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Franz Werfel Dies in Hollywood; Fied Here in 1940 to Escape Nazis

August 28, 1945
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Franz Werfel, Czech-Jewish poet, dramatist and novelist, died here last night after a heart attack. Werfel, who was 54, had been suffering from a heart ailment for several years.

Best known in the United States for his novels “The Forty Days of Musa Dagh” and “The Song of Bernadette,” Werfel came here to live in 1940 after a hair-breath escape from the Nazis, whom he had fought for many years. He had been in America previously, in 1935, when Max Reinhardt produced his “Eternal Road,” a pageant based on the Old Testament.

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