Dancing Out of Bounds: Valeska Gert in Berlin and New York

Abstract

Born Gertrud Valesca Samosch into a German Jewish family on January 11, 1892, in Berlin, Valeska Gert enjoyed many of the advantages associated with typical German upper-middle-class bourgeois households. Her father, Theodor Samosch, managed Zade und Falk, a store that manufactured hat accessories. Gertrud’s mother, Augusta, enrolled her in ballet and Grazie classes when she was seven. Uninspired by academics, Gert dropped out of school. When her father lost his fortune through a poor investment at the beginning of the First World War, Gert worked in a shoe store, as a nanny, as a nurse’s assistant, and satirical writer for the Berlin fashion magazine Die Elegante Welt (The Elegant World) to help support the family.

Und weil ich den Bürger nicht liebte, tanzte ich die von ihm Verachteten, Dirnen, Kupplerinnen, Ausgeglitschte und Herabgekommene.

[Because I despised the burgher, I danced all of the people that the upright citizen despised: whores, pimps, depraved souls—the ones who slipped through the cracks.]

Valeska Gert, Mein Weg (48)