Alive in the Twentieth Century (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781466409477)

Born in South Dakota, Harriet C. Mattusch studied in New York, modern dance, political science, English literature, and theater. In 1933 she studied in Berlin: it was the year that Hitler came to power. From 1935 to 1940, Harriet worked at Briarcliff Junior College in New York. Then she became an editor and free-lance ghost writer. In 1942, she married Kurt Robert Mattusch, a founder of the German Democratic Youth movement, who had advised his groups in 1933 to leave Germany rather than join the Hitler Youth. Before he left Germany in 1937, he wrote about the threat of Hitler for Fortune magazine. During World War II, Harriet was an analyst for the Office of War Information. After the war, she and Robert moved from Washington to Berlin, where he worked for the U.S. Civil Administration and she for Occupation Services. In 1948, they moved to Virginia, renovating first a house in Waterford and then a farm in Clifton. Harriet wrote plays which she produced in a hay barn. From 1959 to 1965, Harriet and Robert lived in Seoul, Korea. Robert founded the Economic Research Center of Korea, and Harriet explored Buddhist, Confucian, and Shamanist monuments. She published articles in the Korea Journal, Blackwood's Magazine, Koko Misul, Hankuk Ilbo, and The Asia Magazine. She wrote two guide-books to Korea, The City of the Yi and The Inns of Korea, and, with Robert, Ornamental Roof Tiles of Korea. During the later 1960s and the 1970s, Harriet and Robert traveled to India, Sri Lanka, and Nepal, Eastern Europe and the Balkans; they lived in France and in Austria. Harriet wrote about their experiences. Robert, an authority on India, painter, poet and farmer, died in 1979. Harriet continued to travel, and she grew flowers. She wrote this autobiography between 1990 and 1995. An insatiable reader, Harriet also reread all the novels of Anthony Trollope. In 2002, she gave the annual lecture to the Trollope Society in New York on "Trollope and the Newspapers." She wrote "Trollope and the Railways" and "Trollope and the Classics." Always a close follower of politics, Harriet died on election day, 2004. People loved to talk with Harriet. They admired her intellect; they found her wise, steadfast, and fearless, hopeful, and possessed of a wry wit. She was a great listener, and she could always find the answer to a question. She could be trusted with confidences and relied upon for advice and support. This book reads as if Harriet were speaking.