“Karl and the Twentieth Century” is the story of a man within the record of the times in which he lived, from birth to death. It is by an Austrian called Rudolf ###runngraber and it is issued here by Morrow in a translation ###den and Cedar Paul. It has a double-edged fascination and, ### as it is, I am not at all surprised to learn that Jacob Was-###mann read it through at one sitting. Every chapter is rich ###vivid.
### child is born toward the end of ### twentieth century to an Austrian ###ant maid and a soldier who, at ### time of birth, is serving a sen-###e in military disciplinary bar-###s. The mother is a drudge, the ###er a wastrel and a drunkard.
### we observe the life of this ###tched trinity as a minute speck ### the life of the times. You may ### miss the story of Karl Lakner as ### minor account, but you cannot ###smiss the record of social, political ### military history which is one of ### chief justifications for “Karl ### the 20th Century.” And yet ###h part serves, in differing de###es, to enrich and embellish the ###er. If the story of Karl Lakner ### his parents were excluded, the ###ok would still be fat with its con-###nt of social history, but the story ### Karl serves to leaven that huge ###ass of matter. Mr. Brunngraber #talizes, impregnates his mass of ###story and statistics with his own ###scinated interest in them. His ### personal material has something ###f the interest which attaches to the ###uman tragedy of Karl, while the ###ory of Karl itself derives a kind ###f glamor from the spectacle of ###orld history in which it is set. No ###ne can read the chapter on the war, ###ntitled Explosion, without deriving ###rom it, in capsuled form, a dramatic record of what the war meant ###o the world and to a typical atomic ###art of it, in the person of a human ###eing. For the benefit of those to ###hom such things mean something, it may be of interest to know that “Karl and the 20th Century” was awarded the Julius Reich prize. It is nevertheless, as indicated, a book well worth your reading.
H.S.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
