Dearest Georg: Love, Literature & Power in Dark Times: The Letters of Elias, Veza & Georges Canetti 1933-48

by Veza Canetti, Elias Canetti, Karen Lauer (Editor)

In 1934, Veza Taubner and Elias Canetti were married in Vienna. Elias describes the arrangement to his brother Georges as a “functional” marriage. Meanwhile, an intense intellectual love affair develops between Veza and Georges, a young doctor suffering fromtuberculosis. Four years later, Veza and Elias flee Nazi-ruled Vienna to London, where they lead an impoverished and extremely complicated marital life in exile.
Spanning the major part of Elias’s struggle for literary recognition, from 1933, before the publication of his novel, Auto-da-Fé , to 1959, when he finished his monumental Crowds and Power , the Canetti letters provide an intimate look at these formative years through the prism of a veritable love the newly married Elias has a string of lovers; his wife, Veza, is hopelessly in love with an idealized image of his youngest brother, Georges; and Georges is drawn to good looking men as well as to his motherly sister-in-law. Independently and often secretly, the couple communicates with Georges, who lives in Veza tells of Elias’s amorous escapades and bouts of madness, Elias complains about Veza’s poor nerves and depression. Each of them worries about Georges’s health–if she could, Veza would kiss away the germs. Georges is an infrequent correspondent, but he diligently stores away the letters from his brother and sister-in-law. In 2003, long after his death, they were accidentally discovered in a Paris basement and comprise not only a moving and insightful document, but real literature.

Genres: Nonfiction

448 pages, Hardcover

First published August 31, 2006

Reviews

[Carmen Sanzo · Rating 3 out of 5]

Me he metido en estas cartas sin haber leído previamente a Elías Canetti. La correspondencia entre Veza, su primera mujer, su hermano Georg y en ocasiones el propio Elías permiten una mirada a unas vidas durísimas, de 1933-38 en Viena y durante la II Guerra Mundial en Inglaterra, siempre faltos de dinero, con relaciones conflictivas entre ellos y con el miedo y la inseguridad por su condición de judíos apátridas. En mi opinión Canetti no sale muy bien parado, la mayoría de las veces la imagen que perdura es la de un personaje muy vanidoso, interesado, atormentado y poco claro. Me ha resultado una lectura ardua y poco gratificante.

[G M]

"Später, als ihr Witz im Schreiben voll ausgebildet war, kann sie sich alles erlauben, ihre Ironie, die sie meisterhaft handhabte, entschuldigte beinahe alles. Sie hebt ihre Schmeichelei auf der Stelle auf und bildet Täuschungen zu Pirouetten um, die durch ihre Form allein entzücken." (Elias über Veza)

Veza Canetti, zunächst Ehefrau und Muse, selbst Autorin, später Elias Canettis Ghislaine Maxwell.