Mary Saran

Maria Saran was born in Cranz, a small seaside town in what was then East Prussia. She was the seventh of ten recorded children born to the busy architect Richard Saran and his wife.Kulenkampff'sche Familienstiftung (Hg.), Stammtafeln der Familie Kulenkampff, Bremen: Verlag B.C. Heye & Co 1959, Linie John Daniel Meier, J.D.M., pp. 47–50. On her mother's side Maria was a niece of the diplomat Johannes Kriege, and thereby a first cousin of the lawyer Walter Kriege and a remoter kinswoman of the early socialist Hermann Kriege. Much of her father's architectural work was undertaken as a result of his employment as a "Regierungs- und Baurat", a government appointment. The family lived a short distance to the west of Königsberg while his children were young, but in 1901 they relocated to Wiesbaden in connection with Richard Saran's work. They moved again, this time to Berlin, in 1906.

She embarked on a course in Medicine, studying at Berlin and Göttingen in 1918, and successfully completing the first stage (Physikum) of the course before abandoning it.{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fGXU6_Wqg60C&q=Maria+Saran+1897+Hodann+verheiratet&pg=PA702|title=Saran, Mary (Martha), geschiedene Maria Martha Hodann, Journalistin, Politikerin|page=702|work=Deutsche Biographische Enzyklopädie (2nd edition) Vol. 8 Poethen – Schlüter|author=Rudolf Vierhaus (Editor/compiler)|volume=8|date=2007|publisher=K.G.Sauer, München|isbn=978-3-11-094025-1}} She married a young doctor called Max Hodann on 24 December 1919, which was the day on which Hodann received his doctorate for a dissertation advocating counseling centres for sufferers from Venereal diseases, entitled "Die sozialhygienische Bedeutung der Beratungsstellen für Geschlechtskranke". The marriage would end in divorce on 13 July 1926,{{cite book|page=297|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HvflAgAAQBAJ&q=Maria+Saran+1897&pg=PA297|title=Max Hodann (1894–1946)|work=Personenlexikon der Sexualforschung|author1=Günter Grau|author2=Volkmar Sigusch (Volume co-editor)|date=2009|publisher=Campus Verlag, Frankfurt / New York|isbn=978-3-593-39049-9}} by which time the couple's daughter, Renate, had been born, and left-wing politics had replaced medicine as the other focus of Maria's life.{{cite web|url=http://www.friesian.com/saran.htm|title=Kay Herrmann in Conversation with Rene Saran|author1=Kay Herrmann (as interviewer)|author2=Rene Saran (as interviewee)|publisher=Kant-Friesian School (Kelley L. Ross, PhD (Administrator / Editor)|date=2008|accessdate=7 October 2015}}

As war gave way to searing austerity and a year of revolutions, Maria and Max Hodann became increasingly involved with the International Association for Socialist Struggle ("Internationaler Sozialistischer Kampfbund" / ISK ), which had been set up in 1918 by the charismatic Göttingen-based philosopher Leonard Nelson.{{cite web|url=http://www.friesian.com/nelson.htm|title=Leonard Nelson (1882–1927)|publisher=Kant-Friesian School (Kelley L. Ross, PhD (Administrator / Editor)|date=2008|accessdate=7 October 2015}} She also worked in adult education in Berlin and engaged in social work. She had also, in 1918, joined the Independent Social Democratic Party ("Unabhängige Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands" / USPD), which had been formed the previous year when the Social Democratic Party ("Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands" / SPD) had split, largely over the issue of whether or not to continue backing German participation in the war. During the early 1920s the USPD in its turn splintered, and Maria Hodann was one of many former "defectors" who was back in the SPD by the middle of the decade, while at the same time actively sustaining her work with the more cerebral and, many would have said, more uncompromisingly left-wing ISK. She was one of those who signed the ISK's Urgent Call for [political left-wing] Unity (against the imminent Nazi takeover in Germany) in 1932.{{cite book|pages= 91–93|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UnLoBgAAQBAJ&q=Dringender+Appell+f%C3%BCr+die+Einheit+ISK&pg=PA91|work=Entlassungsgrund: Pazifismus: Albrecht Götze, der Fall Gumbel und die Marburger Universität: 1930 bis 1946|title=Fascismus vor der Tür | publisher=Waxmann Verlag, Münster| author1=Harald Maier-Metz| date=2015|isbn=978-3-8309-3193-5}}L

During the early months of 1933, the Hitler government lost little time in creating a post-democratic German state. Emergency powers opened the way for attacks against, and mass arrests of, high-profile left-wing activists, Jews, and others identified by government as enemies. Maria Saran escaped with her twelve-year-old daughter Renate (Rene), initially to France and, for some months, Denmark.{{cite book|work=The book gives a brief account of Mary Saran's joint activities with Minna Specht in Denmark|author=Birgit S. Nielsen |title=Erziehung zum Selbstvertrauen. Ein sozialistischer Schulversuch im dänischen Exil 1933–1938| publisher=Peter Hammer Verlag, Wuppertal |date= 1985 |pages=45–52, 166f}} By the end of 1933 they had arrived as refugees in England, living in a "communal household" with fellow socialists.

