Anne-Lise Stern

Anne-Lise Stern (born Anneliese Stern: 16 July 1921 - 6 May 2013) was a French psychoanalyst and Holocaust survivor. Anneliese Stern was born in Berlin and then spent the first twelve years of her life growing up in Mannheim, to where her parents relocated soon after her birth. She grew up in a family atmosphere of intellectual creativity, in which the guiding vision was predominantly secular and left-wing. Heinrich (later Henri) Stern (1893-1948), her father was a Freudian psychiatrist. He was also a passionate Marxist and secular Jew. Her mother, born Käthe Ruben (1893-1968), who worked as a nurse, also came from a politically committed Jewish family. Her maternal grandmother, Regina Ruben, was a militant feminist and Marxist, and a "companion in arms" to Clara Zetkin and Rosa Luxemburg. During her childhood both Anneliese's parents were members of the Social Democratic Party, while her grandmother Regina, to whom Anneliese later dedicated some of her written work, had joined the more recently established Communist Party. The Nazis took power in January 1933 and lost no time in transforming the country into a one-party dictatorship. Like populists through the ages, the Nazis had gained public support on the twin pillars of hope and hatred. The hatred, targeted on political opponents and Jews, became an underpinning of government policy very much more quickly than many had thought possible, and a few weeks after the Nazi takeover Heinrich Stern, by now serving on the local town council, was arrested. Three months later he was released without charge. On the day of his release the Sterns left Germany with their daughter, settling initially with relatives in Paris. Dr. Stern's secretary, Käthe Seitz, stayed in Germany and opposed the Nazis. She was killed by decapitation. From Paris the Sterns moved to Blois in May 1933 and started to build new lives. Later they moved on to Lyon and from there to Nice. Anne-Lise quickly mastered the language and passed her school leaving exams ("Baccalauréat").