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Biographical/Historical Information

Karl Otten was an expressionist author who had been held in custody during World War I due to his anti-military activities. Throughout the Weimar Republic (1919-1933), he was a co-worker for democratic journals and supported the idea of a revolutionary reorganization of society in the sense of a messianic communism. In 1933, he and his later wife, Ellen Kroner escaped Nazi-Germany to Paris and then to Mallorca, Spain, finally settling in London, where he worked for the Propaganda Department of the BBC, writing 120 radio broadcasts. Otten lost his eyesight in 1944, but continued researching German avant-garde literature and writing prose, extensively supported by his wife. In 1958, Ellen and Karl Otten moved to Locarno at Lago Maggiore in Tessin, Switzerland, where Karl Otten died in 1963.

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Citation

Karl Otten, Leo Baeck Institute, F 2854.