OTTO AND DARIA

A poignant memoir of lives cleaved by war, OTTO AND DARIA is the first-hand account of Eric Koch, a man who once was called Otto. As a Jewish refugee from WWII Germany, Otto first left his country for England, and later arrived in Canada, where he was for a time imprisoned in a camp. The counterpoint to Otto's recollections are the letters from his long-distance love interest, Daria Hambourg, a London girl of bohemian temperament, unusual literary talents and a distinguished, but restrictive, family background. These parallel writings tell the story of two young people caught in the grip of history, and together show what you have to give up in order to move forward.

Eric Koch was born in Frankfurt in 1919, around the corner from the Frankfurter Hof. He is the author of thirteen books of fiction and five books of non-fiction. He spent thirty-five years in the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation as producer and executive, and eighteen years as contract professor in the Social Science Division of York University in Toronto.