Karen Gershon

Karen Gershon, born Kaethe Loewenthal (1923–1993) was a German-born British writer and poet. She escaped to Britain in December 1938.

Karen Gershon

Her book We came as Children: A Collective Autobiography uses a number of testimonies of kindertransport to construct a single account.[1]

One of her best-known poems, I was not there, describes her feelings of guilt at not being there when her parents were murdered by the Nazis.

Works
Memorial plaque at Harwich to the Kindertransport, includes "My Father" by Gershon

UK

Poetry

  • THE RELENTLESS YEAR New Poets 1959, Eyre & Spottiswoode 1960
  • SELECTED POEMS Gollancz 1966
  • LEGACIES AND ENCOUNTERS Gollancz 1972
  • MY DAUGHTERS, MY SISTERS Gollancz 1975
  • COMING BACK FROM BABYLON Gollancz 1979
  • COLLECTED POEMS Macmillan, Papermac 1990
  • GRACE NOTES (with drawings by Stella Tripp), Happy Dragons Press, 2002

Non-Fiction

  • WE CAME AS CHILDREN London, Gollancz 1966, republished Macmillan, Papermac 1989
  • POSTSCRIPT: A Collective Account of the Lives of Jews in West Germany Since the Second World War Gollancz 1969
  • A LESSER CHILD (Autobiography, Vol.1) Peter Owen 1993

Fiction

  • BURN HELEN Harvester Press 1980
  • THE BREAD OF EXILE Gollancz 1985
  • THE FIFTH GENERATION Gollancz 1987

U.S.A.

  • WE CAME AS CHILDREN Harcourt Brace & World 1967
  • SELECTED POEMS Harcourt Brace & World 1967
  • A TEMPERED WIND (Autobiography, Vol.2, 1938–1943) Northwestern University Press 2009

Germany

  • WIR KAMEN ALS KINDER Alibaba Verlag 1988
  • DIE FÜNFTE GENERATION Alibaba Verlag 1988
  • DAS UNTERKIND Rowohlt 1992
  • MICH NUR ZU TRÖSTEN BESTIMMT Karin Fischer, Edition Roter Stein 2000

Sources
  • Peter Lawson (2006): Anglo-Jewish Poetry from Isaac Rosenberg to Elaine Feinstein. Pub. Vallentine Mitchell.
  • J. M. Ritchie, German-speaking Exiles in Great Britain, Rodopi, Amsterdam, 2001, ISBN 90-420-1537-3.
  • Literary estate of Karen Gershon (see External Links).

References
  1. J. M. Ritchie, work cited, page 4


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