Editing Rolf Hochhuth (section)

==Life and career==
===Youth===
Hochhuth was born in [[Eschwege]], and was descended from a Protestant [[Hesse|Hessian]] middle class family. His father was the owner of a shoe‐factory, which became bankrupt in the Depression.<ref>[https://www.nytimes.com/1964/03/01/archives/an-interview-with-rolf-hochhuth.html "An Interview With Rolf Hochhuth", The New York Times'', March 1, 1964]</ref> During [[World War II]], he was a member of the [[Deutsches Jungvolk]], a junior subdivision of the [[Hitler Youth]]; membership in the group had become legally compulsory in 1939.<ref>[https://germanhistorydocs.ghi-dc.org/docpage.cfm?docpage_id=2376 "Second Execution Order to the Law on the Hitler Youth" (March 25, 1939), in ''German History in Documents and Images''; accessed April 29, 2023.]</ref> In 1948 he did an apprenticeship as a bookseller. Between 1950 and 1955 he worked in bookshops in Marburg, Kassel and Munich. At the same time he attended university lectures as a guest student and began with early attempts at writing fiction. Between 1955 and 1963 he was an editor at a major West-German publishing house.

===''The Deputy''===
{{See also|Operation Seat 12}}
[[File:Bundesarchiv B 145 Bild-P084771, Verleihung des Berliner Kunstpreises.jpg|thumb|Rolf Hochhuth (right) at the awards ceremony of the [[Berliner Kunstpreis]] 1963 (from left to right: [[Klaus Kammer]], [[Fritz Kortner]], Rolf Hochhuth)]]

Hochhuth's drama, ''[[The Deputy]]'' (1963), was originally entitled ''[[The Deputy|Der Stellvertreter. Ein christliches Trauerspiel]]'' (''The Deputy, a Christian Tragedy'', translated by [[Richard and Clara Winston]], 1964), the play caused a great deal of controversy because of its criticism of [[Pope Pius XII]]'s role in [[World War II]]. The play was subsequently published in the UK in Robert David MacDonald's translation as ''The Representative'' (1965).

Its publisher Ed Keating and journalist [[Warren Hinckle]], who themselves considered it "dramaturgically flawed," organized a committee to defend the play as a matter of free speech.<ref>Warren Hinckle, ''{{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/19991002163145/http://www.ralphmag.org/lemonH.html "The Year They Tried To Block "The Deputy"]}}'' (Excerpt from ''If You Have a Lemon, Make Lemonade'', 1974), ''The Review of Arts, Literature, Philosophy and the Humanities'', Volume XIII, Number 3, Fall, 1997.</ref> In 2007, [[Ion Mihai Pacepa]], a former Romanian spymaster, alleged that the play was part of a KGB campaign to discredit Pius XII.<ref>Ion Mihai Pacepa, [http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=YTUzYmJhMGQ5Y2UxOWUzNDUyNWUwODJiOTEzYjY4NzI= ''Moscow's Assault on the Vatican''] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070205011340/http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=YTUzYmJhMGQ5Y2UxOWUzNDUyNWUwODJiOTEzYjY4NzI%3D |date=5 February 2007 }}, National Review Online, 25 January 2007.</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Pacepa |first1=Ion Mihai |title=Moscow's Assault on the Vatican |url=https://www.nationalreview.com/2007/01/moscows-assault-vatican-ion-mihai-pacepa/ |website=National Review |access-date=10 December 2020}}</ref> A leading German newspaper opined "that Hochhuth did not require any KGB assistance for his one-sided presentation of history."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.perlentaucher.de/feuilletons/2007-04-26.html|title=Heute in den Feuilletons vom 26.04.2007 - Perlentaucher}}</ref><ref>Thomas Brechenmacher, ''Hochhuths Quellen. War der 'Stellvertreter' vom KGB inspiriert?'', Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 26 April 2007 {{in lang|de}}</ref>

The unedited version of the play would have run some eight or nine hours. As a result, each production adapted the text in its own way. No audience saw it in its original form.<ref>{{cite book |last= Bigsby|first=Christopher|title=Remembering and Imagining the Holocaust: The Chain of Memory  |date=2006 |publisher=Cambridge: Cambridge University Press|page=117}}</ref> It includes the true story of [[Kurt Gerstein]]. Gerstein, a devout Protestant and later a member of the [[SS]], wrote an eyewitness report about the [[gas chambers]] and, after the war, died as a [[POW]].<ref name="Gerstein">{{cite web|url=http://www.kurt-gerstein.de|title=Kurt Gerstein}}</ref>

