The Childhood of Kitty Suchny
The Childhood of Kitty Suchny
Narrator:  As Joseph Roth sat in coffee houses here along Taborstrasse, there’s a good chance the three women we’re about the hear from went walking by when they were children, and let’s first hear from Kitty Suschny, who was Kitty Pistol back then."We lived in a real Jewish neighborhood, and my father had his medical practice on the second floor of our building, and my mother worked as his assistant.On the first floor, there was a Jewish family of fur traders. Then Miss Letfuss, across the way, was a big Social Democrat. And old Mrs. Schmitz lived there, too. She was a monarchist. A Jewish monarchist.And there was the Steinmetz family with three girls. Two of them fled to France, and one gone off to fight in the Spanish Civil War. We were not a very religious family, but we observed the High Holidays. Once, we even celebrated Christmas, because we had a Christian nanny for a while. So that year, we had a tree. But when mother took it down, I cried nonstop. Mother was furious, and she vowed we’d never get another one. And we never did have another Christian nanny nor a tree. Then in 1931, out of nowhere, my father had a massive heart attack and died. He was 55, mother was only 37.Well, life carried on. I went to a school in the neighborhood with my best friend, who also lived in Gaussplatz."
As seen on
Centropa Jewish Vienna Tour
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