Hugo Marcus (1880–1966) was a man of many names and identities. Born a German Jew, he converted to Islam and took the name Hamid, becoming one of the most prominent Muslims in Germany prior to World War II. Renamed Israel by the Nazis, he was sent to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp before escaping to Switzerland. In exile, he fought for homosexual rights and wrote queer fiction under the pen name Hans Alienus. 

In his new book “German, Jew, Muslim, Gay,” Marc David Baer tells the story of a highly unconventional man and reveals new aspects of the interconnected histories of Jewish and Muslim individuals and communities, including Muslim responses to Nazism and Muslim experiences of the Holocaust. 

Marc David Baer is professor of international history at the London School of Economics and Political Science and the author of several books, including “The Dönme: Jewish Converts, Muslim Revolutionaries, and Secular Turks” and “Sultanic Saviors and Tolerant Turks: Writing Ottoman Jewish History, Denying the Armenian Genocide.”

Registration is required. More information is forthcoming.

Sponsor: Co-sponsored by Middle East Studies with support from Thurgood Marshall College