Friday, 9th of December see the release of the new Charlotte animated biopic nationwide across the UK and much of Northern Europe. The voice of Charlotte, the Jewish artist who lost her life at Auschwitz while heavily pregnant, is played by Keira Knightly and, as of now, looks to be a triumph at the box Office. However, the screen play has chosen to gloss over the sexual abuse she unquestionably suffered at the hands of her grandfather and the frank confession she made to have poisoned him with a veronal laced omelette.
There is unequivocal documentation that Charlotte abhorred her grandfather to the extreme. Through her major works, Life or theatre, she references ‘Preferring to spend 10 more nights like this than a single alone with him.’ This is transcribed onto an overlay of a gouache depiction of herself and her grandfather on a cramped transporter train. They had been briefly sent to a French internment camp, but were released due to his poor health, Charlotte, ironically, in a caring capacity.
In 2015, a 35 page confession by Charlotte disclosing poisoning her grandfather was released by a Parisian publisher. In this she writes to her former lover, Alfred Wolfsjohn. The hastily penned account states:
‘I know where the poison was,’……’It is acting as I write. Perhaps he is already dead now’.
The source, a veronal omelette which she had served up to her maternal grandfather. Morphine, opium and veronal were frequently carried by Jewish refugees of the period, said for use ‘When the money runs out’.
The proclamation was accompanied by a pen depiction of her grandfather which she claimed was scribed as his ultimate breaths were taken.
Suicides were common within Charlottes family, there had been 8 in total. Her mother had committed suicide when she was 9, this had been predeceased by her aunt, also called Charlotte, suicide. As a youngster she had been told her mother had died from influenza. After Kristallnacht, Charlotte was consigned from her native Berlin to stay with her maternal grandparents in the relative safety of the South of France. Her grandmother had succumbed to deep depression prior to her arrival, charlotte’ attempts to help bring her through the troubled patch were unsuccessful. She managed to end her life by jumping through a window witnessed by her granddaughter. Charlotte trauma was heightened by her grandfather who cruelly revealed how her mother, aunt and other members of the family had deliberately ended their own lives. His devilry extended to telling Charlotte she would be the next to succumb.
When based in Berlin, Charlotte had been having an affair with her step mothers vocal coach, Alfred Wolfjohn, many years her senior. In the last stage of her young life she married a Romanian Jewish refugee, Alexander Nagler, he was 32 years her senior. Relationships outside of typical age boundaries is commonplace with those who have suffered sexual abuse.
The producer, Julia Rosenberg of the latest biopic asserts that there isn’t enough evidence to suggest predatory behaviour by her grandfather. This is supported by Griselda Pollock, a leading art historian who has researched Charlotte Salomon for over two decades. She claims that the confession is that of desire not of reality. Expanding on how much of Life or Theatre deviates between reality and a work of fiction. The line study of her grandfather, apparently dying, could simply be a depiction of him in slumber. The act of drawing a portrait at the final, end of life stage offbeat? Unusual, but a valid response of an artist drawing on the creative process through the passing of life.
Good Entertainment Studios: justified in denying the view a full account of Charlotte’ life? Simply a ploy to keep the age restriction at 12A and not that of an adult. Could this relate more to the commercial viability of an animated movie than a more traditional cinematic?
The poisoning, potentially a means to escape Nazi persecution? By no means, if she did, or did not poison him the desire was clearly present. Even if we have been directed to explore a pastel-pink, child-safe version of Charlotte’s tragic life, the more we and the anticipated Global audience view this leading outsider artist to the greater good.
…There may also be an uncut version out on screens in a few years when the pre-teens able to evade age restrictions are fully grown…
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