Fred Wander (1917–2006) fled to France in 1938, was deported to the Auschwitz concentration camp in 1942, and liberated in Buchenwald in 1945. A photographer, travel writer and journalist in Austria and the German Democratic Republic, he wrote “Der siebente Brunnen (“The Seventh Well”) (1971) and “Hôtel Baalbek” (1991), classic works about the Shoah and exile. It is the perspective of the outsider, of someone who does not belong, that he consistently pursues in his writing. In his autobiography (2006) he celebrated life, this "cheerfulness in the midst of horror.”
Introduction: Walter Grünzweig
Tatjana Velimirov reads from Wander’s autobiography “Das gute Leben.”
Maxie and Fred Wander – a conversation with Herbert Sburny
Moderation: Konstantin Kaiser
Walter Grünzweig is a professor of American and Comparative Literature at the TU Dortmund University, associate professor at the Karl-Franzens University Graz, adjunct professor at the State University of New York at Binghamton and the University of Pennsylvania.
Konstantin Kaiser is a philosopher, literary scholar and co-editor of the magazine “Zwischenwelt.”
Herbert Sburny, née Brunner, brother of Maxie Wander, has been the director of the Vienna Amerlinghaus, a self-administered cultural center, since the 1970s. Engagement at the legendary “Gemeindehof-Theater.” Co-founder of the Austrian Green Party; 1987 full-time secretary of the Vienna Green Party.
Tatjana Velimirov is a theater and film actress.
“Konvent der Bücher” (“Convention of Books”) is a series of events held by the Association for the Promotion and Investigation of Anti-Fascist Literature, funded by the City of Vienna and the Arts and Culture Division of the Federal Chancellery.

Free admission as of 6:15 p.m.

Advance booking requested: Tel.: +43 1 535 04 31-1510 or e-mail: events@jmw.at

Photo (c) Archiv der Theodor Kramer Gesellschaft (Jewish Museum Vienna)

Source: Jewish Museum Vienna