Rolf Hochhuth
Rolf Hochhuth (German: [ʁɔlf ˈhoːxˌhuːt] ; 1 April 1931 – 13 May 2020)[1] was a German author and playwright, best known for his 1963 drama The Deputy, which insinuates Pope Pius XII's indifference to Hitler's extermination of the Jews, and he remained a controversial figure both for his plays and other public comments and for his 2005 defense of British Holocaust denier David Irving.
Life and career[edit]
Youth[edit]
Hochhuth was born in Eschwege, and was descended from a Protestant Hessian middle class family. His father was the owner of a shoe‐factory, which became bankrupt in the Depression.[2] 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.[3] 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.
Hochhuth also collaborated with scripts for cinema and television: