Karl KÃ nig: My Task: Autobiography and Biographies (Karl KÃ nig Archive, 1)

The story of Karl Konig's remarkable life and work.

Karl König: My Task is an inspiring introduction to König's remarkable life and work. This book combines König's autobiographical fragment and an essay by Peter Selg with two selected reminiscences written by König's colleagues Anke Weihs and Hans-Heinrich Engel.

Born in 1902 into a Jewish family, Karl König grew up in Vienna in the last years of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. He studied medicine and during this time came across the work of Rudolf Steiner. Soon after graduating he worked with Ita Wegman in Switzerland, where he also met his wife, Tilla.

He was a pioneer in the early days of Pilgramshain, a home for children with special needs in Silesia, Germany. However, in 1936 under political pressure he left Germany for Austria. Here he had a large medical practice as well as being the focus of a group of young people interested in Steiner's work.

Following the annexation of Austria by the Nazis, König and many of the young people around him came to Britain as refugees. The ideal of working together as a community was put into practice with the founding of Camphill in 1939. König was the driving force behind the expansion of the Camphill movement across the British Isles, into Europe, South Africa and North America. He died in 1966.

Karl König (1902-66) was a physician, author and lecturer. He began his work at the Institute of Embryology at the University of Vienna. In 1940 he founded the Camphill Movement in Scotland. Based on the educational ideas of Rudolf Steiner, the special education schools for children and villages for adults with special needs are now established all over Britain and Europe, North America and Southern Africa.

Peter Selg was born in Stuttgart in 1963. He studied medicine in Zurich and Berlin. Until 2000 he worked as the head physician of the child and juvenile psychiatry department of Herdecke hospital in Germany. He now works as a youth psychiatrist at the Ita Wegman Clinic in Arlesheim, Switzerland, lectures extensively and is the author of numerous books. He is married with three children.