Bruno Apitz (28 April 1900 – 7 April 1979) was a German writer and a survivor of the

Buchenwald concentration camp Buchenwald (; 'beech forest') was a German Nazi concentration camp established on Ettersberg hill near Weimar, Nazi Germany, Germany, in July 1937. It was one of the first and the largest of the concentration camps within the Altreich (pre-1938 ...

Life and career

Apitz was born in

Leipzig Leipzig (, ; ; Upper Saxon: ; ) is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Saxony. The city has a population of 628,718 inhabitants as of 2023. It is the List of cities in Germany by population, eighth-largest city in Ge ...

, as the twelfth child of a washer woman. He attended school until he was fourteen, then started apprenticeship as a die cutter. During

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

, he was a passionate supporter of German Communist Party leader

Karl Liebknecht Karl Paul August Friedrich Liebknecht (; ; 13 August 1871 – 15 January 1919) was a German politician and revolutionary socialist. A leader of the far-left wing of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD), Liebknecht was a co-founder of both ...

. At 17, he made a speech in front of striking factory workers that resulted in his being sentenced to nineteen months in prison. In 1919, he joined the

Social Democratic Party of Germany The Social Democratic Party of Germany ( , SPD ) is a social democratic political party in Germany. It is one of the major parties of contemporary Germany. Saskia Esken has been the party's leader since the 2019 leadership election together w ...

(SPD) and in 1927, the more radical

Communist Party of Germany The Communist Party of Germany (, ; KPD ) was a major Far-left politics, far-left political party in the Weimar Republic during the interwar period, German resistance to Nazism, underground resistance movement in Nazi Germany, and minor party ...

(KPD). He took active part in the German November Revolution of 1918 and in opposition to the

Kapp Putsch The Kapp Putsch (), also known as the Kapp–Lüttwitz Putsch (), was an abortive coup d'état against the German national government in Berlin on 13 March 1920. Named after its leaders Wolfgang Kapp and Walther von Lüttwitz, its goal was to ...

of 1920. During the latter he published his first poems and short stories in Communist newspapers. He wrote his first play in 1924 and was later repeatedly imprisoned under Nazi rule in various

concentration camp A concentration camp is a prison or other facility used for the internment of political prisoners or politically targeted demographics, such as members of national or ethnic minority groups, on the grounds of national security, or for exploitati ...

s for spreading socialistic anti-war propaganda and being an active member of the Communist Party. From 1937 to 1945 he was an inmate of the

near

Weimar Weimar is a city in the state (Germany), German state of Thuringia, in Central Germany (cultural area), Central Germany between Erfurt to the west and Jena to the east, southwest of Leipzig, north of Nuremberg and west of Dresden. Together w ...

. It was this imprisonment that would later become the basis for his most famous novel, '' Nackt unter Wölfen'' (Naked among Wolves). After 1945, he worked for the East German state film company

DEFA DEFA (''Deutsche Film-Aktiengesellschaft'') was the state-owned film studio of the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) throughout the country's existence. Since 2019, DEFA's film heritage has been made accessible and licensable on the PR ...

and as a radio play author. He was one of the founding members of the

Socialist Unity Party of Germany The Socialist Unity Party of Germany (, ; SED, ) was the founding and ruling party of the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) from the country's foundation in 1949 until its dissolution after the Peaceful Revolution in 1989. It was a Mar ...

(SED), which became the dominant party in the German Democratic Republic (East Germany). In the early 1950s, Apitz worked as a guide to the former camp, Buchenwald, and was "actively involved in the plan for the earliest exhibition to be shown there in 1952."Nevin, Bill. The Genesis and Impact of ''Naked among Wolves''. 2007. Note 30, p. 117. He was a member of the Academy of Arts and the PEN-Clubs of the GDR. Apitz's best selling novel ''Nackt unter Wölfen'' was first published in 1958 and then translated into over thirty languages, winning him worldwide recognition. The English translation, the only Apitz novel to have been translated into English, was by Edith Anderson and published by Seven Seas Books in 1967. The

logline A log line or logline is a brief (usually one-sentence) summary of a television program, film, short film or book, that states the central conflict of the story, often providing both a synopsis of the story's plot, and an emotional "hook" to sti ...

for this edition reads as follows: "Armies drive before them the rags of Hitler's might and news trickles through to the concentration camp inmates and a child is saved." Bruno Apitz's home town,

, named him a Citizen of Honour in 1976. He died on 17 April 1979 in

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

Books

* ''Der Mensch im Nacken'', 1924 * '' Nackt unter Wölfen'', 1958; English translation, ''Naked among Wolves'', 1967 * ''Esther'', 1959 * ''Der Regenbogen'', 1976 * ''Schwelbrand. Autobiografischer Roman'', Berlin 1984

Films

* Naked Among Wolves (1963 film) * Naked Among Wolves (2015 film)

References

1900 births 1979 deaths Writers from the Kingdom of Saxony Social Democratic Party of Germany politicians Communist Party of Germany members Socialist Unity Party of Germany members German male short story writers German short story writers German radio writers East German writers 20th-century German novelists 20th-century German dramatists and playwrights German male novelists German male dramatists and playwrights 20th-century German short story writers Communists in the German Resistance Buchenwald concentration camp survivors Recipients of the Patriotic Order of Merit (honor clasp) Recipients of the National Prize of East Germany Writers from Leipzig {{Germany-SED-politician-stub