Wessell, Eva 1939- (Eva-Maria Gawlyta)

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Wessell, Eva 1939- (Eva-Maria Gawlyta)

PERSONAL:

Born December 9, 1939, in Grossräschen, Germany; daughter of Martin Bogdan and Lucie Magda (a homemaker) Gawlyta; immigrated to the United States, 1962; married Earl R. Wessell (a real estate appraiser), December 22, 1967; children: Christina Marie Batcheler-Wessell. Ethnicity: "European-American." Education: University of California, Irvine, B.A. (German), 1978, B.A. (Classical Civilization), 1980, M.A., 1980, Ph.D., 1987. Hobbies and other interests: Skiing, diving.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Capistrano Beach, CA. Office—School of Humanities, University of California, Irvine, 185 Instructional Bldg., Irvine, CA 92697-3385. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:

Academician. University of California, Irvine, lecturer, 1987—; Saddleback Community College, Mission Viejo, CA, adjunct faculty, 1987-94; University of Southern California, Los Angeles, lecturer, 1988. Contributor, organizer, and translator for the Joint U.S.-German War Memorial, 2005.

MEMBER:

Deutsche Thomas Mann Gesellschaft, Phi Beta Kappa.

WRITINGS:

(With Herbert Lehnert) Nihilismus Der Menschenfreundlichkeit: Thomas Manns "Wandlung" und sein Essay Goethe und Tolstoi, V. Klostermann (Frankfurt, Germany), 1991.

(Editor and contributor, with Herbert Lehnert) A Companion to the Works of Thomas Mann, Camden House (Rochester, NY), 2004.

SCREENPLAYS

Getting Zero Some Respect, 1998.

Abelard and Heloise, 2000.

Contributor to books, including Thomas Mann's Erzählprosa, edited by Volkmar Hansen, Reclam (Stuttgart, Germany), 1993. Contributor to the German Quarterly.

SIDELIGHTS:

Eva Wessell is an American academician. Born in Grossräschen, Germany, on December 9, 1939, Wessell immigrated to the United States in 1962 and married real estate appraiser Earl Wessell on December 22, 1967, a few weeks after her twenty-eighth birthday. The pair eventually had one daugther, Christina. Wessell pursued all of her higher education degrees at the University of California, Irvine. In 1978 she completed her first, a bachelor of arts degree in German. By 1980 Wessell had earned a second bachelor's degree, this time in Classical Civilization. She also earned a master of arts degree in German. In 1987 she completed her formal education with a Ph.D.

The same year she completed her doctoral studies, Wessell accepted a position as an adjunct faculty member at Saddleback Community College, in Mis- sion Viejo, California, a position she held until 1994. She also took a position at the University of California, Irvine, lecturing in the humanities. She briefly lectured at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles in 1988. In 2005 she served as a contributor, organizer, and translator for the Joint U.S.-German War Memorial that was erected in her hometown of Grossräschen.

As a writer, Wessell has composed two screenplays. The first, Getting Zero Some Respect, was completed in 1998. Her second screenplay, Abelard and Heloise, was finished nine years later, in 2000. Wessell contributes book reviews to the academic journal German Quarterly. Wessell published her first book in 1991. Written with German scholar Herbert Lehnert, her Ph.D. advisor at the University of California, Irvine, Nihilismus Der Menschenfreundlichkeit: Thomas Manns "Wandlung" und sein Essay Goethe und Tolstoi, was published in the German language. The book originated from Wessell's Ph.D. dissertation.

In 2004, Wessell, a member of the Deutsche Thomas Mann Gesellschaft, paired up with Lehnert again to edit A Companion to the Works of Thomas Mann. Mann was a German novelist and Nobel Prize laureate who thrived in the early to mid-1900s. Mann is popularly known among English-speaking communities for his representation of the positive aspects of Germany during his exile from Nazi Germany's fascist period. This volume also looks into his role as an under-celebrated modernist. The book analyzes some of his better-known works, such as Death in Venice, Buddenbrooks, The Magic Mountain, and Doktor Faustus. Lesser-known works are also examined, including Joseph and His Brothers, Lotte in Weimar, and Felix Krull. Sixteen European and American scholars contributed essays to this study on Mann and his life, primarily discussing the relevance of Mann's writings in the early twenty-first century and new biographical information on his life.