Genre Fiction
![Kathrine Kressmann Taylor - [object Object] author](https://res.cloudinary.com/readsomnia/image/upload/authors/a_B001HQ3RLU.jpg)
Address Unknown: A Novel
A rediscovered classic and international bestseller that recounts the gripping tale of a friendship destroyed at the hands of Nazi Germany
In this searing novel, Kathrine Kressmann Taylor brings vividly to life the insidious spread of Nazism through a series of letters between Max, a Jewish art dealer in San Francisco, and Martin, his friend and former business partner who has returned to Germany in 1932, just as Hitler is coming to power.
Originally published in Story magazine in 1938, Address Unknown became an international sensation. Credited with exposing the dangers of Nazism to American readers early on, it is also a scathing indictment of fascist movements around the world and a harrowing exposé of the power of the pen as a weapon.
A powerful and eloquent tale about the consequences of a friendship-and society-poisoned by extremism, Address Unknown remains hauntingly and painfully relevant today.
In this searing novel, Kathrine Kressmann Taylor brings vividly to life the insidious spread of Nazism through a series of letters between Max, a Jewish art dealer in San Francisco, and Martin, his friend and former business partner who has returned to Germany in 1932, just as Hitler is coming to power.
Originally published in Story magazine in 1938, Address Unknown became an international sensation. Credited with exposing the dangers of Nazism to American readers early on, it is also a scathing indictment of fascist movements around the world and a harrowing exposé of the power of the pen as a weapon.
A powerful and eloquent tale about the consequences of a friendship-and society-poisoned by extremism, Address Unknown remains hauntingly and painfully relevant today.
Editorial Reviews
"Simple, warm, human and tremendously touching. It will take hold of both head and heart." -- Los Angeles Times
"What must be emphasized here is that this is no merely sound journalistic piece. It is a great story regardless of time or place or immediate circumstances. It is a great story because it contains all the elements of storytelling that have gone to make great stories from time immemorial." -- Fred T. Marsh, New York Herald Tribune
"A tremendously powerful piece of work, with a wallop at the end of the kind that Poe, Maupassant, Ibanez, Bierce and O. Henry made famous in their time." -- Joseph Henry Jackson, San Francisco Chronicle
"A short story with a long, dark echo; fierce, clever, and timely in today's world." -- Julian Barnes
"This modern story is perfection itself. It is the most effective indictment of Nazism to appear in fiction." -- New York Review of Books
"A tale already known and profoundly appreciated by members of my generation. It is to our part in World War II what Uncle Tom's Cabin was to the Civil War." -- Kurt Vonnegut
"That this short, fleeting story has lasted so long is not only because of its artistic achievement, and not only because, written in 1938, it astonishingly anticipated the horror that was yet to come. It is because its prescience is not confined to its time. It saw into our own future too." -- Jonathan Freedland
"Captivating, beautiful and unimaginably powerful, a book for our times." -- Philippe Sands
"Address Unknown serves not only as a reminder of Nazi horrors but as a cautionary tale in light of current racial, ethnic, and nationalistic intolerance." -- Publishers Weekly
"Address Unknown will leave you breathless with admiration." -- Star Tribune (Minneapolis)
"Remarkably, despite the multitude of testimony and first-person accounts of life under Nazism with which we've been deluged since its first publication, this old, slim fiction manages to smuggle us across time and space into one eloquent tale of perfidy." -- The Guardian
"This stunning classic brilliantly defines what happens when people are swept up in a poisonous ideology." -- Daily Mail (London)
"[An] astounding work. . . . One aspect of a story's greatness is its ability to speak to readers of different ages. So it is with Address Unknown. . . . I'm hopeful . . . it will reclaim its place on [the] American bookshelf." -- American Scholar
"What must be emphasized here is that this is no merely sound journalistic piece. It is a great story regardless of time or place or immediate circumstances. It is a great story because it contains all the elements of storytelling that have gone to make great stories from time immemorial." -- Fred T. Marsh, New York Herald Tribune
"A tremendously powerful piece of work, with a wallop at the end of the kind that Poe, Maupassant, Ibanez, Bierce and O. Henry made famous in their time." -- Joseph Henry Jackson, San Francisco Chronicle
"A short story with a long, dark echo; fierce, clever, and timely in today's world." -- Julian Barnes
"This modern story is perfection itself. It is the most effective indictment of Nazism to appear in fiction." -- New York Review of Books
"A tale already known and profoundly appreciated by members of my generation. It is to our part in World War II what Uncle Tom's Cabin was to the Civil War." -- Kurt Vonnegut
