Das Neue Ghetto, Theodor Herzl, Vienna: 1897

[4], 100 pp (7 1/2 x 5 3/8 in.; 193 x 138 mm). Original wrappers; front wrapper browned at margins. Bound in gray patterned paste paper boards, gilt-stamped titles on spine; slipcover.

a rare presentation copy, warmly inscribed, and signed by the author

Theodor (Binyamin Ze’ev) Herzl (1860–1904), the visionary founder of Zionism was also a successful journalist, feuilletonist, and playwright.  Das Neue Ghetto, a play in four acts was written in 1894, but first staged in January of 1898. "The 'new ghetto' is Herzl's term for the condition of Jewish emancipation without assimilation.  Written several years before Der Judenstaat, it is Herzl’s only play which contains Jewish characters and deals directly with the Jewish Question. It represents his earliest formal condemnation of assimilation as false and illusory, and as the estrangement of the Jews from their authentic selves. The play was praised by a diverse cross-section of Viennese society, from Herzl's fellow Zionist, Max Nordau, to Sigmund Freud, who attended the opening night and went on to cite the play's influence on him personally in his Interpretation of Dreams.

This copy was presented by Herzl to Baron Arthur Gundaccar Freiherr von Suttner (1850–1902.) In 1891, Von Suttner, an ardent pacifist, founded an organization to combat the spread of anti-Semitism in Vienna. His wife, Bertha became the first woman ever awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace, in 1905. Herzl's inscription reads: "Herr Baron Suttner, In aufrichtiger vereherung (In sincere admiration) Th. Herzl,  March 1898." The next recorded owner of this volume was, quite remarkably, also a Nobel Peace Laureate. Alfred Hermann Fried (1864–1921), an Austrian Jewish pacifist and co-founder of the German peace movement, was awarded the Prize in 1911.

PROVENANCE:
Presented by the author, Theodor Herzl, to:

Baron Arthur Gundaccar Freiherr von Suttner (1850-1902.) In 1891, Von Suttner, an ardent pacifist,founded an organization to combat the spread of anti-Semitism in Vienna. His wife, Bertha became the first woman ever awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace (1905.) Herzl's inscription reads: Herr Baron Suttner, In aufrichtiger vereherung Th. Herzl  March 1898.

Alfred Hermann Fried (1864 –1921), an Austrian Jewish pacifist, co-founder of the German peace movement, and also a winner of the Nobel Prize for Peace (1911.)