little is known about the people involved in the workers' resistance under National Socialism or the "resistance from below". Otto and Elise Hampel are an exception.

there are Gestapo and Nazi justice files on Otto and Elise Hampel's resistance activities as well as their literary treatment by Hans Fallada in his novel Jeder stirbt für sich allein (Everyone Dies Alone), published posthumously in 1947.

Christian Winterstein, board member of the Hans Fallada Society, and Wilhelm Holthus will read excerpts from the Nazi justice files on the Hampel case and passages from Fallada's novel.

The dialogical principle of juxtaposing the historical documents with the passages from the novel creates an informative and exciting approach to the case.

Both approaches complement each other: where the files provide no or only very sparse information, Fallada fills in the gaps with his own literary means. In doing so, he succeeds very convincingly in drawing a moral picture of society at the time of National Socialism. There are both similarities and differences between the historically proven facts and the literary treatment.

In view of the current increase in nationalist and right-wing extremist tendencies in German society, the examination of the "Hampel case" also raises the question of what encouragement their resistance activities can provide for us today.

Meeting point

At the memorial stele "Elise and Otto Hampel", Müllerstraße 147. Afterwards we will walk together to the nearby Schiller Library.

Registration is not required.

Free of charge.

The reading is organized by the Mitte-Museum in cooperation with the Schiller Library.

Translated with DeepL