Did you know …
… what was behind the name „Romeo“ used by the GDR Ministry for State Security – and what it had to do with Brigitte Reimann?Until the end of his life, Siegfried Pitschmann suspected that Hans Kerschek had been deliberately commissioned by the State Security as a so-called „Romeo“ to destroy his marriage to Brigitte Reimann. This suspicion was not entirely unfounded, as the „ménage à trois“ between Reimann, Pitschmann and Kerschek, which lasted almost four years, ultimately led to the divorce of Brigitte Reimann and Siegfried Pitschmann on October 13, 1964, which was followed almost seamlessly by Reimann’s marriage to Kerschek on November 27 of the same year. The term „Romeo“ was used to describe spies whose job was to enter into a romantic relationship with a predetermined target person in order to use them, for example, to „skim“ information of interest to the intelligence services. „Romeos“ were good-looking, very intelligent and had a strong sexual aura. All of this was particularly true of Hans Kerschek – at least in Brigitte Reimann’s eyes.
Before publishing the correspondence between Brigitte Reimann and Siegfried Pitschmann, it was therefore necessary to clarify this question. To this end, the editor consulted the MfS files on Hans Kerschek. The result of the research clearly proves that Siegfried Pitschmann’s assumption cannot be substantiated on the basis of the available documents in the archive of the Federal Commissioner for the Records of the State Security Service of the former German Democratic Republic (BStU). The declaration of commitment by IM „Ewald“ alias Hans Kerschek is dated October 2, 1968 (Archive BStU, MfS, BV Cottbus AIM 228/79 Vol. I, page 17), a date on which Brigitte Reimann had already been Kerschek’s wife for four years. On November 18, 1968, the writer left Hoyerswerda and moved to Neubrandenburg. Hans Kerschek did not follow her, but instead entered into a new relationship.
Read more in: „Would have been nice!“ The correspondence between Brigitte Reimann and Siegfried Pitschmann
Before publishing the correspondence between Brigitte Reimann and Siegfried Pitschmann, it was therefore necessary to clarify this question. To this end, the editor consulted the MfS files on Hans Kerschek. The result of the research clearly proves that Siegfried Pitschmann’s assumption cannot be substantiated on the basis of the available documents in the archive of the Federal Commissioner for the Records of the State Security Service of the former German Democratic Republic (BStU). The declaration of commitment by IM „Ewald“ alias Hans Kerschek is dated October 2, 1968 (Archive BStU, MfS, BV Cottbus AIM 228/79 Vol. I, page 17), a date on which Brigitte Reimann had already been Kerschek’s wife for four years. On November 18, 1968, the writer left Hoyerswerda and moved to Neubrandenburg. Hans Kerschek did not follow her, but instead entered into a new relationship.
Read more in: „Would have been nice!“ The correspondence between Brigitte Reimann and Siegfried Pitschmann
Did you know …
… what is behind the license number of GDR books?In the GDR, the license number was a national book number comparable to the „International Standard Book Number“ (ISBN). It was issued until 1989; from 1986 to 1989 in parallel to the ISBN. The license number consists of the following four blocks of digits: publisher’s number / publisher’s number for printing permission / serial number of the publication within the calendar year / year of publication. Until the early 1960s, however, there were some deviations from this structure, for example with military publishers.
The license number is an important key to finding the respective printing permission process. In the GDR, every publication had to go through an extensive and standardized printing approval process before publication, which was documented in writing. For this purpose, the publication was given a print number, which is identical to the last three blocks of digits of the license number.
The printing approval processes are now held in the Federal Archives and can be accessed via an online index.
The license number is an important key to finding the respective printing permission process. In the GDR, every publication had to go through an extensive and standardized printing approval process before publication, which was documented in writing. For this purpose, the publication was given a print number, which is identical to the last three blocks of digits of the license number.
The printing approval processes are now held in the Federal Archives and can be accessed via an online index.
Did you know …
… that Brigitte Reimann’s and Siegfried Pitschmann’s texts sometimes flowed together as if nested inside each other?In the last months of the war in 1945, Siegfried Pitschmann and some of his classmates were sent to station duty a few kilometers away from his hometown of Grünberg (now Zielona Góra). He processed these memories, which haunted him for the rest of his life, in several stories, most of whose protagonists bear the name Gottfried (Siegfried Pitschmann’s eldest brother, who died in the last days of the war).
Brigitte Reimann used Siegfried Pitschmann’s experiences on station duty in an alienated form as the central motif of her 1960 story „The Confession“: the event for which her protagonist Martin feels guilty and – in the certain assumption that he will now be sentenced for it – goes to the judge.
Brigitte Reimann used Siegfried Pitschmann’s experiences on station duty in an alienated form as the central motif of her 1960 story „The Confession“: the event for which her protagonist Martin feels guilty and – in the certain assumption that he will now be sentenced for it – goes to the judge.
Did you know …
… that Brigitte Reimann’s urn found its final resting place at the Ostfriedhof cemetery in Burg on July 20, 2019?Brigitte Reimann would have been 86 years old on July 21, 2019. The writer would probably never have imagined that her mortal remains would make an eventful journey in the footsteps of the Reimann family up to this point: on February 20, 1973, Brigitte Reimann succumbed to cancer in Berlin-Buch Hospital. The funeral service organized by the German Writers’ Association took place on 2 March at the Berlin-Baumschulenweg cemetery. Brigitte Reimann was buried in her home town of Burg on April 3, 1973. In 1991, the urn grave was transferred to Oranienbaum (the home of Brigitte Reimann’s younger brother Ulrich) and buried next to her parents Willi and Elisabeth Reimann. On March 26, 2019, Brigitte Reimann’s urn was brought back to Burg from the Oranienbaum cemetery on behalf of the town of Burg and in consultation with the Reimann family. Since July 20, 2019, Brigitte Reimann’s urn and gravestone have been located at the Ostfriedhof in Burg (old part of the cemetery), Berliner Chaussee 139a, 39288 Burg (near Magdeburg).
