mail-order marriage would not be accepted in the US for Kurt to enter the country. She must marry him somewhere in Europe. She consults a lawyer who strongly advises against it, regardless of her family's adamant opposition. She only manages to get more affidavit letters from her aunt and a friend in the hope of getting a more positive response.
The fairy tale cannot end badly. Helen writes:
Don’t you know that in fables when the princess helps the prince she doesn’t know that he is really a prince. And only after she falls in love with him, and helps him, does he tell her that he really is a prince. And then of course they live a very happy life ever after.
Helen's parents try to stop her writing to Kurt. But Helen disobeys and continues to write, almost every day.
9 December 1938. The new life.
On 9 November 1938, Nazi Germany and Austria are shaken by Kristallnacht. Synagogues burn, shops are devastated, Jews are dragged through the streets, beaten and killed. Kurt's brother-in-law ends up in a concentration camp. The sisters are still in Vienna, locked up at home.
Kurt tries to lead a normal life in Basle: he takes a walk every morning, reads the newspapers, thinks, writes and waits. A month later, on 9 December 1938, he opens the envelope of an official letter from Zurich. He runs to the post office and sends a telegram with only four words for Helen:
J GET VISA - KURT - STOP
Kurt arrives in New York in February 1939, eight months before Hitler invades Poland, starting World War II. Kurt and Helen marry and have a son. They remained together for fifty-eight years, until Kurt's death in 1997.
Epilogue. How did this story reach us?
Like many Jewish families with memories of exile and the Shoah, Kurt and Helen Kleinman(n) donate their memories - all the letters they exchanged, family photos, telegrams - to the Leo Baeck Institute,, which patiently works to collect, digitise and transmit these memories.
A story to listen to.
It is from this immense archive of stories large and small that this story emerges, thanks to a beautiful narrative podcast entitled 'Exile', produced by the Institute and available on all channels: Apple / Google / Spotify.
Helen and Kurt's story spreads like their letters, through a patient tour of the world, from link to link, from listening to listening and in public readings.
The podcast Exile has been produced in two series so far: each episode is a small narrative and immersive gem. In September 2023, at the Austrian embassy in Berlin, the story of Helen and Kurt Kleinman(n) was told in a staged reading in German: you can see it here, starting at minute 17:01 (live Google subtitles available):