A notorious and complex figure in the history of National-socialism, Stella Goldschlag, has received renewed attention recently in the news following the publication of a book based on her life in the January of this year. Takis Würger’s Stella has, according to an article from die Welt, divided critical opinion. While there are those who consider the novel an impertinence, others are far less condemning.
Whether you love or loath the new book, what undeniably makes it interesting is the fact that Würger’s protagonist, Stella Goldschlag, really existed. The German-born Jew was persecuted for her religion following the Nazi’s seizure of power. She briefly managed to evade detection in 1943 thanks to faked document but was swiftly re-discovered by the Gestapo.
Following days of interrogation and torture, Goldschlag made a deal with the devil. Stella, in exchange for a promise that her and her family would not be deported, began aiding the Gestapo in their hunt for Jews that had gone undercover to avoid persecution. Being a woman who was considered to have been very beautiful, she was known in the underground Jewish circles as the "das blonde Gift” (the poisonous blonde). After the defeat of Germany and the National Socialists, she was identified as a Nazi perpetrator and arrested. In June 1946, the Soviet Military Tribunal sentenced Goldschlag to ten years in a labour camp as retribution for her work for the Gestapo.
Goldschlag served her time in full, and upon her release lived in West Berlin with her husband until the 1980s. The infamous huntress’ story comes to an end when in 1994 Goldschlag takes her own life by throwing herself from the window of her apartment. Whether this story is one of justice or tragedy, Stella’s life is certainly one that reaffirms the cruelty and brutality of the 1940s in Germany.
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