In Britain{{cite book |author= Susanne Miller |author-link= Susanne Miller |title="So würde ich noch einmal leben". Erinnerungen, aufgezeichnet von Antje Dertinger |publisher=Dietz 2005, Bonn |pages= 71–87, 97}} she worked with in the Socialist Vanguard Group (SVG),{{cite web|title=Mary Saran|author=Thomas Tretzmüller|publisher=Institut für Geschichte der Universität Wien|date=4 January 2001|work=Sozialistische Europapläne während des 2. Weltkriegs am Beispiel des Internationalen Sozialistischen Kampf-Bundes und der Socialist Vanguard Group |url=http://www.univie.ac.at/igl.geschichte/ws1999-2000/se_beitraege_tretzmueller_fin.htm#Saran|accessdate=8 October 2015}} which was effectively the British branch of the ISK.{{cite web|url=http://bus.lsbu.ac.uk/resources/CIBS/european-institute-papers/papers2/498.PDF|title=The Labour Party and Europe during the 1940s: the strange case of the Socialist Vanguard Group.|author=Mark Minion|publisher=London South Bank University|accessdate=8 October 2015|archive-date=23 September 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150923195337/http://www.bus.lsbu.ac.uk/resources/CIBS/european-institute-papers/papers2/498.PDF|url-status=dead}} In 1941 she became editor of the group's monthly publication, retaining the editorship (latterly jointly with Rita Hinden) until 1955.{{cite web|url=http://dscalm.warwick.ac.uk/DServe/dserve.exe?dsqIni=Dserve.ini&dsqApp=Archive&dsqDb=Catalog&dsqCmd=Document.tcl&dsqItem=SOY.pdf|page=1|title=Records of'Socialist Vanguard', Socialist Commentary Publications Limited and Friends of 'Socialist Commentary' 1934–1981|accessdate=8 October 2015|publisher=Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick|archive-date=22 November 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151122215727/http://dscalm.warwick.ac.uk/DServe/dserve.exe?dsqIni=Dserve.ini&dsqApp=Archive&dsqDb=Catalog&dsqCmd=Document.tcl&dsqItem=SOY.pdf|url-status=dead}} During the 1930s she had obtained British citizenship, in 1935/36{{cite web|url=http://www.freebmd.org.uk/cgi/information.pl?cite=Vs2V0m5Nwt225Y6Di6Ukqw&scan=1|title=Index entry Maria Saran|accessdate=8 October 2015|work=FreeBMD|publisher=ONS}}{{cite web|url=http://www.freebmd.org.uk/cgi/information.pl?cite=39%2BPesm0Q%2Bi7a9cW51QgoA&scan=1|title=Index entry Allan D Flanders|accessdate=8 October 2015|work=FreeBMD|publisher=ONS}} briefly marrying a fellow socialist, Allan Flanders,{{cite book|work=Ethical Socialism and the Trade Unions: Allan Flanders and British Industrial Relations reform|author=John Kelly|title=Organization and Finances of the British section|publisher=Routledge, New York| date=2010| url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4H_FBQAAQBAJ&q=%22Mary+Saran%22+obituary&pg=PA1681|isbn=978-0-415-87848-7}} in support of her citizenship application.{{cite web|url=http://www.ajr.org.uk/index.cfm/section.journal/issue.Nov14/article=16012|title=Marriages of convenience as a survival strategy |publisher=Association of Jewish Refugees (AJR), Stanmore, England|author=Irene Messinger (adapted and translated from the German by Anthony Grenville)|date=November 2014|accessdate=8 October 2015}} War ended in defeat for the Nazi régime in May 1945. Many of the socialist refugees from Nazism, who had lived in England since the 1930s now returned to Germany, including Minna Specht with whom Saran had at times worked closely in London. Mary Saran stayed on in England, working as a freelance journalist, contributing particularly (but not exclusively) to socialist and women's publications. Till 1947 she was the editor for "Europe speaks" in succession to Willi Eichler who had also returned to Germany.{{cite web|url=http://library.fes.de/fulltext/isk/es-t-6.pdf|title= Germany To-Day: This article is based on a speech recently made in London by Willi Eichler, editor of the "Rheinische Zeitung", and executive member of the Social Democratic Party| work=International Publishing Co. 7 Carteret St. London, S.W.I |publisher=Bibliothek der Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung |date=20 August 1946|page=1|volume=6|accessdate=8 October 2015}} She also worked with the UNESCO, focusing on women's issues. She continued to play an active part in British Labour Party politics and in adult education. From 1974 she taught in a London school. Her memoir appeared in 1976 under the title "Never give up".{{cite book|isbn=978-0-85496-257-0|title=Never give up|author=Mary Sarandate=1976|year=1976|publisher=Oswald Wolff, London|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/nevergiveupmemoi0000sara}} 1976 was also the year in which she died. Her English language memoir was translated by her friend, the historian Susanne Miller, and published privately in Germany under the title "Gib niemals auf. Erinnerungen" in 1979.{{cite book|title=Gib niemals auf. Erinnerungen|author1=Mary Saran (author)|author2=Susanne Miller (Uebersetzung)|date=1979|publisher=S. Eichler, Selbstverlag, Bonn}}

• 1976 Never give up. Memoirs. Preface: W. Arthur Lewis. Oswald Wolff Ltd., London (German translation by Susanne Miller: Gib niemals auf. Erinnerungen. Privately printed, Bonn 1979)
• 1975 For Community Service. The Mount Carmel Experiment. Blackwell Publishers, {{ISBN|0-631-15630-5}}
• 1945 with Willi Eichler & Werner Hansen: Re-Making Germany. Foreword: James Griffiths. International Publishing Company, SVG, London
• 1942 The Future Europe. Peace or Power Politics? London
• 1941 European Revolution: How to Win the Peace. London

• {{Interlanguage link multi|Philosophisch-Politische Akademie|de}}
• Socialist Vanguard Group

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Category:1897 births

Category:1976 deaths

Category:People from Zelenogradsk

Category:Writers from East Prussia

Category:Independent Social Democratic Party politicians

Category:Social Democratic Party of Germany politicians

Category:German opinion journalists

Category:Emigrants from Nazi Germany to the United Kingdom

Category:Naturalised citizens of the United Kingdom