Parallelwelten - Hamburg unterm Hakenkreuz - 4 Zeitzeugenberichte

In the organizer's words:

"Hamburg unterm Hakenkreuz" tells of the experiences of four people who witnessed the events in and around Hamburg as children, teenagers and young adults during the Nazi era. One part of the stories consists of an almost banal everyday life, which makes the other linguistically created images of hunger, coercion and violence all the more painful to experience. But there is also room for childlike tension and even humor. A portrait is created that captures the mood of the time, but also makes the parallel worlds that existed at the same time visible.

The play is based on interviews with contemporary witnesses and archive material. The material and the interviews have hardly been changed in their wording and thus reflect the concrete childish or youthful perspective on the events of the time.

The testimonies are supplemented with other dimensions, including lyrical elements by Kurt Tucholsky, who lived in exile during the Nazi era, the poet Gertrud Kolmar, who was murdered in Auschwitz, and the persecuted Jew Selma Meerbaum-Eisinger, whose poems, alongside those of Paul Celan, are now part of the literary heritage of the German-Jewish culture of Bukovina, which was wiped out by the Germans. Images, sound and two narrators link the linguistically narrated lives of the contemporary witnesses into a whole and at the same time offer a 'breather' from the sometimes drastic descriptions.

The staged reading pursues the intention of reproducing the experiences of the contemporary witnesses: No more, but also no less; to show the story - however different it may be - as it was experienced. They are preserved without moralizing or even glorifying the time depicted.

This production is suitable for anyone who is interested in the "little" history of Hamburg, but also for school classes, so that pupils can experience what it was like to be a child at that time and at the same time get to know a part of our - and their - history.

Drawings by Else courtesy of Brother Lukas Ruegenberg, Benedictine Abbey Maria Laach.
Texts by Else with the kind permission of Else Baker.

Price information:

15 € normal price 12 € reduced price for pensioners, the disabled, unemployed etc. (on presentation of appropriate ID), for groups of 10 or more and for children's theater. 9 € schoolchildren and students