The play was first performed in Berlin on 20 February 1963 under the direction of [[Erwin Piscator]]. It received its first English production in London by the [[Royal Shakespeare Company]] at the [[Aldwych Theatre]] in 1963 in a translation by [[Robert David MacDonald]]. It was directed by [[Clifford Williams (actor)|Clifford Williams]] with Alan Webb or [[Eric Porter]] as Pius XII, [[Alec McCowen]] as Father Fontana and [[Ian Richardson]]. In the United Kingdom it has since been revived at the [[Citizens Theatre]], Glasgow, in 1986, and at the [[Finborough Theatre]], London, in 2006.

An abridged version opened on [[Broadway theatre|Broadway]] on 26 February 1964 at the [[Brooks Atkinson Theatre]], with [[Emlyn Williams]] as Pius XII and [[Jeremy Brett]] as Father Fontana. The play ran for 316 performances.

''The Deputy'' was made into a film ''[[Amen. (film)|Amen]]'' by [[Costa Gavras]] in 2002, which focused more on the story of Kurt Gerstein.<ref name="Gerstein"/>

===''Soldiers'' and Sikorski crash theories===

Hochhuth's next play, ''[[Soldiers (play)|Soldiers: An Obituary for Geneva]]'' (1967), claimed that [[Winston Churchill]] was responsible for the death of Polish statesman [[Władysław Sikorski]] in the [[1943 Gibraltar B-24 crash]], contradicting the official version of events as an accident; the play implied that Sikorski had been murdered on Churchill's orders. Unbeknownst to Hochhuth, the pilot of the B-24, [[Eduard Prchal]], was still alive and won a libel case against Hochhuth that seriously affected the London theater which staged the play.<ref>[http://www.firstthings.com/article/2004/04/001-the-end-of-the-pius-wars "''The End of the Pius Wars''"], [[Joseph Bottum (author)|Joseph Bottum]], [[First Things]] Magazine, April 2004, retrieved 1 July 2009</ref>

That aspect of the play has overshadowed Hochhuth's conceit that the play would contribute to a debate on the ethics of the [[area bombardment]] of German cities by the [[Royal Air Force]] (RAF) during [[World War II]], with particular reference to [[Bombing of Hamburg in World War II|Operation Gomorrah]], the Anglo-American air raid on [[Hamburg]] in 1943, and culminating in a fictional debate between [[Winston Churchill]] and the pacifist [[George Bell (bishop)|George Bell]]. The play partially drew on the work of English author [[David Irving]], later known as a [[Holocaust denial|Holocaust denier]]. Irving and Hochhuth remained long-standing friends.<ref>Oliver King [https://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/nov/17/secondworldwar.internationaleducationnews "David Irving arrested in Austria"], ''The Guardian'', 17 November 2005</ref>

Controversy arose in Britain in 1967 when the intended premiere of the play at the [[Royal National Theatre|National Theatre Company]] was cancelled due to an intervention from the theatre's board, despite the support for the play by literary manager [[Kenneth Tynan]] and [[Laurence Olivier]], under pressure from [[Joan Plowright]], his wife. At the time of the controversy, Irving was the only figure who gave his "unequivocal" support for Hochhuth's allegations towards Churchill; others consulted by Tynan considered it highly improbable.<ref>Nicholas de Jongh ''Politics, Prudery and Perversity'', London: Methuen, 2000, p.169-61, 160.</ref> The play was produced shortly afterwards in the West End with [[John Colicos]] in the cast. The English translation was again by [[Robert David MacDonald]]. In the UK, the play was seen on tour in the early 1990s and was revived most recently at the [[Finborough Theatre]], London, in 2004.

===''Sommer 14 - A Dance of Death''===
''Sommer 14 - A Dance of Death'' had its UK premiere (and world premiere in English) in August 2014 at the [[Finborough Theatre]] in London. It was directed by [[Christopher Loscher]] for Cerberus Theatre.

===''A Love in Germany'' and the Filbinger Affaire===
[[File:Bundesarchiv B 145 Bild-F054628-0028, Ludwigshafen, 26. CDU-Bundesparteitag, Laurien, Filbinger.jpg|thumb|[[Hans Filbinger]] (centre) had to resign in 1978 as Minister-President of [[Baden-Württemberg]] after it became public via Hochhuth's novel ''A Love in Germany'' that he was responsible for death sentences as a Navy judge at the end of [[World War II]]]]

In 1978, his novel ''A Love in Germany'' about an affair between a Polish POW and a German woman in [[World War II]] stirred up a debate about the past of [[Hans Filbinger]], Minister-President of [[Baden-Württemberg]], who had been a Navy lawyer and judge at the end of [[World War II]]. The affair culminated in Filbinger's resignation.

