Arthur R. G. Solmssen (1928-2018) was born in New York City to Marguerite and Kurt Solmssen, both members of prominent German banking families. Just two months later, the Solmssens took their new baby home to Germany and remained there until he was eight years old, at which point a reverse migration became urgent. Hitler had risen to power, and Kurt, whose father was at one point chairman of Deutsche Bank, had a Jewish background.
Young Arthur quickly learned English and at Harvard reviewed films for the Crimson. He took time out for Army service at the end of the Second World War, finally graduating in 1950. After law school at the University of Pennsylvania, he joined what was then Saul, Ewing, Remick & Saul, one of the city’s leading law firms.
Despite his demanding career as a securities lawyer, to say nothing of fatherhood, he found time to write novels, book reviews and a history of his colorful and accomplished family. “I don’t play golf, tennis or squash,” he told the New York Times in 1982, “and I don’t play bridge or mow the lawn.”
Arthur Solmssen’s literary gifts, psychological acuity and erudition were on display in all of his books, but his novelistic skills were at or near their peak in The Comfort Letter. He died in 2018.
Books by Arthur R. G. Solmssen
