"I will, I hope..." The Diaries of Elisabeth Block and Anne Frank - for Schools

"I will, I hope..." - The Diaries of Elisabeth Block and Anne Frank

A devised theatre piece based on the diaries of Anne Frank and Elisabeth Block

Classroom theatre for ages 14 and up

Running time: approx. 60 minutes (with post-show discussion approx. 90 minutes)

About the piece:
Who am I? And above all: who do I want to be? What place do I want to take in society? These big questions keep coming back - every teenager knows them.

But what if that place is suddenly denied? What if discriminatory parties have planted their agenda so deeply in people's minds that exclusion becomes lethal?

"I will, I hope, be able to confide everything to you...", are the first words Anne Frank writes on 12 June 1942 in her diary in Nazi-occupied Amsterdam. Three months earlier and 800 km away, 19-year-old Elisabeth Block from Rosenheim writes in her diary about the birth of her friend's child. It would be her last entry. The Block family, also Jewish, was deported and most likely murdered in a camp in Poland.

Between Elisabeth Block's last entry and Anne Frank's first, there are not only 96 days but two entirely different lives and circumstances. They were very different young women, yet they suffered the same tragic fate. Because of their membership in a group, they were discriminated against, excluded, tormented, and murdered.

Despite everything, they share a remarkable strength: a will to live that is without equal, and whose radiance is as fascinating as it is moving. With hearts full of hope, they keep turning their gaze to the beautiful things in life. Picking buttercups. Baking biscuits. Reading. Writing. Letting their hair fly in the wind.

How can students connect with the events of the Nazi era? How do we make that time comprehensible to ourselves, so that we can draw lessons from it for today?