How I Came to Berlin - An Artist's Journey from Belfast and the London Blitz to a Cold-War City

Elizabeth Shaw

Summary

Elizabeth Shaw, who has until now remained all but unknown in her native Ireland, was one of the most celebrated children's authors in East Germany, producing a series of masterful children's books that have stayed in print since her death in 1992. She was also a deeply complex, passionate woman, a brilliant author, and a gifted artist beyond the confines of Children's literature.   
Born in Belfast in 1920 to Irish parents, Shaw was a life-long outsider, sheltered from the poverty and violence of the city at the liberal, left-wing Royal Academy. At the age of 12, her family moved to Bedford in England, and she would eventally go on to attend the Chelsea School of Art, impressing her teachers and absorbing the social and political struggles of her time. In 1939, she was called up to the war effort and worked in the London telephone exchange.   
Having published sketches in 1940 and contributed to the London left-wing magazines Our Time and Lilliput, she exhibited works in 1943 at the Artists' International Association in London. In 1944l, she met the Swiss-born émigré artist and communist René Graetz. They married in 1946 and, like other German exiles opposed to National Socialism, decided to help build a better, socialist Germany. Deeply inflected by the politics of East Germany, she worked as a caricaturist with Neues Deutschland, the newspaper of East Germany's ruling Socialist Unity Party, before going on to write 23 enromously successful books for children, making her a household name across Germany.   
By times elusive, moving and deeply revealing, this is a finely tuned memoir by one of Ireland's great forgotten artists - now illustrated with many never-before-published illustrations, and with an insightful and enligtening afterword by Fergal Lenehan and Sabine Egger which delves into the under-explored aspects of Shaw's relationship to Stalinism, the GDR, and those around her.

Available since: 09/18/2025.

Print length: 255 pages.

Other books that might interest you

Crowned with Glory - How...

Jasmine L. Holmes

America was founded on the concept of the innate and inalienable rights of humankind. Many Christians see an echo of the imago Dei—that every human being carries the image of God—within those ideals. Yet these rights were systemically withheld from the Black and enslaved residents of this country for centuries. Through it all, Black people have proclaimed the truth of their dignity and personhood in powerful and profound ways. 
 
 
 
Crowned with Glory collects many of the writings of these men and women, both familiar and lesser-known, to shine a light on what has always been there: an enormous movement of Black Americans demanding the liberty they were promised and deserved. With moving and insightful reflections on these oft-forgotten or suppressed voices, author Jasmine L. Holmes offers a hopeful and encouraging testament to the power of unrelenting cries for justice that will strike a chord with anyone looking for a robust Christian history of resistance. 
 
 
 
If you want to understand how we got here, listen to this book. If you want to know where we go from here, listen to it again.

Show book

The Progressive Presidents

Editors Charles River

When William McKinley was assassinated in 1901, young Theodore Roosevelt was thrust into the presidency, one that would earn him a place on Mount Rushmore, Roosevelt’s “Square Deal” domestic policies favored average citizens while busting trusts and monopolies. Roosevelt also promoted conservation as an environmental stance, while his “speak softly and carry a big stick” foreign policy is still an oft used phrase today. Roosevelt even earned a Nobel Prize during his presidency.
As one of the most influential men of the 20th century, there is no shortage of adjectives to use when describing Woodrow Wilson’s two terms as president of the United States. Wilson was a pioneer of the Progressive movement both before and during his presidency, becoming a populist champion a generation before Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal. He ran for reelection by touting his neutrality during World War I, only to lead his nation into the war and become the architect of a world body that would lead to greater inter-connection among nations. Today Wilson is best remembered for his Fourteen Points, one of the most forceful arguments for an idealistic foreign policy in American history.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt might be America’s greatest 20th century president, but there’s no question that he was the most unique. A well-connected relative of Theodore Roosevelt, FDR was groomed for greatness until he was struck down by what was widely believed to be polio at the time. Nevertheless, he persevered, rising through New York politics to reach the White House just as the country faced its greatest challenge since the Civil War. For over a decade, Roosevelt threw everything he had at the Great Depression, and then threw everything the country had at the Axis powers during World War II. Ultimately, he succumbed to illness in the middle of his fourth term, just before the Allies won the war.

Show book

In the Arena and Aroma of Words...

Martin Hackleman

Martin Hackleman's personal reflections of an early age and as an older person. Reflections as a 17-year-old young man trying to understand who is becoming and the same person at 73 sharing what happened and new wonderings in general. Told through musical lessons, ways to improve your life.

Show book

Infantry Life - Vietnam's...

Dennis M. Witt

Firefights, mortar attacks, and friendly fire were all part of the experiences of an infantryman in the jungles of the Central Highlands of Vietnam. But bugs, leeches, exhaustion, swamps, accidents, snakes, C-rations, digging in, cutting overhead cover, grief, humor, camaraderie, rain, thirst, impressive weapons, useless weapons, care packages, and much, much more filled up most of the infantryman's one-year tour in Vietnam. 
 
 
 
Daily life as an infantryman in Vietnam was a completely foreign experience compared to the lives most young American soldiers knew growing up. The war and the jungle saw to that. Soldiers had to cope and adapt. Almost all did. 
 
 
 
In this book, the author tells many stories of events he personally experienced during his year in Vietnam. Through these stories, he aptly describes the daily life and shared experiences of soldiers in the 4th Infantry Division in the jungles of Vietnam's Central Highlands. 
 
 
 
Anyone who has a personal connection with someone who served as an infantryman in Vietnam or simply has curiosity about infantry life in Vietnam will better understand, after listening to this book, the answer to the question "What was daily life like for them there?"

Show book

Lessons Learned on Bay Street -...

Don Johnson

In this memoir, one of the most successful investment bankers on Bay Street shares the lessons he learned about business and life in a long and successful career as president of Burns Fry and then as vice-chairman of BMO Nesbitt Burns. Lessons Learned on Bay Street tells the inside story of how Donald K. Johnson led financing transactions involving hundreds of millions of dollars for Canadian and international corporations, deals that involved some of the biggest financial players in the world, such as Warren Buffet. Johnson shows how he applied that deal-making ability to raise millions for charities. And he illustrates his motto, "the sale begins when the customer says no," with a tale about how he convinced the government to remove the capital gains tax on donations of listed securities. As a longtime practitioner of meditation, Johnson urges readers to choose a career they love, and to keep mentally and physically fit on the way up. This book, from an 85-year-old financial wizard born in Lundar, Manitoba, offers sage advice and a big dose of inspiration to readers seeking success in finance, in other businesses, and in life.

Show book

Solving the West Georgia Murder...

Clay Bryant

On a sultry August morning in 1970, the battered body of a young woman was hoisted from a dry well just outside Hogansville, Georgia. Author and investigator Clay Bryant was there, witnessing the macabre scene. Then fifteen, Bryant was tagging along with his father, Buddy Bryant, Hogansville chief of police. The victim, Gwendolyn Moore, had been in a violent marriage. That was no secret. But her husband had connections to a political machine that held sway over the Troup County Sheriff's Office overseeing the case. To the dismay and bafflement of many, no charges were brought. That is, until Bryant followed his father's footsteps into law enforcement and a voice cried out from the well three decades later.

Show book