Carl Djerassi

Recently there has been much discussion about the awarding of an honorary doctorate to Carl Djerassi by the TU Dortmund, Germany. Carl Djerassi was awarded the honorary doctorate by the TU Dortmund, Germany last Thursday April 23rd because of his literary works and not because of his worldwide success as chemist. It was Carl Djerassis’s 21st award to honor his works, but he was awarded for the very first time ever because of his literary works and he was awarded for the first time by a German university.
Actually, Carl Djerassi, a chemist, novelist and Professor of chemistry at the Stanford University, USA is best known as the father of the so-called Pill, thus as the inventor of the first oral contraceptive pill. The also called birth-control pill made and still makes it possible for many heterosexual couples and other heterosexual people to have sex without getting pregnant, therefore to decide when and with whom a woman wants to have a baby. The development of “the Pill” was a major breakthrough the scholarship and the whole world, especially the “women’s world” experienced in the mid of the past 20th century. “The Pill” and therefore Carl Djerassi allow women great latitude and for sure the men do benefit as well.
A great latitude Carl Djerassi himself really had to fight for to resume his own liberty. Born in Vienna, Austria in 1923 he was forced to flee from Austria in 1938 because of his Jewish background. When Austria became part of “Nazi Germany” it was to dangerous for Carl Djerassi and his Jewish mother to stay in Austria and they decided to escape to Sofia, Bulgaria where they already used to live until Carl was five years old when his parents broke up. Carl’s father was a Bulgarian Jew and he still lived in Sofia when he decided to remarry Carl’s mother in order to protect Carl Djerassi and her against Nazi Germany and against its leader Adolf Hitler. Later on Carl Djerassi went to the American College of Sofia where he attained fluency in English. In 1939 Carl Djerassi and his mother emigrated to the United States of America where Carl made his career and became one of the most important, maybe “the most important” chemist worldwide.
Last Thursday evening I attended the awarding of the honorary doctorate to Carl Djerassi by the TU Dortmund, Germany and I found it very interesting that Professor Grünzweig among other things called Carl Djerassi a “Kulturtourist” or a “Kosmopolit”. Indeed, it is interesting and difficult to say to which culture or nation Carl Djerassi exactly belongs. He is born in Austria, half Bulgarian and spent almost all his life in the United States. He also was awarded by so many different institutions and universities of so many different countries all around the world what makes him a so-called “cosmopolitan” and what makes it nearly impossible to say to which culture Djerassi now belongs or to which culture he feels he belongs to. How does Carl Djerassi define cultural identity for himself as a “Kulturtourist”? Is it for example like Stuart Hall defines cultural identity, thus a shared culture, but one true self besides others?
All this above mentioned facts and Carl Djerassis’s “second string to his bow” as a novelist and playwright make Carl Djerassi so interesting and impressive and it makes me think about cultural identity and cross-cultural literature more than ever before.

www.djerassi.com
www.tu-dortmund.de