Review: A conversation with Ian Rank-Broadley, frss

My father-in-law was a Jew in Vienna, and he made a very courageous and successful attempt to escape.Just getting out before the Nazis came in, he took a train to Switzerland, and at a prearranged signal, threw himself off the moving train to make sure that he ended up in Swiss territory.In doing so, he broke both legs.Most of us would consider that very unsuccessful.But for him, it was the best thing that could have happened because the Swiss authorities were obliged to put him in hospital.And that saved him.While he was in hospital in the 1930s, he wrote to Michael Marks -later the Marks of Marks and Spencer -and explained his plight and that he needed somebody to sponsor him so that he could leave Switzerland and come to England.Marks agreed.A Jew himself, he had that natural empathy.Obviously, this country took a great many Jews, but even so there are very many who didn't manage to get out, and with that there's great shame.This country benefited enormously -Freud came here; Isaiah Berlin came here. 2These Jewish refugees immeasurably uplifted England's cultural and scientific life.My father-in-law's sister tried the same tactic a little while later: she jumped from the train at the pre-arranged spot, but didn't break her legs.She was sent back and, along with his mother, was sent to Mauthausen and perished.My wife is Jewish, and my children would be seen as Jewish by Israel even though I'm not Jewish.But I felt that great empathy for the dilemmas of a people who just had to get out and had nowhere to go.And for me, I tried to imagine, in very real terms, what that meant, and how I could put that into a statue.I didn't want Licoricia to be in any way sentimental or maudlin or even romantic.I saw, looking at my own daughter, who's quite statuesque, a very strong, independent woman who was capable of actually conducting international banking affairs.She really captured my imagination.MAK: Now I feel like I wasn't imagining that Licoricia was clutching Asher's hand and that she had a look of worry or fear in her eyes. IR-B: I always imagine: what if that were my daughter, with a dilemma that Licoricia was faced with, what would it mean?Licoricia must have had such a strong will because even though she was protected as part of the king's estate, she was still vulnerable to all sorts of prejudice and bad actions that other Jewish members of the population had to endure. MAK:When I look at Licoricia, I put myself in the space she occupies.