Strange Bird: The Albatross Press and the Third Reich

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The first book about the Albatross Press, a Penguin precursor that entered into an uneasy relationship with the Nazi regime to keep Anglo-American literature alive under fascism The Albatross Press was, from its beginnings in 1932, a “strange bird”: a cultural outsider to the Third Reich but an economic insider. It was funded by British-Jewish interests. Its director was rumored to work for British intelligence. A precursor to Penguin, it distributed both middlebrow fiction and works by edgier modernist authors such as D. H. Lawrence, Virginia Woolf, James Joyce, and Ernest Hemingway to eager continental readers. Yet Albatross printed and sold its paperbacks in English from the heart of Hitler’s Reich. In her original and skillfully researched history, Michele K. Troy reveals how the Nazi regime tolerated Albatross—for both economic and propaganda gains—and how Albatross exploited its insider position to keep Anglo-American books alive under fascism. In so doing, Troy exposes the contradictions in Nazi censorship while offering an engaging detective story, a history, a nuanced analysis of men and motives, and a cautionary tale. Contents Acknowledgments INTRODUCTION. Behind the Door ONE. Tauchnitz Has a Rival TWO. Spies for England THREE. Winning the Continent FOUR. Un-German Literature FIVE. Made in Britain? SIX. The Scissors in Their Heads SEVEN. A Tale of Two Publishers EIGHT. The Center Will Not Hold NINE. The Shell Game TEN. Suspicion ELEVEN. Dear Reader TWELVE. Allegiances THIRTEEN. Faces of War FOURTEEN. Enemy Books FIFTEEN. Return and Departure SIXTEEN. Albatross Under the Occupation SEVENTEEN. The Deutsche Tauchnitz EIGHTEEN. English Books Abroad NINETEEN. Rivals TWENTY. When the Bombs Fell TWENTY– ONE Making Peace TWENTY– TWO Rising from the Ashes TWENTY– THREE Homecoming CONCLUSION Longing Notes Selected Bibliography Chapter-Opening Illustration Credits Index