Nonetheless if I could have my way I would like to found a weekly, as you advised me to do time and again. I already nursed that idea myself for a long time, but i do not belong to those people anymore who build castles in the air. A broad and safe foundation must be laid first, and this implies a long preparation. I am not thinking only of a material foundation, but above all of a true core of people (co-workers and readers as well!).
I want first to convince myself that there still exist some convinced, energetic, in a word – sturdy antisemites. In the meantime they do not make themselves heard.
These ‘entrepreneur-antisemites’ who now float on the surface are, as a matter of fact, absolutely unreliable fellows: they burst like soap bubbles under the slightest pressure, and will disperse like ‘chaff in the wind’.”
[ . . . ]
Source of English translation: Moshe Zimmermann, “Two Generations of in the History of German Antisemitism. The Letters of Theodor Fritsch to Wilhelm Marr”, Leo Baeck Institute Year Book 23 (1978): pp. 89-99, here pp. 95-97.
Reprinted with the generous permission of the Leo Baeck Institute. More information on the Baeck Institute is available at: lbi.org (New York), www.leobaeck.co.uk (London), and www.leobaeck.org (Jerusalem).
Original German text reprinted in Staatsarchiv Hamburg [Hamburg State Archive], Private Papers of W. Marr, Bestand A, No. 67, Theodor Fritsch to Wilhelm Marr, Letters from May 8, 1884 (Bl. 1-2), April 7, 1885 (Bl. 17-18), and July 1, 1885 (Bl. 23-24).
print version
return to list
previous document