Stefanie Zweig
Encyclopedia
, fled Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
, for Africa
Africa
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...
. They went from an urban life in Breslau (now Wrocław) to a farm
Farm
A farm is an area of land, or, for aquaculture, lake, river or sea, including various structures, devoted primarily to the practice of producing and managing food , fibres and, increasingly, fuel. It is the basic production facility in food production. Farms may be owned and operated by a single...
in Kenya
Kenya
Kenya , officially known as the Republic of Kenya, is a country in East Africa that lies on the equator, with the Indian Ocean to its south-east...
in 1938 when she was five. She attended an English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
boarding school while there. In 1941, the family received a postcard from her grandmother saying "We are very excited, we are going to Poland tomorrow", which implied Auschwitz. Zweig has returned to Kenya twice since leaving in 1947 at the age of 15. She found the farm had been destroyed.
Her teenage years in Germany were recounted in the autobiographical novel Irgendwo in Deutschland (Somewhere in Germany). Her father was given work as a judge in post-World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
West Germany
West Germany
West Germany is the common English, but not official, name for the Federal Republic of Germany or FRG in the period between its creation in May 1949 to German reunification on 3 October 1990....
, partly because there was no need to "denazify
Denazification
Denazification was an Allied initiative to rid German and Austrian society, culture, press, economy, judiciary, and politics of any remnants of the National Socialist ideology. It was carried out specifically by removing those involved from positions of influence and by disbanding or rendering...
" him.
Her first African novel was Ein Mund voll Erde (A Mouth Full of Earth) in 1980. It won several awards, and describes an infatuation
Limerence
Limerence is a term coined c. 1977 by the psychologist Dorothy Tennov to describe an involuntary state of mind which seems to result from a romantic attraction to another person combined with an overwhelming, obsessive need to have one's feelings reciprocated...
with a Kĩkũyũ
Kikuyu
The Kikuyu are Kenya's most populous ethnic group. 'Kikuyu' is the Swahili form of the proper name and pronunciation of Gĩkũyũ although they refer to themselves as the Agĩkũyũ people.There are about 5,300,000 Kikuyu people in Kenya The Kikuyu are Kenya's most populous ethnic group. 'Kikuyu' is the...
boy.
She had a long career as an arts editor on a Frankfurt tabloid. In later life, she began writing children's literature and then began her novels. Although she is a best-selling author in German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
, she is not well known in the English-speaking world, except for Nowhere in Africa.