Graf was born in
Berg in the
Kingdom of Bavaria, situated in the picturesque landscape around
Lake Starnberg near
Munich. He was the ninth child of baker Max Graf and his wife Therese (née Heimrath), a farmer's daughter. From 1900 onwards he went to the state school in Aufkirchen, in the municipality of Berg. After his father died in 1906, he learned the baker's trade and worked for his brother Max, who had taken over their father's bakery. In 1911, hoping to earn a living as a poet, he fled to Munich to escape his brother who treated him badly, sometimes resorting to violence towards his family members. He joined
bohemian circles and took odd jobs like mail sorting and operating an elevator. In 1912 and 1913, he traveled to
Ticino and
northern Italy. On 1 December 1914, he was drafted into Imperial German Army service. A year later, he published his first story, in the magazine
Die Freie Straße ["Free street"]. In 1916, Graf was nearly court-martialed for refusing a command given by a superior officer. However, after a ten-day
hunger strike, he was sent to a
psychiatric hospital and was later discharged from the military. On 26 May 1917, Graf married Karoline Bretting. A year later, their daughter Annemarie (13 June 1918 – 2008), nicknamed Annamirl, was born. Earlier that year, Graf had gotten arrested for participating in a munitions workers' strike. Around the same time, he also met the woman who would later become his second wife, Mirjam Sachs, the sister of
Manfred George and a cousin of
Nelly Sachs. In 1919, Graf was arrested again for participating in
revolutionary movements in Munich. In 1920, he was active as a
dramaturg at the working-class theater
Die neue Bühne ("The new stage"), until he achieved literary fame in 1927 with his memoir
Wir sind Gefangene (
Prisoners All), which allowed him to make a living as a freelance writer. The book was retranslated into English, and republished with the title
We Are Prisoners in 2020. On 17 February 1933, he traveled to
Vienna to give a lecture, a trip that marked the beginning of his voluntary
exile from Germany. Graf's books were not included in the
Nazi book burning; at the time, most of them were actually approved by the Nazis as recommended reading. In response, Graf published an appeal that subsequently became famous,
Verbrennt mich! ["Burn me!"] in Vienna's
Arbeiterzeitung. == Works==