„Many liked her, with her tricky sense of reality, behind which she sometimes expected a second reality, with her preference for loud colors and noises, some were suspicious of her premature sympathies, antipathies, with her scent for the current, necessary, and a few hated her with her addiction to truthfulness, which could also offend. Very vulnerable herself, always, and therefore fearless, brave, often to the limit of what was reasonable – a lot of mimicry, if you looked closely. Now that she is no longer here, her far too short life seems like a constant alternation of departures and arrivals.“
Siegfried Pitschmann („Sonntag“, 04.03.1973)
„Many liked her, with her tricky sense of reality, behind which she sometimes expected a second reality, with her preference for loud colors and noises, some were suspicious of her premature sympathies, antipathies, with her scent for the current, necessary, and a few hated her with her addiction to truthfulness, which could also offend. Very vulnerable herself, always, and therefore fearless, brave, often to the limit of what was reasonable – a lot of mimicry, if you looked closely. Now that she is no longer here, her far too short life seems like a constant alternation of departures and arrivals.“
Siegfried Pitschmann („Sonntag“, 04.03.1973)
Did you know …
… that almost all of Siegfried Pitschmann’s literary texts, who would have turned 89 on January 12, 2019, feature a clock?Siegfried Pitschmann was so influenced by his apprenticeship with Mühlhausen watchmaker Gottfried Rost that he „hid“ detailed information about watches and how they work in almost all of his literary works and drawings and also wrote several (published and unpublished) stories on the subject. A selection of Pitschmann’s drawings can be found in „Wär schön gewesen!“ (correspondence with Brigitte Reimann) and the book „Siegfried Pitschmann in Mühlhausen“.
Did you know …
… how Reiner Kunze’s famous children’s book „The Lion Leopold“ got its unmistakable cover image?For Christmas 1969, Marcela gave her father Reiner Kunze twelve envelopes that she had painted herself with small flower and animal motifs, one for each month. Reiner Kunze sent the envelope with a tiny lion to S. Fischer Verlag as a New Year’s greeting. The publisher liked Marcela’s drawing so much that the „envelope lion“ became the „book cover lion“.
Read more in: „The letter as such would feel honored“
Read more in: „The letter as such would feel honored“
Did you know …
… that both Brigitte Reimann and Siegfried Pitschmann have written a Christmas story?Brigitte Reimann’s story „Bei der halben Nacht“ was written for the 1961 Christmas edition of „Wochenpost“.
The story consists of three independent episodes, all set in Hoyerswerda and on Christmas Eve, with an open ending. The protagonists of all three episodes work at the Schwarze Pumpe combine.
The story consists of three independent episodes, all set in Hoyerswerda and on Christmas Eve, with an open ending. The protagonists of all three episodes work at the Schwarze Pumpe combine.
The Christmas story is introduced by Brigitte Reimann herself as follows: „The house I live in is brand new, and the city is new, a city out of a construction kit, with ruler-straight streets and shaggy little trees. Sometimes, on the heavy, gray winter evenings, the air tastes of the smoke and soot of the big factory that is beginning to stretch its pipe fingers over the heath. In my blue and yellow house, it still smells of paint and the harsh smell of concrete, but on the walls in the stairwell there are already useless inscriptions and scrawny little men, like children draw them … I’ve had a year to get to know my neighbors – and now the year is coming to an end, it’s Christmas, a quiet, frosty night with a slanting moon over the snow-spotted roofs, and the house is filled with a warm, fragrant broth in which the scents of honey cake and apples and pine needles mingle.“
Siegfried Pitschmann’s story „Das Fest“, set on Christmas Eve 1957, was written for the 1960 Christmas edition of „Wochenpost“.
In 1957, modern-day gold diggers, socialist heroes and failed existences lived and worked in Trattendorfer Heide, between the towns of Spremberg and Hoyerswerda, who came together to build the Schwarze Pumpe lignite combine for reasons of money, idealism or a roof over their heads. „When five workers celebrate Christmas together in ‚Das Fest‘ with goose legs and peppermint fudge by the light of real candles and one of them tells how his mother died on the run – you feel a lump in your throat. Pitschmann could have become a Charles Bukowski. But he would have had to leave. He died in 2002.“ (Andreas Montag in „Mitteldeutsche Zeitung“, 27.02.2016) The complete collection of Siegfried Pitschmann's „Erzählungen aus Schwarze Pumpe“ was published as a book by Aisthesis-Verlag in 2016.
Siegfried Pitschmann’s story „Das Fest“, set on Christmas Eve 1957, was written for the 1960 Christmas edition of „Wochenpost“.
In 1957, modern-day gold diggers, socialist heroes and failed existences lived and worked in Trattendorfer Heide, between the towns of Spremberg and Hoyerswerda, who came together to build the Schwarze Pumpe lignite combine for reasons of money, idealism or a roof over their heads. „When five workers celebrate Christmas together in ‚Das Fest‘ with goose legs and peppermint fudge by the light of real candles and one of them tells how his mother died on the run – you feel a lump in your throat. Pitschmann could have become a Charles Bukowski. But he would have had to leave. He died in 2002.“ (Andreas Montag in „Mitteldeutsche Zeitung“, 27.02.2016) The complete collection of Siegfried Pitschmann's „Erzählungen aus Schwarze Pumpe“ was published as a book by Aisthesis-Verlag in 2016.
