Tag: Alan Isler

Bamberg

Continuing with the exploration of my father’s Kodachrome slides from the 1950s (see the original post here), we turn to Germany. Most of the upcoming images were taken in Bamberg, the town where my father was billeted in an apartment with my mother. They were there from approximately the summer of 1955 to the summer of 1956 with trips to England, Switzerland and around Germany in between.

We’ll start with a trio of images, I think all taken in the same spot, some kind of stone balcony overlooking the town, (perhaps at the Rose Garden?) with one portrait each of my mother, my father and my father with an army buddy my mother identified as Chet, “who came at the weekends and never left.”

Mom at Bamberg
Dad at Bamberg
Dad and Chet overlooking Bamberg

The bottom shot was a kind of monochrome greeny-yellow. I tried adding some warmth to it, not very successfully and made the sky bluish to add a little interest (winds up looking like one of those hand-tinted B&Ws). Needless to say, while I’ve been calling these “my fathers slides,” and it’s possible he set the camera up on a tripod, I think it unlikely he took at least 2 of these.

Happy Birthday, Dad

Author and professor, Alan Isler, died March 29, 2010 after a long illness. Born in London on September 12th, 1934, Alan Isler emigrated to the United States at the age of 18. He served in the US Army from 1954 to 1956. He received his doctorate in English Literature from Columbia University and taught Renaissance literature at Queens College, CUNY, from 1967 to 1995. His first novel, The Prince of West End Avenue, won the National Jewish Book Award in 1994 and was nominated as a finalist in fiction by the National Book Critics Circle. In England in 1995, it won the Jewish Quarterly-Wingate Literary Prize and was a finalist for the Writers’ Guild award. He is also the author of: Kraven Images (1996), The Bacon Fancier, also published as Op. Non. Cit. (1999), Clerical Errors (2002) and The Living Proof (2005). His work, noted for its wit and literary erudition, has been translated into more than twelve languages.

Alan Isler, late 1970s

In Memoriam

 

ALAN DAVID ISLER

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Alan D. Isler, author and professor, died March 29, 2010 after a long illness. Born in London in 1934, Alan Isler emigrated to the United States at the age of 18. He served in the US Army from 1954 to 1956. He received his doctorate in English Literature from Columbia University and taught Renaissance literature at Queens College, CUNY, from 1967 to 1995. His first novel, The Prince of West End Avenue, won the National Jewish Book Award in 1994 and was nominated as a finalist in fiction by the National Book Critics Circle. In England in 1995, it won the Jewish Quarterly-Wingate Literary Prize and was a finalist for the Writers’ Guild award. He is also the author of: Kraven Images (1996), The Bacon Fancier, also published as Op. Non. Cit. (1999), Clerical Errors (2002) and The Living Proof (2005). His work, noted for its wit and literary erudition, has been translated into more than twelve languages. He is survived by his wife, Dr. Ellen Isler, president and CEO of JBI International, the Jewish Braille Institute; his sisters, Fay Ruback, Dolly Gillin of Los Angeles and Ella Molin; four children, Adam, Eric, Joshua and Claudia; two stepsons, Adam and Ethan Gahtan; and eleven grandchildren. Donations in his memory may be sent to JBI International, 110 East 30th Street, New York, NY 10016.