EDUARD TRAUTNER (1890–1978): AN ELUSIVE LATE-EXPRESSIONIST WRITER

Abstract

The poet, doctor, writer and editor Eduard Trautner (1890–1978) was a central figure in the literary Expressionist and New Objectivist movements in Germany of the 1920s. This is the first detailed study of his life and literary legacy. His most important works are the short play Haft (1921), the political crime study Der Mord am Polizeiagenten Blau (1924), and the novel Gott, Gegenwart und Kokain (1927). He took part in the Munich revolution of 1919 and was co-editor of the Munich cultural-revolutionary journal Der Weg. He served a prison sentence for helping Ernst Toller to escape lynching. After moving to Berlin, he completed his medical studies, worked as an editor for the publishing houses of Kiepenheuer and Die Schmiede, and became a leading figure in the ‘Novembergruppe’ and ‘Gruppe 1925’. A dark but gregarious person, he was a regular presence at the ‘Romanisches Café’, where he was known as a ‘father-confessor’ to the artists there. In 1930, after a controversial relationship with the French writer Colette Peignot, aka Laure, he withdrew from literary life, finding his way to Mallorca, England and, eventually, Australia, where he achieved distinction as a biomedical researcher with pioneering studies on the psychopharmacology of lithium.