EINSTEIN, Albert Autogr. signed letter to Frau Destrées [sic], Le Coq (De Haan - Belgium), 18/08/1933, 1 p., 4to.
Estimation :
2000 / 3000
Adjudication :
4800 €
Description
In German. Daughter of the Mons engraver Auguste Danse, Marie Danse (1866-1942) was painter and engraver in her own right. In 1889, she married the Belgian lawyer, socialist politician and cultural critic Jules Destrée (1863-1936), Minister of Arts and Sciences from 1919 to 1921. With his wife he had a renowned "salon" where he received numerous well-known scientific and artistic figures. After Einstein had decided not to go back to Germany (his time as guest professor in the United States had ended) he arrived in Belgium in 1933 with the steamship "Belgenland". For a couple of months he and his wife, Elsa Koch, settled in De Haan. It's from there he writes to Mrs Destrée about Julius Levin (1862-1935), a German doctor, writer and violin maker who also fled from Germany. Einstein praises Levin for his craftmanship to build violins which are of an equal quality as the old-Italian instruments. He wants to respect Levin's last wish (Levin "der leidend ist und über 70 Jahre alt ist") to create a workspace in Brussels were people could learn the art of violin making. However, the plans never got realised and Levin, who suffered from cancer for quite some time, died in 1935 after an operation in Brussels.
