Zinner, Hedda (1902–1990)

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Zinner, Hedda (1902–1990)

German novelist, playwright, and political writer. Name variations: Heda. Born in 1902 (some sources cite 1905 or 1907) in Vienna, Austria; died in 1990.

Selected plays:

Caféhaus Payer (1945); Spiel ins Leben (Play in Life, 1951); Der Mann mit dem Vogel (The Man with the Bird, 1952); Teufelskreis (The Devil's Circle, 1953); Die Lutzöwer (1955); General Landt (1957); Was wäre wenn? (comedy, 1959); Die Fischer von Niezow (The Fisherman of Niezow, 1960); Leistungskontrolle (Achievement Control, 1960); Ravensbrücker Ballade (1961).

Published works:

(novel) Nur eine Frau (Only a Woman, 1954); (autobiography) Ahnen und Erben (Ancestors and Inheritors, 1968); Die Schwestern (Sisters, 1970).

Hedda Zinner was born in Vienna in 1902, where she studied acting at the Schauspielakemie. Developing an interest in the workers' movement, she left Vienna in 1924 for Berlin, where she joined the Communist Party in 1929. Zinner worked as a reporter for Rote Fahne and contributed short stories, poems, and satirical political songs for left-wing journals. After Adolf Hitler rose to power, Zinner left Nazi Germany in 1933 for Prague, where she founded the subversive cabaret Studio 1934. A year later, she migrated to the USSR and lived in Moscow for the remainder of the war. She worked as a reporter, served on the editorial board of Das Wort, and wrote radio plays.

After World War II, Zinner moved to East Berlin where she continued to write. The revolutionary and early feminist Luise Otto-Peters is the subject of her novel Nur eine Frau (Only a Woman, 1954); Ahnen und Erben (1968) is her own two-volume autobiography; and Die Schwestern (Sisters, 1970) concerns the problems women faced in early 20th-century Germany. In addition to these literary works, Zinner wrote various modern history plays. In Tesufelskreis (The Devil's Circle, 1953), she relates the story of the burning of the Reichstag. General Landt, which was written specifically to oppose Carl Suckmayer's Des Teufels General, concerns the transformation of a non-political officer into an ardent Nazi, motivated by greed and fear. Basing the work on a novel by Martha Dodd , Zinner condemns Suckmayer's concept of a Prussian general and focuses instead on the militaristic tradition of Prussia. Though Zinner was popular in East Germany, her plays have been the subject of critical scrutiny. Adversaries have accused her of rewriting history through the lens of socialism in a dull and journalistic manner.