She has used words to fight oblivion and forgetting
This story was meant to be published on November 9, 2015, the memorial day of the ‘The Night of the Broken Glass’ in 1938, when Germany’s biggest and most beautiful synagogue burst into flames.
But Anne Ranasinghe neither owns a computer nor is she a friend of Facebook or Skype. Calling over the phone is not that easy either – especially, when one does not know each other. So the exchange of letters with Sri Lanka’s most famous poet takes weeks. Anne Ranasinghe replies in English as – besides rare occasions – she has not used her German in 77 years. A lifetime ago it used to be her mother tongue, just as Essen/Germany used to be her home town. There Anne Ranasinghe was born as Anneliese Katz.
In early 1939, at the age of 13, her Jewish parents sent her off to relatives in England and therefore Anne survived the Holocaust. Ever since she has used words to fight oblivion and forgetting.
Late, but not too late, the Federal President Joachim Gauck awarded the 90-year-old writer Germany’s highest tribute, the Federal Cross of Merit
“I thought, it might be misaddressed”
“A wonderful, warm and moving celebration” describes one of Anne’s German friends; the evening of music, poetry and dialogue that took place in Anne’s residence during which German Ambassador Dr. Jürgen Morhard conferred the Cross of Merit.
“Future needs remembrance” thus he commenced his speech.“It is Anne’s mission to keep memories alive and to fight oblivion”.
And Anne Ranasinghe responds in her very own ironical way. When receiving the Federal President’s letter, she says, she thought there might be a mistake, the wrong address maybe or someone trying to pull her leg. But then again, she adds with a smile, so often in her life had she been tripped up and “always landed safely on her feet” as her late aunt called it. “It was an unexpected and incredible gift”.
And now she commemorates her father and her mother who died at the age of 52 and 42, younger than Anne’s grandchildren or her youngest daughter are now.
On June, 23, 1939, Anne’s father Emil writes to his 13-year-old daughter who lives in exile in Britain:
“Dear Anneliese! I write to you from Düsseldorf and I intend to spend another two days in Cologne. There is a big festival in Essen so I rather stay in Cologne. It is more quiet. No remarkable news. We are all well and keep on trying to get out of here. There is a woman in our parish who wants to help us. Please, give my regards to auntie and uncle. Love, your Papi”
Her mother Aenne tries to comfort her: “Here you would not have anything anymore …we must bear this in mind as well…there would be no distraction for you at all”.
This sounds so normal, ordinary. And yet the life of the Katz family in Essen had already come apart at the seams. The father, a highly decorated WWI veteran, was arrested on November 9, the Night of the Broken Glass. Nazis ravaged the apartment in the Southern part of the town.
Later, Anne writes in one of her poems:
“I still can hear
The ironed heel – its echoing thud
And still can taste the cold
Winter taste
Of charred-wood-midnight fear
Knowing
That nothing is impossible
That anything is possible
That there is no safety
In words or houses
That boundaries are theoretical
And love is relative
To the choice before you”
The choice that the parents had to take for their only child, 13-year-old Anneliese, was to put her on a train and send her off to her aunt in England on January 26.
Until then Anne had lived a happy-go-lucky life. Father Emil, a faithful Jew and upright German citizen, had taught her in best Jewish tradition that the biggest treasure in life was her brain. She was expected to study and go to university, relates Anne at an interview.
Already as a small girl she starts writing poetry and a school play. She attends the Jewish Elementary School in Essen and later the Jewish Gymnasium, the “Jawne”:
“Live happily, live cheerfully, like the pug dog in its fur coat. I wish you luck and no mishaps” writes her classmate Erich in Anne’s friendship book (autograph book). She is excited about “hitzefrei” (early dismissal from school due to summer heat), she roller skates and swims – strictly prohibited – in the River Ruhr.
One of her nicest memories, and often mentioned in her books is summertime in Züschen where the family travels in an old Opel. Where Oma (granny) Marianne owns a small shop and bakes the most wonderful “Pflaumenkuchen” (plum cake). The shop had a rear exit to the garden, through which her relatives managed to escape when Nazis wreaked havoc on November 9.
In England Anne attends school in Dorset. She never sees her parents again. Aenne and Emil Katz were deported in 1941 and killed in Chelmo in 1944.
Anne works as a nurse and journalist. In 1949 she marries Dr. Don Abraham Ranasinghe. She lives in England, then moves to Sri Lanka where she works for Amnesty International for many years.
“This house has seen a lot,” says Anne “seven children, births and birthdays, weddings and deaths, Buddhist, Christian, Jewish and Muslim celebrations. Evenings with poetry and music.”
Her family in Essen and Züschen and their destiny under the Nazi regime are recorded in her poems and books, in English, as for a long time she had no opportunity to use her German “the language of the murderers”.
And so it took her over 44 years until she was willing to return to Essen with mixed emotions.
Today she does not travel any more but stays in touch with German friends who supported the long overdue award. In Sri Lanka Anne Ranasinghe was awarded the highest literary award and Israel as well as Queen Elizabeth II have recognized her work.
Courageous people like Anne Ranasinghe initiated the process of coming to terms with history, said Ambassador Dr. Morhard, and witnesses are more important than ever as time passes.
(The article was published in the Neue Ruhr Zeitung [NRZ ])