Über das Glück und die Liebe

Emil Ludwig was one of the most well-known and successful authors of the Weimar Republic and worldwide, with his biographies focused on 'historical fiction' about Goethe, Napoleon, Bismarck, Wilhelm II, and Hindenburg. His works have been translated into 28 languages. Today, he is inexplicably forgotten. Born in 1881 in Breslau as the son of a prominent ophthalmologist, he studied law in Berlin but became a freelance writer and journalist after earning his doctorate, despite having the opportunity to build a career in his uncle's firm, the second richest man in Prussia. He was friends with notable figures such as Gerhart Hauptmann, Thomas Mann, Walter Rathenau, and Erich Maria Remarque. Due to Prussian militarism, he moved with his wife to Switzerland in the early 20th century, where he built an impressive house in Moscia near Ascona. Because of his left-democratic beliefs and Jewish heritage, he became one of the most hated enemies of the Nazis, who banned and burned his books. The potential threat from the Nazis, even in Switzerland, led him to emigrate to the USA in 1940, where he became a political advisor on Germany to President Roosevelt. He returned to Moscia in 1945 and died there in 1948. Here, we present a lesser-known essayistic book by Emil Ludwig, published in 1940 by the Swiss exile publisher Oprecht, exploring two central phenomena of human existence: happiness and love—philosophically profound yet light-hearted in style.