‘Krieg und Frieden’ [‘War and Peace’: a collection of five pamphlets] Berlin, Geneva, Zurich, 1919-20

Sammelband comprising five pamphlets bound together, of which four are inscribed to Rudolph Kommer:

Lammasch, Henrich: La Maintien de la Paix, Geneva, édition Atar, n.d. (inscribed)
Ehrlich, Eugen: Bismarck und der Weltkrieg, Zurich, Orell Füssli, 1920 (inscribed)
Ehrlich, Eugen: Quelques aspects de question nationale Autrichienne, édition Atar, n.d. (inscribed)
Herron, Prof George D: Le Jour der Judgement de Democratie, Geneva, Librairie Kundig, 1919
Palyi, Eduard: Der Kommunismus. Sein Wesen - sein Zeil - seine Wirtschaft. Grundzüge eines Systems der Gemeinschaft. Berlin, Brandus' sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1919 (inscribed)

Journalist, impresario, spy

Rudolph Kommer (1886-1943) usually added the abbreviation ‘a. Cz.’ (for ‘from Czernowitz’) and thus clearly indicated his Judaism. Having worked as a correspondent in Berlin, London and New York City, Kommer was deported from the US in 1917 and employed by the Austrian secret service as a diplomat and spy in Stockholm and then Bern (hence the inscription).

Kommer translated at least one of Herron’s works, which were highly critical of US President Woodrow Wilson, from English into German. Other authors and subjects (‘aspects of the Austrian national question’; ‘the essence, purpose and economy’ of Communism etc.) are also what one might expect a well-connected Austrian journalist to be concerned with in the aftermath of the Great War. In the 1920s he became Max Reinhardt’s representative in English speaking countries and, nicknamed ‘Kätchen’, offered support to numerous exiles from the cultural scene who had emigrated to the UK and the USA during the Third Reich.

Condition & Materials

Bound in pebble grained cloth-backed decorative paper boards, a little rubbed and worn, with paper title-label to spine: 'Krieg und Frieden' . Ownership inscription to free endpaper: ‘RK Kommer a. Cz., Bern - 1919’.

Filters

_1919-20

Krieg und Frieden: A Collection of Inscribed Pamphlets assembled by Rudolph Kommer