For ''A Love in Germany'', Hochhuth was awarded the [[Geschwister-Scholl-Preis]] in 1980.
In 1983 [[Andrzej Wajda]], who would later win an Honorary Oscar for Lifetime Achievement, made the story into the film ''[[A Love in Germany|Eine Liebe in Deutschland]]''.

===''Alan Turing''===

His 1987 drama ''[[Alan Turing]]'' featured one of the fathers of modern [[computer science]], who had made significant contributions to breaking German ciphers during [[World War II]]. The play also covered Turing's [[homosexuality]], discovery of which resulted in his loss of career, court-ordered [[chemical castration]], depression, and [[suicide]].

===McKinsey controversy===
[[Image:Rolf Hochhuth, McKinsey is Coming, Duisburg 2005.jpg|thumb|Rolf Hochhuth after a reading of his book ''McKinsey is Coming'' in [[Duisburg]], 2005. ]]

In 2004, he again caused controversy with the play ''[[McKinsey & Company|McKinsey]] is Coming'', which raises the questions of unemployment, social justice and the "right to work". A passage in which he put the chairman of the [[Deutsche Bank]] in one line with leading businessmen who had been murdered by left-wing terrorists and also with Gessler, the villainous bailiff killed by [[William Tell]], was widely seen as advocating, or at least excusing, violence against leading economic figures. Hochhuth vigorously denied this.

===Anti-Semitism allegations===
[[Image:Rolf Hochhuth David Irving.jpg|thumb|Rolf Hochhuth with British Holocaust denier [[David Irving]] in 1966.]]

In March 2005, Hochhuth became embroiled in controversy when, during an interview with the German weekly ''[[Junge Freiheit]]'', he defended [[Holocaust denial|Holocaust denier]] [[David Irving]], describing him as a "pioneer of modern history who has written magnificent books" and an "historian to equal someone like [[Joachim Fest]]".<ref>[http://www.jf-archiv.de/archiv05/200508021809.htm ''Die Würde des Ortes respektieren'']. Writer Rolf Hochhuth on his proposal for a museum of war bombings, David Irving and Winston Churchill. Interview with Rolf Hochhuth in [[Junge Freiheit]], 18 February 2005. {{in lang|de}}</ref> When asked about Irving's statement that "more women died on the [[Chappaquiddick incident|back seat of Edward Kennedy's car]] at Chappaquiddick than ever died in a gas chamber in [[Auschwitz]]", Hochhuth dismissed it as provocative black humour.<ref>Karl Pfeifer, ''Rolf Hochhuth: Lob für einen notorischen Holocaustleugner'', [http://www.hagalil.com/archiv/2005/02/hochhuth.htm Hagalil] 21-02-2005. The columnist on the Hagalil website notes that Irving made the remark not in response to a "tremendous provocation" but to a paying audience. The speech was screened in a video during the London libel trial. Richard Rampton, counsel for the defendant [[Deborah Lipstadt]], commented [quote back-translated from German]: "Ridicule alone is not enough. You must also be tasteless. You must say things such as: More women died in the backseat of Senator Edward Kennedy's car in Chappaquiddick than in the gas chambers of Auschwitz." {{in lang|de}}</ref>

[[Paul Spiegel]], President of the [[Central Council of Jews in Germany]], argued that with these statements Hochhuth himself was [[Holocaust denial|denying the Holocaust]]. After weeks of uproar, Hochhuth issued an apology.<ref>''[http://n-tv.de/340976.html Wie ein Blinder von der Farbe - Hochhuth hatte keine Ahnung]'', N-TV, 25. February 2005 {{in lang|de}}</ref>

===Casual allegations===
On opening of the archives of the Stasi, the East German Security Service, a report emerged according to which Hochhuth had casually made the allegation that [[Timothy Garton Ash]], at that time working on a history dissertation in East Berlin, was a "British spy". The book by Garton Ash about how he himself had been surveilled details how such allegations in other cases had major consequences for the involved individuals.<ref name="Ash">{{cite book |last1=Garton Ash |first1=Timonty |title=Die Akte Romeo |date=1997 |publisher=Carl Hanser Verlag |location=Germany |page=155}}</ref>