Few activities were available when Phyllis Rauch moved to the lakeside area with her late husband Georg in 1976. “Had there been more to do, Georg probably would never have written the memoir of his World War II experiences as an Austrian-born Jew inducted into the German Army,” she says.
In fact, Georg Rauch might still be known only as a successful artist had the couple not run out of ideas for the monthly soirees at which those attending took turns at providing cultural entertainment.
“In those hippie-influenced days there was always someone to play guitar or do a poetry reading,” says Phyllis. “One woman sometimes performed an Isadora-style interpretive dance. When Georg’s teenage daughter visited us from Europe, we persuaded her to join us and pose so that Georg, who had been an artist all of his adult life, could draw her while the others watched.”
Desperate for a something to read at the soirees, Georg dipped into the sealed box of letters he’d written to his mother while he was away at war. After avoiding them for more than 30 years, he found the letters more interesting than disturbing, Phyllis remembers.
“At the party when he read sections in German and I translated into English, those attending were fascinated and begged for more. Eventually they convinced Georg to put his brushes aside for a time and to use the letters as the framework for a memoir of his wartime experiences.
“For months he wrote and I translated,” says Phyllis, who had made a career of translating a variety of languages. “The finished manuscript sat as I searched for a publisher. Eventually long-time guests and friends convinced us to self-publish ‘The Jew with the Iron Cross.’ We presented the book and had a signing just months before Georg died in 2006.”
The long-awaited major publishing company finally came calling, and in February 2015 MacMillan Children’s Publishing Group will release Rauch’s wartime experiences as a “young adult book” with a new title – “Unlikely Warrior: A Jew in Hitler’s Army.”
MacMillan obviously expects the book to sell to a much larger audience. They’ve announced a simultaneous release of the digital editions, the Blackstone audio version, and 2,400 hardcover copies for their own Junior Literary Guild, a young adult book club for libraries. Another order will earmark 35,000 paperback copies for Scholastic clubs and book fairs.
It appears that more good news about Georg’s war time experiences is on the horizon. MacMillan’s executive editor recently informed Phyllis that the Italian and Polish rights to the book are already signed.
Up until now, Georg has been renowned internationally, not as a writer, but an innovative expressionist artist.
After a good deal of success in Europe, he was invited to participate in the art section of the Austrian pavilion at the Montreal World Expo. When the fair concluded, other Austrians persuaded the couple to join a group trip to Mexico. Georg and two other artists documented the two-month trip in watercolors which were all purchased in Guadalajara by the Austrian consul. He gave the artists a boost by inviting them to meet a group of the city’s art collectors.
“Georg had convinced me to come to Mexico by promising that we would return with more money than we started,” says Phyllis. “When the Guadalajara collectors bought all of the paintings we had carried throughout Mexico, Georg could fulfill his promise.
“We were invited to return to experience winter in Mexico. While I was a guide for the cultural events in Guadalajara during the 1968 Olympics, Georg was commissioned to make the poster for those events.
Georg’s major Mexican art shows included a 1989 event at Guadalajara’s Instituto Cabañas. His work nearly filled that enormous complex. In 2000 he was invited to show at the Ex Convento del Carmen. His work was also featured in two major Chapala shows – one of which was mounted after his death.
Two exhibits
Coinciding with the triumph of the publishing of Georg’s book, two major two-month-long shows of the artist’s work will open next week in Guadalajara and Chapala.
The museum in Jalisco’s regal Palacio de Gobierno, facing the Plaza de Armas, will host an exhibit of 40 of Georg’s oil paintings, with a cocktail inauguration set for Thursday, December 11, 7 p.m.
Just two days later, on Saturday, December 13, an exhibition of 25 of his silk screen posters will open at noon in the Centro Cultural Gonzalez Gallo (the old train station) in Chapala.