Klein, H. Arthur, collector.

Biographical Note

Herbert Arthur Klein, a journalist and author, and his wife, Mina Cooper Klein, had a life-long fascination with the works of B. Traven. For over fifty years, the Kleins collected many different kinds of material on Traven. They also translated and edited a collection of short stories by Traven, The Kidnapped Saint (Lawrence Hill, 1974).

Herbert Klein was born around 1907 in New York City. He received his A.B. from Stanford University and his M.A. from Occidental College. In addition, Klein pursued graduate studies at Columbia University, UCLA, Berkeley, and the Berlin Handelshochschule.

Klein began his career as a newspaperman, moving in 1930 to the Berlin office of the Chicago Tribune. Shortly thereafter he married. A couple of years later, he taught English at the Marxistische Arbeiter Schule in Berlin. Here one of his students first introduced him to the work of B. Traven, who was an especially popular author among German workers. The Kleins left Germany in 1933.

After returning to the U.S., Klein corresponded with Traven from 1933 to 1935 (about a dozen letters altogether). Mina Klein also wrote Traven a few times and was answered by a Señor Martinez, whom she strongly suspected was Traven. Although the Kleins never met Traven, after his death they did visit his widow, Rosa Elena Luján.

The Kleins lived most of their lives in Malibu, California, where the air was better for Herbert Klein's health. Mina Klein died in 1979, and Herbert Klein died about ten years later.

Klein's professional name was H. Arthur Klein. He and his wife wrote, edited, or translated over twenty books. Some of these were popular science and art books, such as The World of Measurements (1974), Peter Bruegel the Elder, Artist of Abundance (1968), and Käthe Kollwitz; Life in Art (1972). The Kleins also translated works by Wilhelm Busch from German into English. Although this collection contains several plans for a study of Traven, only The Kidnapped Saint was ever completed.

From the guide to the B. Traven Collection, 1917-1989, (Stanford University. Libraries. Dept. of Special Collections and University Archives.)