Early life
Singer was born in 1926 in Warsaw, in his parents' home. His father, Bernard Singer, was to become a well-known journalist,
but was impoverished at the time of Daniel's birth. His mother, Esther Singer, was a teacher, and the child of wealthy Jewish parents. Esther, a Marxist, interested both Daniel and a young Isaac Deutscher in left-wing politics, and specifically the ideas of Marx and Rosa Luxemburg. As Daniel aged, his father became more financially successful, and the family was able to move out of the ghetto. Esther quit her job, and Daniel attended a school where he was the only Jew in his class.
Education and escape from Holocaust
In 1939, when Nazi Germany invaded Poland, Daniel and his sister and mother were staying in southern France. They went to Paris in an attempt to book passage to Varsovie, but could not. Instead, after the occupation of Paris by the Germans Daniel and his mother and sister lefy Parid . They went first to Anger where Daniel went to the Lycée david d'Anger; then to Toulouse (Lyce Lakanal) and after to Marseille (Lycée Thiers). In the beginning of August 1942 the French police came to arrest them; his sister jump through the window (second floor),broke her leg and was send to the hospital; Daniel was away in the country side with some school friends and learn about his siter coming back home. With the help of the resistance first Daniel, and then his mother and sister, escaped to Switzerland. Bernard Singer, meanwhile, was arrested by the Soviet Union, which had occupied eastern Poland under the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. Bernard was send to the goulag for two years and release when the USSR entered the war before being allowed to leave for London.
During the middle of the Second World War, Daniel studied philosophy in Geneva. In 1944, he and the remainder of his family joined his father in London, where Daniel obtained his bachelor's degree in economics from the University of London.
Journalistic career and marriage
Singer began working for
The Economist in 1948, with assistance from his old friend Isaac Deutscher, and for the
New Statesman in 1949. His work focused on Poland, France, Eastern Europe, and the Soviet Union. He remained on staff with
The Economist for 19 years. In this period, he also provided radio and television commentary for the BBC and the Canadian CBC.
In 1956, Singer married Jeanne Kérel, a French doctoral student in economics in the University of Paris; with a British Council scholarship she spend a year in London in 1952-1953 at the London School of Economics. After their wedding they lived during two years separated. Daniel moved to Paris in Mai 1958 when he was send as
"The Economist correspondent moved to Paris,'.
Singer spent the rest of his life living in Paris, reporting first for
The Economist, and then, after 1970, for
The Nation, and became in 1980 the magazine's European correspondent. He wrote critically of Charles De Gaulle, François Mitterrand, and the French Communist Party, but was enthusiastic about the events of May 1968.
Death
Singer died in 2000 of a lung cancer. He requested that the announcement of his death be accompanied by a quotation from Rosa Luxemburg, still his political icon, shortly before her execution:
Your order is built on sand. Tomorrow, the revolution will raise its head again, Proclaiming to your horror amidst a blaze of trumpets, "I was, I am, I always shall be."
The
Daniel Singer Millennium Prize Foundation was established in Singer's name after his death. It offers an annual $2,500 prize for an essay in Singer's spirit. The Daniel Singer Millennium Prize Foundation