Sigfrid Gauch (born 9 March 1945) is a German writer. He lives in Mainz. Gauch is the son of Hermann Gauch, a

Nazi Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...

official and member of the SS. He was born in

Offenbach-Hundheim Offenbach-Hundheim is an ''Ortsgemeinde (Germany), Ortsgemeinde'' – a Municipalities of Germany, municipality belonging to a ''Verbandsgemeinde'', a kind of collective municipality – in the Kusel (district), Kusel Districts of Germany, district ...

in the last few weeks of the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. His parents separated when he was a young boy.Copley, Antony, "Hitler's Children, A Preface to Sigfid Gauch's Vaterspuren", in Gauch, Sigfrid, ''Traces of My Father'', trans.

William Radice William Radice (1951 – 10 November 2024) was a British poet, writer and translator. His research area was in Bengali language and literature, and he was the senior lecturer in Bengali in the School of Oriental and African Studies at the Univer ...

, Northwestern University Press, xi-xx. He studied at the Universities of

Heidelberg Heidelberg (; ; ) is the List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, fifth-largest city in the States of Germany, German state of Baden-Württemberg, and with a population of about 163,000, of which roughly a quarter consists of studen ...

and

Mainz Mainz (; #Names and etymology, see below) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate, and with around 223,000 inhabitants, it is List of cities in Germany by population, Germany's 35th-largest city. It lies in ...

. He worked as a school teacher, teaching German, philosophy and ethics at the ''Integrierte Gesamtschule'' in

. He was awarded a doctorate from the University of Mainz in 1985 for a dissertation on "Overt and covert spellings in literary

Jacobinism A Jacobin (; ) was a member of the Jacobin Club, a revolutionary political movement that was the most famous political club during the French Revolution (1789–1799). The club got its name from meeting at the Dominican rue Saint-Honoré ...

". It was later published as ''Friedrich Joseph Emerich – ein deutscher Jakobiner. Studien zu Leben und Werk''. In the 1970s Gauch published essays and poetry. He made his name with his book ''Vaterspuren'' (Traces of My Father) in 1979, an influential memoir that began what later became a genre of literature about children of Nazi parents attempting to come to terms with their family's past.Figge, Susan, "Father books: Memoirs of the Children of Fascist Fathers", ''Revealing Lives'', Yallom and Bell, eds, pp 196-200. He later published ''Fundsachen. Die Quellen zum Roman Vaterspuren'', a collection of primary source material related to the book. His novels ''Winterhafen'' (2010) and ''Schattenbilder'' (2012) explore the same issues through fiction. In addition to his novels, short stories and poetry collections Gauch has co-edited numerous anthologies, especially with regard to literature from

Rhineland-Palatinate Rhineland-Palatinate ( , ; ; ; ) is a western state of Germany. It covers and has about 4.05 million residents. It is the ninth largest and sixth most populous of the sixteen states. Mainz is the capital and largest city. Other cities are ...

, including, from 1994, the ''Rheinland-pfälzisches Jahrbuch für Literatur'' (Rhineland-Palatinate Yearbook of literature) published by Brandes & Apsel. Since 2002, this has come out under the title ''Jahrbuch für Literatur'' (Yearbook for Literature). Since 2004, he has edited the Edition Schrittmacher series of books, of which 30 volumes have been published.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gauch, Sigfrid 1945 births Writers from Mainz German ethicists 20th-century German philosophers Living people German male writers Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz alumni