Charley Berg to Frida Semler Seabury
20 July 1936
[Translated from German]

[Letterhead:]
CHARLEY BERG
EXPORT – COMMISSION – IMPORT
VI., Liniengasse 4, Vienna (Austria)
Representing in Austria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Yugoslavia: S. H. Kress & Co., New York
Prague branch: Erich Berg, Praha XII, Korunni tr. 2287
Cables: Ceberg Vienna. Bankers: Österr. Credit-Anstalt — Wiener Bankverein, Vienna.

Vienna, 20 July 1936.

Mrs. Mortimer Seabury,
Hotel Continental,
Munich.

Dear Madam,

Only just now have I learned, through your father, that you are in Munich, and I am today sending you the letters from my dear brother Alban that you so kindly lent me at the time.

These letters, so I am told — and as Dr. Willi Reich, the editor and author of the biography of Alban, informs me — do contain various matters of interest.

Once the biography is finished, which will be the case in late autumn, I will take the liberty of making you a gift of one copy. May I ask you to let me know to where I should send it?

I confess that I still have not gotten over the pain of the loss of my brother. It is, after all, continually reawakened by performances [of his works] and by memories of him.

I hope that you, dear Frau Frieda, are thoroughly enjoying life here, at the side of your wonderful, quite unique father, and I remain, with best regards — unknown though I am to him — to your husband, and with kisses to your hand,

Your wholly devoted
Charley Berg

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Translator's notes:
- "Herr Dr. Willi Reich" refers to the musicologist Willi Reich, who edited and largely wrote the first substantial biography of Alban Berg (Alban Berg: Mit Bergs eigenen Schriften und Beiträgen von Theodor Wiesengrund-Adorno und Ernst Krenek), published in Vienna in 1937 — consistent with Charley's expectation here that it would be ready "in late autumn" (1936).
- The Prague branch address on the letterhead, under the name "Erich Berg," suggests a relative (possibly a cousin or nephew) served as the firm's representative in Czechoslovakia; this is the first appearance of a Prague office in the correspondence seen so far.
- "Present" in the German text is a period loanword from French/English (common in Austrian usage) meaning "gift," rendered here simply as "gift."

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Translated by Claude Sonnet 5 on June 30, 2026
https://claude.ai/share/b3dba9da-1c07-4cae-b1d6-1894894e9dda