"That this short, fleeting story has lasted so long is not only because of its artistic achievement, and not only because, written in 1938, it astonishingly anticipated the horror that was yet to come. It is because its prescience is not confined to its time. It saw into our own future too." -- Jonathan Freedland
"Captivating, beautiful and unimaginably powerful, a book for our times." -- Philippe Sands
"Address Unknown serves not only as a reminder of Nazi horrors but as a cautionary tale in light of current racial, ethnic, and nationalistic intolerance." -- Publishers Weekly
"Address Unknown will leave you breathless with admiration." -- Star Tribune (Minneapolis)
"Remarkably, despite the multitude of testimony and first-person accounts of life under Nazism with which we've been deluged since its first publication, this old, slim fiction manages to smuggle us across time and space into one eloquent tale of perfidy." -- The Guardian
"This stunning classic brilliantly defines what happens when people are swept up in a poisonous ideology." -- Daily Mail (London)
"[An] astounding work. . . . One aspect of a story's greatness is its ability to speak to readers of different ages. So it is with Address Unknown. . . . I'm hopeful . . . it will reclaim its place on [the] American bookshelf." -- American Scholar
Readers Top Reviews
Elly PpavelRoniHJ. L
This is a short book that was originally published in 1938 and republished in 2019. It is an epistolary story written over the course of two years during the rise of Hitler’s Third Reich. The letters between two friends, one in the United States and one in Germany depict how extremism in politics destroys relationships and societies. This book is a classic tale of warning.
David Evans Katz
Address Unknown is a chilling epistolary novella written a year before the outbreak of World War Two. It is a series of letters between two former business partners and close friends, one a German-American living in San Francisco who is Jewish and the other a German Christian who, having lived in the United States, has returned to Germany. Over the initial series of letters, it is revealed that the partner in Germany has become enthralled with Hitler and Nazism. The ensuing letters reveal duplicity, betrayal and, ultimately, revenge. This is a classic that, despite its age, is timeless. It will leave the reader open-mouthed in shock.
John LeB MA
A chilling novella about the desperation borne from a rising tide of evil. The epistolary is the right style for the narrative. This is a cautionary tale for our times about how ill fortune cycles back upon its source. As criticism, the speed with which a reasonably decent man embraces such evil seems beyond credulity -- but perhaps not, maybe human beings are often so easily corrupted.
Stephan F.
If you've ever wondered how regular people stood by and watched Germany descend into Naziism, just look at what is happening right now in the USA! I heard the book title ADDRESS UNKNOWN mentioned on NPR, and that's why I bought it off Amazon. Although the story was published in 1938, it's extremely relevant today! Please read it if you can. On another note, I did find that there was a 1940 movie version made of the book, and so I watched it on YouTube after I had already read the book. BLAH! I suggest reading the book, (the story is only 33 pages long), and don't watch the movie. The movie bastardized the story way too much and lost focus of the author's true point.
gammyjill
I read Kathrine Kressman Taylor’s short story “Address Unknown”, back in the 1990’s, in one of its re-publications since it was originally issued in the late 1930’s. It is a short book, written in the form of letters from Max Eisenstein to his former business partner, Martin Schulte. The two men were partners in a profitable art gallery in San Francisco. Eisenstein was Jewish, and like Schulte, he was a German immigrant to the United States. But Schulte is a Protestant and he returns to Munich, in 1932, so his children can be raised as Germans. The year 1932 in Germany means the depths of the world wide economic Depression, and the rise of Hitler and the Nazi party to power. After Martin Schulte and his family return to Germany, he comes to terms with the “new Germany” and turns into a rabid Nazi. His future in Germany is assured, until an incident with Max’s younger sister happens. Max is out for revenge and is able to use Nazi brutality to punish Martin. And here’s where the title of the book becomes interesting. Instead of downloading the Kindle version of “Address Unknown”, I bought the Audible version and listened to it. There’s a difference in the words “Address” and “Addressee”. The first seems to denote a physical entity, where as the second denotes a person. The book’s narrator pronounced the word as “addressee” when referring to the disappearance of Eisenstein’s younger sister, an actor in Berlin. Then, the word is pronounced “Address” when referring to Max’s letters to Martin when they are returned to him, implying the house is unknown. That difference in spelling and pronunciation puts the title of the book into a possible reinterpretation. Maybe just the house is just empty because the family has moved, for purely innocent reasons? (not likely, but just saying…) I realise I’m just quibbling here, but the substitution of “Addressee” for “Address” can change the meaning of the book.
