Der Vorleser

In the organizer's words:

The work is about guilt and atonement, the silence of a generation and the question of how to deal with the crimes of one's ancestors.

Shortly after the end of the war, as a 15-year-old schoolboy, Michael meets the much older streetcar conductor Hanna. She becomes his first lover, full of affection and tenderness, but also brusque, irritable and tyrannical. Hanna also seems to enjoy literature more than sex and demands that Michael reads to her. What he doesn't know is that Hanna is desperately guarding a secret. One day she disappears without a trace. He only sees her again years later.

Bernhard Schlink's novel has been translated into more than 50 languages and has become an international bestseller. He sensitively and precisely examines the relationship between love and guilt against the backdrop of German Nazi crimes and approaches the events through the process of remembering - searching, questioning and aware of how much our past determines our present.

Altona Theater
Director: Kai Hufnagel
With: Johan Richter, Anjorka Stechel and many others.