Israeli heir: More Kafka works stashed in Swiss vault
New information likely to affect ongoing suit over Kafka archives by the National Library in Jerusalem.
By Ofer Aderet Tags: Israel newsParts of Franz Kafka's literary estate are being kept in a safe in a Zurich bank, and they too are owned by Chava Hoffe, the German weekly Die Zeit reported Saturday.
This new information is likely to affect an ongoing suit by the National Library in Jerusalem against Hoffe. The library is demanding Hoffe hand over the Kafka archives, which she inherited from her mother Esther Hoffe, the secretary of Kafka's friend Max Brod.
Although no one but the Hoffe family appears to know the exact contents of the Zurich safe, Die Zeit quoted sources who said it contains several pages from "Letter to my father," a seminal text Kafka wrote to his father in 1919, which is considered a literary and psychoanalytical milestone.
The safe is also said to contain some drawings by Kafka, as well as Brod's personal diaries, which may contain hitherto unknown information on Kafka's private life and on the two men's friendship.
As reported in Haaretz earlier this month, Hoffe's lawyers gave the keys to her Israeli safes to neutral court-appointed executors, after an exhaustive legal battle. The five safes are located in banks in Tel Aviv, but now the Zurich safe is apparently going to enter the dispute as well. The executors are supposed to examine the contents of the safes and advise the court, so it can decide whether the Hoffe family or the State of Israel owns the archives.
The Die Zeit report includes a letter by Brod, stating he gave the Kafka archives to Esther Hoffe as early as 1945. This would mean the state's claim to the archives is unfounded, the newspaper said.
According to the report, Brod himself placed the documents in the Zurich safe. Previously, they had been held by his friend, Haaretz founder Zalman Schocken. Esther Hoffe auctioned off some of the papers in the Zurich safe, and her daughter now wants to sell the rest of the archives to Germany.
Jerusalem National Library attorney Meir Heller said the library has no knowledge of the claim that Brod gave the archives to Hoffe in 1945, and said this contradicts statements Brod made in his will and on other occasions.
"The secrecy surrounding the Zurich safe speaks for itself - if the Hoffes are the rightful owners, what do they have to hide?" the lawyer asked.
Why Facebook Connect?
Comment on Haaretz.com articles with your Facebook login, and share your thoughts on your own wall.
- Latest
- Most Viewed
- Most Rated
- Open all
If Israel wants them, let them pay for them if there are no clear rights in the wills of these people. If this material is such a cultural treasure, surely Israel can pay - if not, whose property is safe?
thats true what you post, their is a lot of antisemitsm in switzerland, because the banks are being exposed for their theft of jewish peoples money, jewellery, gold etc.
Nothing leaves kafkaes world so far behind as Swiss banking secrecy laws and swiss banks machinations in general!!
It is difficult to understand the Hoffe side of the story. One would think after living all the years in Israel they would have a minimum of loyalty to the Jewish state. One would think that they would want, a cultural treasure to be in the land Kafka at the end of his life aspired to live in, and not in the one responsible for the destruction of a good share of his family. This would seem to be a case not simply of greed on the part of Hoffe but also of arrogance. Who is she to think she 'owns' this work which she and her family did nothing to create, and which is a cultural treasure of mankind?
There is hardly anything more kafkaesk in the modern world.
Kol Hakavod to Liberman. It is becoming evident that the only sane person in the government is Avigdor Liberman.
they will lie and say they don't know anything about the items. Just like they lied about hoarding gold stolen from victims of the holocaust.